..Who Said You Can't Trek in Flip Flops- Chiang Mai

Fifteen hours on a train obviously did something strange to us as upon arrival in Chiang Mai we visited a temple.

Chaing Mai turned out to be a city of crazy times and things we never thought we'd do...

Crazy time number one was we actually walked, map in hand and searched out a place of religios worship. Not just walked past, we actually went inside and had a proper look around. Talk about cultural - and you all thought we were just going on a beach holiday! It turned out the Monks weren't too keep on the demin hotpants/strappy top look so we were dressed by a little old lady in a fetching scarf/skirt creation. Lodge went for brown tones while I was sporting the cool blue/purple look. Lovely.

After our religios experience we went for a much needed nap in preparation for an activity we are much more accustomed to - shopping. The Sunday market in Chaing Mai is enormous, full of traditional crafts, clothes, jewellery, silks and food. We had the most amazing corn on the cob and each bought a few new bits, but only small light things as we were already buckling under the weight of our backpacks. We stopped off for a beer to recharge our batteries and suddenly everyone stopped in the bars and resaurants and stood still in the streets and began singing the national anthem. It was all a bit strange.

Crazy time number two was we actually had a proper good nights sleep..well, apart from Lodge's new yellow Casio. Her new 2 pound pride and joy woke Lodge up at 4am, who in turn woke me up exclaiming "as if my Casio is set to 4am".

Crazy time number three, four, five, six, seven and eight all happened on Monday (24th Jan). Defeating the time zone for the first time, we made it up and were ready for our pick up at 8am. The first stop for our group which consisted of Lodge and I, 2 Dutch guys, a Canadian couple, and Aussie couple, a German, and Italian and 2 Argentinians, was Elephant trekking! The first obsticle was having to cross a bamboo and rope bridge into the jungle which looked about as safe as something Dad had made :) Princess Lodge's scared sound started here (it goes a little something like "mmmiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeee" and lasted a lot of the day. We made it through and met the Elephants including two babies.

The health and safety standards continued to be as non-existant as ever and we climbed some rickety old wooden stairs up to a hut from which we mounted our Elephant who we liked to call Nelly and met our 'driver' who we liked to call Mogoli. Our carraige was very basic - metal with a wooden seat and some tarpauling to sit on, attached to the Elephant with a rope. Lodge held on so tight, her hands practically embedded into the metal poles, there was not a chance in hell she'd be letting go to take any pictures so I had the camera in one hand, which left the other to hold on - if only I could find a spot on the hand rail that Lodge wasn't holding! It became quickly apparent that the guides thought that this was extremely funny and the rest of the day turned into 'pick on Lodge and Sarah day'.

We were on Mummy Elephant so had a baby following us around. We trekked into the jungle down some very steep slopes, feeling about as safe as being on a roller coaster without a safety harness! Our Elephant driver found this hilarious and decided it would be funny to jump off, wander into the undergrowth, get our his catapault and start shooting birds with rocks, leaving us in charge of a bloody great Elephant and her baby. This didn't ease Lodge's nerves, which in turn only further amused our Elephant driver and the rest of the group. Thankfully, he eventually returned and took us for a very hilly walk, up and down and through rivers while finding it funny to mimic everything we said.

After the trekking we headed to the river for a raft ride. Our raft driver...Mogoli II continued the theme of winding us up and proceeded to point out every snake in the water and kept getting us soaked with his steering stick. We were both brave and stood up on the raft and surprisingly enough, managed not to fall in.

Next it was on to lunch and crazy time number five. After a lovely lunch we discovered that the toilet facilities were less than basic (where's Lodge's sheewee when you need it!?) The first indication things might be bad was the lady at the resaurant (well, shack on the side of the road) told Lodge she best go with me as I may need assistance. The open-topped shack made the train station toilets I'd already flatly refused to use, look like the restroom at the Ritz. There wasn't even a butt-gun (what they use instead of toilet paper...note: butt-gun is not the technical term) in sight. There was a pan - hopefully not from the same set from which they were serving our food - and a trough of very grimy water. needless to say, we laughed a lot...which didn't help the need to wee...and left without going. Yuck.

From here we visited the Karen tribe and then trekked...yes trekked...through rice fields, up hills and down steps to the Mae Wang waterfall. Here I bullied Lodge into doing crazy time number six and we got in the water, which was rather chilly. Lodge was being a wimp (for a change) so I led the way, confidently and quickly entering the water, swimming out towards the waterfall. Well at least that's what the rest of the group belive, as in actual fact, I had no choice in the matter as I'd slipped down a rock and fallen in...I think I got away with it. As a reward, we had a beer in preparation for the next leg of the trek to a Mong tribal village.

At this point, noticing how every other member of our group was sporting trainers or walking shoes, we considered out choice of attire - dress/playsuit, bikini and flip flops - but decided we were doing pretty well just the way we were. Feeling pretty smug I promptly slipped down a muddy hill before Lodge ran down another, almost taking out the poor Dutch guy at the bottom who had stopped to help us down. The rest of the way was along a river embankment, no wider than a plank of wood with plants on one side and a drop on the other. The ground was as uneven as physically possible so cue another quite spectacular fall in which I was centimeters away from landing face-first in the water. Oh well, it gave the Aussie guy behind me quite a laugh!

Flip-flops aside, we did pretty well and after the trible visit we headed back to the bus to go home. We had a lovely chat with Tum (our guide, aka Tom Thumb or an ant from A Bugs Life according to Lodge). All in all, a busy but amazing day which we topped off by both falling asleep on the bus on the journey home, both our mouths wide open. Sexy.

One recharge nap later, we headed for dinner, went to the night market and then to a few bars near a hotel where we saw a dog which looked like Partner (another moment which warmed Lodge's heart).

Tuesday was a relaxing one in preparations for two nights on the train. We went in search of straighteners (one week with frizzy hair is quite enough!) on the oldest looking and slowest tuk-tuk invented to what was meant to be the premier shopping plaza in Chiang Mai. Not convinced we were in the right place, seeing a lizard run across the floor was the last straw, we decided our tuk-tuk driver had got discomfobulated, not surprising - he must have been about 105!

We made it to Central Plaza and found some srtaighteners so mission accomplished, we decided to go for a picnic in the park. One thing about Bangkok is there is no fresh air and it's very smoggy so we hadn't really had a chance to sit in the sun. Chiang Mai park was lovely, however our supermarket trip for some picniccy bits wasn't quite as successful...the Thais aren't into cocktail sausages, scotch eggs or sandwiches and we aren't keen on pork intestines, fish heads or green eggs so we ended up with a bag of crisps and some plum tomatoes but it was nice to sit in the sunshine and finally start building a tan. As well as frizzy hair, we are fed up as being as pale as Casper's slightly whiter sisters!

Then we had a pedicure before getting back on the night train for the 15 hour journey back to Bagkok. Train arrives at 7am, we have the day there and then it's back on the train for another mammoth journey to Koh Tao via Chumphon on Wednesday night. Having spent the journey to Chiang Mai sleeping next to a bag of Lodge's sick, this time we had a bed which which was the victim of a beer soaking, a neighbour who snored like a foghorn and a man up the carriage parading around in his pants! Got to love the night train - crazy times!