We have arrived in Thailand!
We've been told that some of the blog's have been a little too educational so we will go back to tales of drinking and sight seeing!
After one of the worst bus trips ever in my whole life (due to some pilock who needed to tell everyone about his life and how many times he has been to Thailand and if there was anything anyone needed to know he would have the answer!)
When we got to the border on the Laos side there are 2 windows ie 2 queues, oh but no there is the secret I live here so I can push in front of you English people queue!
Eventually we got our stamp and then in a little boat to cross the water to the Thai border, here we had a medical on the bank of the river for Swine Flu.
The Thailand passport control only gave us 15 days on our visa, this really pissed us off as when we did the trip plan it was still 1 month on a land border. So now we don't have enough time to explore the country.
After passport control we were taken to a hotel were we had to wait another couple of hours before we are taken to Chiang Mai. We arrived in Chang Mai in the afternoon and were dropped of the old main gate of the city. This is a nice enough area to stay and we walked around trying to find a hostel or hotel. Its a bit more expensive here so we stayed in a cheaper hotel/hostel with no air-conditioning. A bit of a mistake but hey we are on budget. We checked into our room and had a quick snooze and shower. By now we have been travelling for 2 days getting to Chang Mai.
Feeling a bit better later that evening we went out to walk around town and explore our surroundings, we found the night market and of course Pizza Hut. A proper meal at last and also more important lunch for tomorrow with the leftovers!
After dinner we walked around the market some more and then went to bed.
The next morning we had a nice breakfast at a little shop close to our hotel, it has a really nice courtyard in the back and a very rustic look.
We walked down the main street to the tourist office to see if we can get our visas extended, they were closed so we walked along the river walking through a few temples and smaller wats on the way we found ourselves at the flower market. Amazing that they sell so many flowers and it all looks so nice, A lot of the flowers are also kept on ice. We think these flowers are more for the temples then anything else. The town itself again is very busy. We walked though some small roads with loads of little shops and found ourselves in a small coffee shop in a clothes shop on the ground floor with an art gallery and coffee shop on the second level looking out over the street. I had a coffee and Christina a Coke. Funny enough I cant walk past a coffee shop curing the day without going in. Might be addicted to coffee. When we were done we walked back to the tourist info centre. There the woman told us that she cant do anything but we can go to a visa/passport office on the other side of town. There they might be able to help. By now it was a bit to late to go there so we just walked around town. That night we went to the undercover market. The market is amazing with all the tourist stuff and of the course the food. Our first experience of Pad Thai. Delicious. We sat at a local food market and we were not sure what to get so we got Pad Thai. The food was very cheap and we also ordered some Thai beer that was also very nice. After dinner we watched a local Thai dance performance that was very good and we got some photo's too. Our camera is still making spots on the lens in night shots and we cant get the lens on the inside clean. During the day the camera takes nice photo's but at night the flash reflects on the particals on the lens and it makes spots on the photo's and its really pissing me off.

The next day early we got a tuk-tuk to the passport office. The driver waited for us there. We got the papers and had a look at the details. We only then found out that they can give us 2 weeks extra and nothing more for £80 each. b******s. This has ruined part of our plan. So we decided it was cheaper to fly out and back to Phuket to get a month on the visa. Very pissed of again we decided to have a look around the old town. We hired the tuk-tuk driver for a couple of hours and he showed us around town and all the temples. Very cool. This put us in a better mood. There are loads of very nice temples and you can even do a monk chat. You can go and talk to them and ask them questions etc.
On the way to Wat Phra Singh we where ordered of the street by a very scary looking police man into the police station, the road was cleared and a fleet of cop cars drove up followed by armoured trucks and a 4x4 porsche. We asked the police man what was happening and he was very friendly and after asking all his friends who could speak English they told us that Princess of Thailand was going to pray.
We asked where but he said he couldn't tell us but they pointed to the wat at the end of the road so as soon as we where allowed to leave we discreetly jogged to the wat. :)
There was a lot of police presence in the wat but they are not allowed to close it off, so we walked around looking for the armed police, they again where really friendly telling us which part of the temple she was in and where we could stand and when she came out we HAD to bow to her and we could not take any photos. I don't know what her name is but she is about 15 maybe 16 and definitely does not dress like a Thai! The monks and the Thai people where very excited to see her. There where a few people who refused to bow to her obviously Europeans – shame really if you go to a different country you should really respect there culture.
Anyway back to the Wat, it was really beautiful and shiny! You have to take your shoes off and your shoulders have to be covered at all times and in some ladies can't wear shorts, but the temperature is 30'C + so you have to carry a change of clothes. But you can also borrow some at the temples the monks hand them out.
One of the most interesting one's was Wat Chedi Luang, which is where they have the monk chat – I really wanted to ask them where they get there money from because I saw one buying an Ipod (but I wasn't sure if that was an appropriate question??)
At the end of the day we went to the train station to buy our tickets to go to Bangkok.
The next day we got a sleeper train to Bangkok, these trains are not the same as the ones we had on the Russia to China trip. These trains are all open with just a little curtain covering you from everybody else, so you hear everything from the 100 crying babies to the 100 snoring old men to the 100 moaning old women!! You have to wait for the conductor to come and fold the bed down and make it up. Then you can get in and sleep. Its not the most comfortable and its very hot and stuffy if you have gone for the cheap beds.
The next morning at 6am we arrived in Bangkok.

(Only Bangkok, Phuket, Ko Tao and South Africa to add before we are up to date!)