We arrive in Bangkok on a baking hot Friday morning. Following our rather soggy encounter with the Philippines we are grateful for the intense sunshine that has graced our arrival. We are quickly reminded by the liquid gushing out of Paul's pore and Amy's shade seeking that we are not designed for heat of this calibre.

Anyway the heat is just a side note to our excitement. Our Canadian followers have a flight to Europe in two days and we intend to use the last days of our six weeks together spending too much money and having too much fun in Bangkok.

Firstly, we need an extravagant hotel. Enter Tenface and its two bedroom suite. This boutique hotel is certainly not within our travel budget but is by no means sending us home a month early. The hotel is fabulous. It's marvelous. It's delightful. It's borderline erotic. It's ours for the next two days. And we make the most of it. Bathrobes are donned and gin is consumed whenever we're in our pad and outside the suite we are enjoying shopping trips, haircuts, massages and devouring street food left, right and centre. The hotel even had a wine tasting night and a little flirting from Brooke and Amy got us in. Heavily out of place we took full advantage of wine and canapés before our welcome is overstayed.

The Bangkok Blowout as we termed it was a huge success. Brooke and Luke left us in the early hours of Sunday morning and we were left all alone in our gigantic, flash pad. It was all for the best really as Amy, clearly torn up by the loss of our allies, began emptying her insides all over our luxurious bathroom. Blaming some Kao San Road raw chicken cross contamination Paul also starts to feel himself slipping across the thin line of healthy. The pair we were trying to checkout of this trendy establishment whilst trying not to void our bowels whilst standing at reception.

We had intended to hit up a dorm room in a hostel nearby and enjoy a couple more days in Bangkok whilst planning our next move. Not wanting to subject anyone else to the salmonella trauma that was our current condition we upgraded to a private room and for the next three days festered watching films and doing occasional food runs and some site seeing when we felt able.

Once we'd pulled ourselves together physically, mentally and otherwise, we jumped on a train up to Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand. We were feeling a bit defeated (especially Amy) by our recent fall from physical grace and the departure of our familiar travel associates. Thoughts of home and a general "what are we doing out here" echoed within our minds. We were fed up to say the least and seriously starting to question the length of our trip. You have those days when you travel. Most travelers we've met experience the same and though we're sure there are travelers out there to whom these notions are more foreign than the cultures they visit, we do not envy them. Travelling is amazing but sometimes you want something different and feeling like this now and again tells us that we have homes worth going back too and people worth missing.

But as we said travelling is amazing and arriving at our hostel (Spicy Thai) lifted us out of this cloud of stink. We met so many great people and had such a fun time that the descending depression couldn't compete. Chaing Mai itself was delightful. There was quite a large tourist/expat scene but this just seemed to create culinary options that we had not had for a while. We spent our first day in Chaing Mai exploring the city and booking onto the various things we wanted to do with our time. That evening we visited the Chiang Mai night market with a few others from the hostel. Easily the most enjoyable market we've been to. Not so much hassle from touts and a wide selection of goods form fakes to fabrics. If you find yourself in Chaing Mai make sure you go to the market.

We rose early (for us) the next day and ventured to Asian Scenic to partake in their coking course. It was phenomenal! We spent the day at a farm and made six dishes (starter, stir fry, soup, curry paste, curry and dessert) we were able to choose different dishes and the group we were with got on a treat. As a result the day was an undeniable success. Back at our hostel we arrived just in time to join in on a BBQ organized by the owner of the hostel and a guest (for his friend's birthday). The BBQ was both affordable and delicious and provided a brilliant atmosphere for a group of travelers to get drunk and wax lyrical. The BBQ was followed by a large contingent heading to the bars in town and culminated in a pretty messy evening.

We were plenty messy and would have amplified our messiness had we not been aware of our commitment for the following day. So after a mere 5 hours sleep we bound down the hostel stairs to the van waiting outside waiting to take us to our day volunteering at the Elephant Nature Park. Possibly one of our best days traveling so far, we spent the day meeting, feeding, learning about bathing and hugging rescued elephants.

The ENP provides a safe home for 35 elephants that have been rescued from abusive backgrounds. Lek, the founder of the foundation began purchasing elephants using her own money and continues to do so to this day (it's just now there are a lot of people giving her money for this cause). The park is massive with plenty of space for the elephants to roam and a river for them to bathe (a big part of an elephants day).

