The day started with a prompt wake up at 8:00am to rush and get ready for our pick up 30 mins later. Me and Dan both sat in the front of the mini van as it was all full in the back. I didn't mind this really as i got to have a chat with our driver about lots of food and all the kind of exotic fruits available this side of the world. He mentioned he ate dog and that it tastes delicious! I'm not really about that life though! The journey was around one and a half hours long, maybe shorter. Our first stop was the elephant camp. Here we all unloaded the mini van and were given mini bananas to feed a few of the elephants around. There were 3 at first, a male with gigantic tusks, a female and a baby. We had fun passing them the bananas as their trunks were swinging our way for more. Great photo op!

We then proceeded to mount the elephants. Dan had his heart sat on riding the big male and we were the last couple to mount and we ended up riding him! Our driver was a crazy looking thai man wearing a ridiculous afro type wig. We had to step onto the elephants neck and onto the small seat that was strapped to its back, i was conscious the whole time incase i was hurting our elephant but he didn't seem too fazed by it, although i'm sure he's used to ferrying around tourists by now; still not something i agree with but it was a good opportunity to be able to get so close to such a beautiful creature.

The elephant led us through the forests, up steep uneven hills, and down them! We were clinging on for dear life as it didn't seem unlikely the elephant could take a wrong step and fall right over, but he didn't. As were rode through a small stream on our elephant we ended up back at our minivan and proceeded on a 7 minute drive to where we would be bamboo rafting.

There were 4 people to each raft and so me and dan got paired with a young british couple from oxford, all was well as we chatted together about our travelling plans, not getting too wet. Me and laura, the girl had decided to sit down on the raft because standing up did look a little unsteady, not knowing how wet our bottoms would actually get! Lucky enough we didn't end up in the water unlike poor dan who had somehow slipped off the raft and into the river! Thank god it wasn't so deep though! After the rafting, we proceeded to lunch, we drove about 5 minutes to a small stopover where i think most of the tourist groups go to eat. We were all starving by then as we didn't have time for breakfast so were excited to see what they had in store for us! I was a little disappointed as i was expecting a lunch similar to what we had at the Erawan waterfalls, a buffet type lunch with salads, grilled chicken, vegetables and soup. What we got, were pots of rice to share with some potatoes and a small bowl of veg. Nonetheless we were grateful for any food! Laura ate a veggie option and found a hair in it poor girl but munched it down anyway because of the hunger! We then drove to a small village to visit some tribal women making handmade scarves. After the village, we all began to trek to a waterfall through a forest which made a beautiful walk.

Once we got to the waterfall, i was all up for a swim until i tested how cold the water was. And it was a tad too cold! So me and laura stayed dangling our feet into the water and let the boys dive in. Both Dan and Ben did look cold but respect to them for doing it! Oh i must mention how much Ben reminds me of Tom Baker to look it! Crazy! After the waterfall we started another trek through a small community where the long neck tribe live but didn't actually go inside to visit, was more of a stop off opportunity to buy a drink and a few souvenirs. We then got picked up and made our journey back to Chiang Mai. I was sooo tired by this time but had nowhere to rest my head as i was wedged between pino, our driver and dan!

We got on so well with the british couple Laura and Ben that we had arranged to meet up with them that evening as it was chinese new year and we thought we'd visit china town for the celebrations. We managed to find them hanging about at the gate, just by chance! We then made our way to china town where the place was beaming! So many people and so much food! I should mention now that me and fan got a pizza before we went to china town which we regretted a lot after seeing all the delicious food on sale at china town! It did get a bit too overwhelming so we left the havock of china town to get a beer in the first bar we've found. We spoke about all sorts, books, films, life, all sorts! After the pretty expensive chang and singa we realised how late it had got and so said our goodbyes and went to our guesthouses again! I'm sure we'll bump into each other again as we're pretty much taking the same route.