Got picked up at 8 am, then we drove for about an hour outside the city to the Mae Tang River for some adventures with 8Adventures.

I did a short 3km hike to a waterfall, then went whitewater rafting in the afternoon. A few highlights from each:

Hiking

* Fruit: Burmese grape (like a sour lychee - delicious! Had fun convincing some Americans to try it too), pig egg (a little like a plum), grapefruit, lychee

* Banana plant uses: new shoots (eat like cucumber, full of water), new leaves can be rolled up & dried then smoked with tobacco inside, brown stem can be twisted into strong rope that lasts 4-7 days, banana stem "gun" (cut small pieces out of the stem, then run your finger along so they snap back in - makes a gun sound)

* Pepper plant for cooking

* Spicy chilli-like plant

* Tried raw turmeric (it's very bitter!)

* Lemon-scented tree

* Tried slingshot (I was hopeless but Tom was excellent)

* Climbed up & put sandbags & rocks to "fix" the waterfall (change where it was falling)

* Red teak tree leaves rubbed turn your hands red like blood

* Grass stem shooter - shoot the main stem of a blade of grass by pulling down the outside quickly

* Elephant tracks everywhere

* big leaves you can stitch together to make a waterproof hat or basket

* Leaves you can stick onto your clothes

* Poisonous & edible (fibrous) mushrooms

* went to the main waterfall & since we made good time & there was just me, we also went upstream to an even higher one

* Tom had fun scaring the other tour groups by telling them to watch out for the snake up ahead! (The path is so well-travelled every day, it's very rare to ever see a snake)

* Rode back to the trekking company's office on an ATV which was fun! Only about 10min ride so not far.

Rafting

* Rafted 10km down the Metang River (?) near Fang in the mountains outside Chiang Mai

* Another couple from HK: Patrick (Corporate banker with HSBC) & Fion (nurse)

* Mostly pretty tame grade 3-4 but Fion screamed down most of the rapids! Made it more exciting!

* No one fell out but I jumped out a couple of times

* Towards the end, Tom swapped places with me so I could kayak down a few minor rapids. The kayak was so much more manoeuvrable!

* Amazing how clean the river is. Virtually no litter anywhere, many signs about not littering, polystyrene is banned from the area, and there are recycling bins everywhere

* Floating downstream, we could see just how much of the hill underneath the road had disappeared in a recent landslide. Fortunately, there's a layer of concrete on top that's about 15cm thick because that's about all that's still in place! Glad some other vehicles had been over it before us because it was only about a third of the road was supported by dirt underneath!

Came home afterwards, had a shower, then went out to find some food at a nearby restaurant.

The pineapple fried rice was OK but I like the Perth Hyatt version better!

It wasn't too late so I went for a bit of a walk & ended up finding a karaoke bar where a few other westerners were singing some English songs & I joined in after a few vodkas! It was lots of fun & we even convinced Pei Pei, our waitress to sing a few songs with us!

Got home a bit later than I was planning, a little after midnight.