Hi,
Chang Mai-
In order to go to Chang Mai, I had to get an overnight bus. As I had already booked it, I headed back to Ko San rd to catch my bus. People make me laugh, as soon as they saw my ruk sac I was harrassed- you need somewhere, where you going. I had this every step of the way. After chilling out and having a drink I got on my bus. Met a couple of people on the bus to have a chat too. Sadly I was sat behind some French people. They were drunk and one continued to chat to me about random stuff until he ran out of stuff to say. Although later that night he was so rude to me, I moved seats but enough said about that.
When I arrived in Chang Mai I knew I had made the right decison. It is lovely and when I arrived at my hostel I was so happy. It was like a big student house. A big living room where you could all hang out for movies, hammocks in the garden to chill on etc etc. Everyone was great when I arrived and you could feel what a great vibe there was in the house. Immeditely after brekkie I headed out to Tiger Palace with one of my room mates Steve. Tiger Palace is awesome, its where you can have a tiger experience. This is where you go inside their cage and can hold them and so on. I went with a baby one called Lala, she was only two months old and so adorable. I even got to have a cuddle with her.
After this we met back up with the rest of the hostel and a few of us went swimming. I had only been here a few hours but already I felt so chilled out and more relaxed then I did in Bangkok. That night most of the hostel were going out. I decided to join them to see what the nightlife was like. We went and got some cheap beer from a shop on the street and then the shop had chairs outside where you could sit and drink it-bizzarre. I had had my first successful street meal in Bangkok before I got on my bus and was eager to try more. Its so cheap your paying about 50p for food here. The night was a laugh and the club was weird but ok. Lots of lady boys and their weren't many tourists inside the club which meant it was a more local one. What surprised me was that they had the lastest charts hits and a whole variety of music playing. I just couldn't get over how friendly my entire hostel was-the owener was the one who was taking us out and showing us these places. Its great most days the hostel we organise something for people to do if they want. It just makes for a great atmosphere were evreryone from all the different rooms mixes.
The next day I headed off to the Jungle Zip wire. It was a day of zip wiring through the jungle-great fun. Some of the wires were 300 metres long and you even had to drop (like an absail but not) over 40 ft. It was a laugh and lunch was great. Im finding Im not eating much here but have also got ulcers along my tongue that are making it really hard and painful to eat. I loved swinging through the trees and the views was beautiful. By the time I got home it was already dinner time. Miguel lent me his scooter so I could go out and grab some food. Ahh I was a little freaked out because I had never been on one before but I took it slowly and soon found a great little place to pick something up. Then it was movie night back at the hotel. A few of us had arrnaged to chill and watch some films. I was up for this as I was heading into the jungle for a two day trek tomorrow and needed to save my energy. I felt like I was beginning to come down with something and really wanted to try and rest so I didn't get ill.
It was another early start to head into the jungle. A couple of the guys from my hostel were going so at least I would know a couple of faces. The weather is warm here, I was secretly hoping it would be cooler in the jungle but I was wrong. We had to trek to our base camp for the night. It was hard work at points because the route was so steep but it was well worth it when we bumped into a load of kids at thier swimming pool. They followed us for quite a while up the mountain before they disappeared. The humidity in the jungle is quite bad so you get hot very quickly. It was ok though becuase after a couple of hours we made it to base camp and got to have a shower in a waterfall- so I can't really complain. It was awesome, this was only the small waterfall, we would be going to a big waterfall tomorrow. It was so much fun all of us standing under this waterfall getting clean. It was then a very slow walk back up to the top in order so I didn't get sweaty again. That night we had dinner witha view of the jungle, it was just surreal. So peaceful and quiet. I headed to bed pretty early as I was not feeling great. My ulcers had gotten really bad y throat was really sore and my chest felt really tight-not good. I slept on and off the whole night-hopin I wouldn't get ill. We all slept in this hug bamboo hut like the tribes do. We briefly got to see a village early and what surprised me most was that they had these bamboo huts, but they had TVs and stuff in them. They may look simple but they still have electricty and so on.
The next day was an early start with an Elephant trek. I got to go and watch this huge beautiful creatures get washed and then ride one through the jungle. They just plod along with nothing bothering then. There were quite a few steep dips into the river that the elehant had to take, where you were on such a slant you could see over the elephants head!! It was such an awesome thing to that I wished Darren was there with me. I am still finding it hard without him. I have never had someone special before where I wanted to share every thing with someone. I have always been this girlfriend that goes off and does what she wants to do. It's different now and I am really missing him. I thought I would miss him more when I was relaxing but I find it harder when I'm doing exciting stuff like this as I want him here. It's just something I am having to get used to. The elephant trek was great and I was dissappointed that I had to say goodbye to the them. They were only 40 years old and one elephant cost 400,000 baht (42 baht=1 pound, you do the math). There were meant to be 3 elephants but one had been really slow getting there, this meant that one of the boys had to sit of the elephants neck. Micheal was a little worried he was going to fall off and the guy told him to holf onto his ears lol. Anyway after this it was another hike to the waterfall. This was a killer. Too many steeps up's and not enough down's, it was tough. Eventually we made it to the water fall and it was so worth it. It was so cool, you could stand under one particular bit and you were in your own little cave with a cascading waterfall hiding you. Beautiful. We spent ages there just relaxing and swimming although the current was quite strong you had to be careful to not go over the other edge. I got quite a few scratches from the rocks as you can't see where are they are around the edge. I did pluck up the courage to jump in with the rest of the boys and was really pleased with myself that I did. It was perfect. Then it was another hike for lunch. On the way we stopped to go to a bat cave. It was ok nothing special though just a lot of sleeping bats. Everyone was on their third helping while I was still slowly only about half way through my first helping :( The tour guides were actually telling us to go and I hadn't finished mine yet. Next it was white water rafting. So much I love doing stuff like this. You have to paddle through and then hold on for dear life when you hit the rapids so you don't fly off. Good fun although we kept hitting rocks and doing a 360 but still a great giggle. After this was bamboo rafting, which wasn't as fun. As we had so many people on the raft it sank a little under water and we were all running from one side to the other in order for it not to tip over. It was pleasant but not nearly as fun as the rapids. You just float along quite merrily until we reache the end which was the end of our trek. I was kinda sad for it to be over but was also shattered as well. I had also been sneezing all day and by the end of the trek I had a full blown, nasty cold, I felt like death warmed up.
When I got back it was shower time!!! Then the hostel were all heading out for dinner. I managed to make it to the restaurant but then came back and crawled into bed. I felt so rough, I had booked myslef a bus to Pai the next day. Pai is a place where every travellers I have met raves about. I am quite excited, it's meant to be beautiful and very relaxing. Going to stay there a few days till I feel better. My time in Chang Mai has been brilliant, I loved my hostel, I loved my trek and everything I did there. It has been a really bust few days so going to recharge my batteries in Pai now.