Saturday, the first official day of the Songkran New year celebrations and we were guaranteed carnage! The origins of this so called 'water festival' have much more calm and traditional roots. It was originally about people offering their respects to Buddha and their elders then washing the buddhas with water to cleanse themselves from sins. In present day Thailand however this has now turned into one massive water fight with Bangkok and Chiang Mai being the epic...

Today we woke lazily around nine and headed downstairs. The hostel was getting things prepared for the first day of the Songkran Water Festival tomorrow so there were barrels being filled with water and tables put out side. We still had one day to kill before our flight so decided to have a little wander before spending the morning chilling out. The afternoon again was pretty uneventful and I took the opportunity to catch up with the blogs which seem to be tak...

This morning we were up and out of the door by around 8:15am to get our train tickets to Chiang Mai. Laura thanked the hostel ladies and said we would likely see them again soon... we had no idea then it would much sooner than we thought. On arriving at the train station there were a lot of people milling around waiting for trains. I confidently strolled up to the ticket office, smiling, to then be told all the 3rd class tickets had been sold. Me and Laura looke...

The room was so stuffy when we woke up to the aroma of unwashed clothes and stale beer that normally follows unhygienic men. I escaped as soon as possible downstairs to make a cup of coffee and breathe some fresh air.... Well more humid then anything but fresh all the same. You forget how humid it is in Bangkok compared to the dry, intense heat of Burma. Just sitting out of air conditioning for five minutes made me feel the sweat forming on my brow. I was more ...

So it was our last morning in Burma, it would be sad to leave but we both knew expense prevented us from staying longer. We met up with Kratos outside and enjoyed breakfast in the already quite stifling heat. Zdenek eventually joined us being fashionably late as always. Before our departure from Mandalay airport we wanted to stop off at the U Bein Bridge, one of Mandalay's premier tourist attractions. The bridge is officially the world's longest teak wood bridge ...