Hi everyone, Hope all is well in sunny England. There is so much to fill you in on and so little time!! We have been in Chaing Mai for just over a week now. It's a beautiful place with lots of things to do, so I would suggest to anyone who is coming to Thailand in the future to make a stop here. We thought that the train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai would take about 12 hours, which is quite painful in itself. Everything was going well....the chairs were comfortable, we were being fed lots and the toilets weren't too bad. Then, about 2 hours outside Chaing Mai, the train began to go backwards!! Not knowing what was going on and looking for someone who spoke English, we finally stopped in a tiny deserted station to be told that the train wouldn't be able to make it up the hill because the engine didn't have the correct part! As this trip is done everyday, you would think that they would know by now that the train has to get up the hill.....The Thai's were as cool as cucumbers (which is what they always seem to be like), whereas we were not impressed!! We finally made it 15 hours after leaving Bangkok.......London to Leeds is now going to be a breeze!! We then arranged our trek in the jungle for three days and two nights. WHAT AN EXPERIENCE!! We were in a group of 7 (the 5 of us), a Scottish guy called Seth and an Australian girl called Lucy. The first thing we did was go elephant trekkng which was amazing. We watched the elephants do some tricks and Sandra was given a massage by one of them!! We decided to call the elephant Welshie as i'm from England, Eileen's from Ireland and Seth's from Scotland Great thinking on my part I thought!!! We got to sit on the elephants neck which is seriously spikey and rough and feed him bananas. He was a greedy elephant and stopped every two seconds for another one....he'd worked his charm on us as we continued to feed him!! We walked for 23km over the 3 days with our guides Rocky and Bobby. No longer than 5 minutes into the trek, I went flying onto my arse and into pools of mud! It was down hill from there, as I continued to slip over and make a fool of myself!! Bobby, who I became great buddies with, as I was always the one lagging behind became my knight in shining armour!! He cut a bamboo stick for to use, he swapped shoes with me, he held my hand when we were crossing water and on the last day carried by bag to the van.....It gets even better.....on the second day, Eileen, Lucy and I got stung my bees and he became my doctor, by putting tiger balm on my leg.......very sweet I hear you cry!! Whislt in the jungle, we stayed with one of the hill tribes (the Karen tribe). It was a great experience as we got to live the way they do......no hot water, showering out of a bowl and using a torch to get around at night. On the second night, we tried rice whiskey which is a speciality We also paid the tribe 1500 baht to go to the next villiage to kill a pig for and then spit roast it for us. It was very tasty, but I felt seriously guilty watching the poor thing roast!! We played drinking games for most of the night as there was not much else to do and then ended up having a sing song which involved one or two lines of every kind of song and not much else!! We also met another trekking guide called Tony who gave us an insight into Thai men.......he said that they were just like chillis, hot and spicy and that he wouldn't be able to take the four Irish girls because they wouldn't get quality!!! On our last day, we went bamboo water rafting which was very wet!! It goes without saying that we have been to the markets and shopped till we dropped!! In the Sunday market there were stalls with cooked insects on and so very calmly I thought I would try a bamboo worm!! It was very crispy and left an awful after taste in my mouth. Oh well, try anything once is what I say!! I could now have a new occupation......Thai wife, as we attended a Thai cooking course for the day. I passed with flying colours as I didn't burn the kitchen down and according to me, my food was very tasty!! One of my own favourite highlights so far has been a Buddhist meditation retreat which we went to for a night. We had to dress in white gowns and then got to chant with the monks. They also taught us sitting meditation, walking meditation and lying meditation. It was very intense, but the lying mediation was my favourite. I was so relaxed whilst I was doing it that I fell asleep and had to be woken by one of the other group members....how embarrassing!! We were in bed by 10pm as we had to get up at 5am to go and do some yoga and some more mediation. We had a discussion about Buddhism and in line with Buddhist tradition, offered food to the the monks. We had to sit in silence whilst we were eating and think about the food. It was a fantastic experience and one I'm sure I won't get to do again. I met a medical student who's from Harrogate, but at Leicseter Uni.....I just can't seem to escape them!!! HAHA Today we just chilled out and went to the zoo which was fun. Looking forward to a few Singha beers tonight as it's our last night in Thailand for the mo.....I can't believe that we've been here a month. Tomorrow we fly Loas.........another new experience which i'm looking foward to. You probably haven't drawn breath whislt reading this, so will say bye for now!! Take care, Lots of love Em xx