You might be wondering why there are so many elephants in need of rescue. Basically elephants were used in the Thai logging industry until the industry was banned by the Thai authorities, leaving hundreds of individuals and elephants unemployed. The elephants could not be released into the wild and some were abandoned by their owners. Others were reduced to street begging and circus style performing. There are no animal rights in Thailand and as a result many elephants were not properly cared for and mistreated. Just being in a city is mistreatment for an elephant. Their feet are ultrasensitive to vibrations and they can feel movements occurring many miles away. The result is that in a city an elephants tactile senses can be overloaded and this lovable pachyderm can become excessively distressed.

Lek and the ENP she has developed provide a home for elephants that cannot live in the wild due to human conditioning or human cruelty. One story that stood out for us involved a female elephant who was forced to work in illegal logging operations despite being pregnant. The stress of the work caused her to prematurely give birth on a hillside and the new born fell down the slope and died. Refusing to work her owner took to beating her as a form of motivation. This left her blind. This is just one of the many tales of tragedy surrounding the elephants living at the ENP.

Being at ENP for the day and interacting with these beautiful giants was inspiring. None of the elephants at the ENP are ridden and each has their own mahout, who cares for and trains the elephant (though they largely seem to run around after elephants, who just do their own thing). Check out the National Geographic documentary 'Vanishing Giants' which details the plight of elephants in Thailand, it is well worth a watch even if some of the footage is pretty heartbreaking.

The ENP certainly gave us a lot to think about and we're extremely grateful for the experience. Plus washing an elephant in a river and feeding them whole pumpkins is the most fun a boy/girl can have.

Back in Chaing Mai and we are talked into heading to Pai near the Thai-Burma border. Apparently everyone else is going. And we can see why. Pai is fantastic; it's chilled out, hippie'ish environment; beautiful mountainous surroundings and delightful eateries are enough to draw anyone into spending a lifetime there.

We meet up with friends from Chiang Mai and make new friends there. We hire scooters and explore the surroundings. We fail to properly prepare for a trip up a mountain and have petrol concerns on the way back. The latter would not be such a big deal if we had learned from our mistake. The next day we (a group of 8 of us minus Amy who wasn't feeling too great) set off to see a cave system about 40km away. All fuelled up we set off and have an epic journey over a mountain and to the caves.

The cave network was stunning and after hours of stumbling around in darkness, waiting for sunset and watching thousands of swifts return to the cave (a truly awe inspiring experience) we head back to the bikes in the pouring rain. We drive further afield towards the petrol station of the next town. However as fate would have it (and she is a mean b**** sometimes), the station is closed. Perplexed, annoyed and with shadows of anxiety creeping in we realise that we're f***ed. Two of the team set off to see if there's anything else further down the road (there aint). Two of the team admit defeat and decide to spend the night in a guesthouse in this tiny town. Paul is aware that Amy's probably pretty worried right now, what with the statement of "I'll be back around 5pm" being thrown out as he left that morning and the current time reading 8:30pm. As a result he has no plans to stay the night. With no knowledge of the fact, the rest of the group talk ourselves into a belief that we can make it back. So what if the fuel gauges read below a quarter tank.

We set off. Very slowly. At the foot of the mountain Paul's fuel gauge is in the red and the steep incline does not help matters. There's one person riding shotgun so we take turns carrying her to spread out the fuel consumption. After some concerning moments and a whole lot of doubt we reach the top. Everyone is in or below the red at this point. Paul's had passed the 'E'. We save more fuel by using gravity and minimal breaking. It actually works, we arrive back, all of us, at about 11:30pm. We've not eaten and are exhausted. Paul finds a very worried Amy on Skype to her mum and he is greeted by the sentence "It's alright he's here!". A big day for everyone involved. Well worth it though.

Having thoroughly enjoyed our time in Pai we head back to Bangkok via Chiang Mai to grab a flight to Saigon, Vietnam. Now, all you Thailand enthusiasts out there will be aware that in doing this we've missed out a fair few places in Thailand, not to mention the entire south with its myriad of islands. You'll probably say "Gee Paul and Amy why didn't you go to XY and Z?"

Well, no one asked you smartarse. So put your opinion back in its box of 'should have's and 'have to's, and let us explain our rationale. We had agreed to meet Paul's parents and younger brother in Saigon on the 6th July and wanted a bit of time to explore the Mekong area in the south. As a result Thailand; like Malaysia before it; and Borneo before that; and Western/Central Indonesia before that; and Central Australia before that; and all the other places that we have been unable to find the time to explore this year; got removed from our itinerary. Basically you can try to see everything and travel with a rocket up your arse or you can stop and look around. We chose and prefer the latter. Save it for another day. We're off to Vietnam.