Chiang Mai:

On Saturday 23rd we travelled from Bangkok to Chiang Mai on a very comfortable overnight train. After arriving on the 24th we checked into a nice guesthouse and took a tuk tuk to Tiger Kingdom. The tigers looked really sedated and drugged up, they were all lying about on the floor looking like they were dead and it was really sad. We felt bad being typical tourists taking lots of photos, however, this did not stop us paying to have our photos taken on our own with the biggest tiger. He was a bit more lively and scared the hell out of us. We drove back and found a really nice Mexican place for dinner. We all had amazing burritos and Lisa almost died eating a chilli. Typically of us we had arrived on Sunday which meant more major shopping and money spending at the huge Chiang Mai Sunday markets.

We were feeling wild so bought ourselves a Smirnoff ice to drink whilst we got glammed up. After much searchin we found Zoe in Yellow bar where we all bought our first ever Samsong bucket which got us hammered. The bar was getting busier and busier but absolutely full of Thai people. The police came and shut it down at midnight so we found some guys and fitted 8 in a tuk tuk all the way to spicy club. We were loving life in spicy club until a load of Thai national anthems came on and it shut. Then everyone told us there was a secret club called lucky which was open until late so we all made our way there. We were all really drunk and it was really weird...it a seedy dark men's club with lady boys and strange people. We decided to all it a night. After much debate about which way to go, and getting lost several times, we finally made it back to our guesthouse.

The day we were booked in for an evening Thai cooking course. We got driven to the Thai cooking school and they started off my showing us around their natural gardens and all the herbs and spices they use. Then they took us to a Thai market to get the rest of the ingredients. We started off cooking pad Thai which was followed by making our own spring rolls. Ellie volunteered to be masterchef. Then we made massaman curry. All the food tasted was amazing and we are now professional Thai cooks. The girl taking the course was a legend and we helped her with her love life.

We had an early night as we had to be up very early on Tuesday 26th for our trekking day! The tuk tuk picked us up and our first stop was at a not very interesting butterfly and orchid farm. Luckily we only spent 15 minutes there. We then drove to see the elephants! They all looked amazing and we fell in love with them all, especially the baby. The three of us climbed up onto one, Sarah was bareback on the front! The elephant trekked through the rainforest for about an hour with us feeding it bananas on the way. We loved it.

The three of us got in a zip wire cable car across the river to the beginning of white water rafting. We did our ice bucket challenge in a raft with dirty river water chucked over our heads. Then the white water rafting as rude began. It was our closest near death experience to date but so much fun. We raced through the rapid at high speeds and the waves were towering above us. We got stuck on rocks, the boat nearly capsized and Lisa nearly went over the edge. The driver was shouting orders at us and we did not know what was going on. Eventually we made it to shore and had a lovely pad Thai lunch.

Then we begun our one hour trek to the waterfall, over narrow bridges over rough rivers and up and down Rocky Mountains. After about an hour at the waterfall we trekked back to the tuk tuk and drove back home, via a weird hill tribe trying to sell us things.

In the evening we went back to Zoe in Yellow bar and met us with some girls and guys from our trek, and was joined by some other weird men. We all played lots of drinking games and the Samsong was getting us smashed. At about midnight we left with Charlotte and some random Dutch guys and tried to get a cheap tuk tuition fabric. The angry tuk tuk drivers tried to send us the wrong but eventually we made it. However, we had to pay entry and so went to spicy instead. We loved spicy, we insisted on walking Charlotte home but were all going crazy, singing down the street, speaking to random Thai people and throwing stolen talcum powder everywhere. Charlotte thought we were nuts.

On Wednesday we were up early again, absolutely hanging and about to begin our extremely long journey to Laos! Firstly we took the mini bus to Chiang Rai or Chiang Kong where we spent a boring night in the worst accommodation ever, ready to cross the border by boat the next day.

Bye bye Thailand...Hello Laos.