Hello from Thailand!

What a week it's been! We crossed from Laos to Northern Thailand last Thursday and had an action packed week in Chiang Mai. I love Thailand! It was quite a relief to be here after Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos - it's a lot more relaxed in some ways, not as poor, a bit more Westernised and very friendly! We did a two day trek in the mountains which involved waterfalls, hot springs, visiting hill tribe villages - the people rarely go to the city and I couldn't believe how much was growing in their villages - bananas, guavas, mangos, lycees, tumeric, coffee beans, tamerind, cotton, tobacco, basil, corriander, garlic, rasberrys, rice,etc etc! - there were pigs dogs cows and chickens all wondering around too. The trek also involved, an elephant ride and a floating down stream on a bamboo raft for 2 hours - as well as lots of lovely Thai food along the way! The actual trekking itself was good - difficult in some places - very steep and narrow but coming downhill was just as bad for trying not to slip! We stayed in wooden huts on matress inside mosquito nets - we were quite tired from the long day so fell asleep without any problems! I really enjoyed the whole experience - money well spent.

We've been battling with ourselves not to SPEND SPEND SPEND again, the night bizarre in Chiang Mai is amazing!! The biggest one I;ve been too yet, we went every night that we could during out stay! The day after the trek we did a 6 hour cooking class at our guest house. It was so much fun! I made Thai Green Curry, Spring Rolls, Thai style Morning Glory, Chicken Fried Rice, Hot and Sour Prawn Soup, and Mango and Sticky Rice - we went to the market and bought all the relevant ingrediants then came back to cook, eat, cook, eat, cook, eat . . and so on! I've never eaten so much good food! Everything we couldn't manage was bagged up and put in the fridge for later.. waste not want not! We got a recipe souvineer book so I'll be attempting to cook lots of Thai meals when I get home!

The next day we travelled 3 hours North West of Chiang Mai to Pai - a very laid back town full of hippies! It was so friendly there, and the place was filled with comfy bars and cafes. I;ve never seen so many dreadlocks and tatoos! It was very cool though, it's low season so it wasnt very busy and only 2pounds each for a nice room! Took advantage of the quiet roads and cheap prices (2 pounds for 24 hours) and hired a scooter / motorbike! It's not a very big place so it was easy to navigate our way to where we wanted to go - we went to a waterfall and to a huge outdoor swimming pool / bar place, spent a couple of hours there swimming and reading, very nice! (We did end up driving through some villages where we were flagged down as what seemed like a matter of urgency by a middle aged Thai woman and offered 'gange or opium?!?!?!?!' .. Decline.

Then it was back to Chiang Mai as our bus to Bangkok was booked for that evening. Finally a proper bus with big fully reclining seats, a foot rest, and loads of leg room! I slept like a log.

Bangkok: wowza. Only spent one night here but we arrived at 6am yesterday and got to bed around 3am so it felt like the longest day ever! We didn't really have time to venture much further than Khoasan Road, the backpackers Hub but that was really nice! Such a good atmosphere - I was expecting it to be a lot more full on and daunting but it was great! Very friendly and more amazing shopping! Lots of street food so you can easily eat a good big meal for less than 1pound.

We've booked onto a package tour for the Islands as there are Political Protests in Bangkok at the moment and Thai New Year is next week (things get manic and very expensive for the 5 day celebrations!) - so we thought we'd let them take care of everything for us including buses to the ports, boats to the Islands, pick ups, accomodation (on the beach!) and a train to the Malaysia border - i'm glad it's all taken care of - it'll be nice to have a relaxing 10 days now, we've been on the go so much lately and it's starting to catch up with me! We leave Bangkok this evening and will be spending the next 10 days on Koh Phangan, Koh Samui, and may do a day trip to Koh Tao - then to Malaysia!

All in all, Thailand has been spectacular, and the best is yet to come! I agree with the summary in the Lonely Planet - the perfect balance between foreign and familiar!!

I will let you know how those beaches are! ;-)

Lots of love - Lucy xxxxx