Mi 48th Bday

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Chiang Mai is the biggest town in the North ... it's very spread out with in the center the old town of Chiang Mai which is a LARGE block (with hundreds, if not thousands of soi/little streets) surrounded by a modern town ... takes mi about 15-20 minutes to drive from one side to the next, so u can image how the large the area is ... many IMPORTANT thai temples r here, which was seen in mi last blog ... i wanted to go into the monestery around my birthday, however now i was close to the center, had a nice, although VERY hot, room in a wonderful maze ... i decided i was gonna face mi worst fear, m afraid of heights ... thereafter i would just see and let the day take mi where it should

at 7'30am was the first to be picked up by an airconditioned minivan ... i glanced over the drivers pick up list and noticed a party of 2, turned out to be bangkok boys in their early twenties, and a party of 5 giggling beauticians on a fieldtrip from Kuala Lumpur Malysia ... i booked the short version which was about 15 slides down cables and a few very scary drops down large trees ... abseilen they call that ... hmmmm think i like the canyoning version better ... u can see at the pictures ...

After my trip into the jungle i hopped on the bike (which were available from the guesthouse) and drove out of the center of town where i had dropped up one of mi cameras which got a nasty shower on april 10th in Nong Khiaw when i didn't expect the waterplay to begin already then ... however should have known with 20 villages getting together for a yearly celebration l... my camera was all working, however i decided i wanted to stay in the A/C store for a bit more as outside it was a swealtering 45C (can't even translate this into F) ... and i got to talk with a young lady from Hungary who had been living in NZ for a while and just moved to Perth ... anyway we REALLY hit it of and i helped her pick some pictures she wanted to print for friends of hers and her aunt/godmother who still lives in Hungary ... They met each other here with Kleopatra's (yes its her real name ...) friend Sissy and all three had some cosmetic surgery done and they spend a month here altogether ... anyway to make a long story short we split up and later on met again and got totally wasted on margaritas in a mexican restaurant and wi finished celebrating mi bday with a group massage ... meaning we were all in the same room getting massages, giggling about nothing and discussing life the universe and everything in between ... anyway think the pictures tell all



oh yeah the day b4 i went to meet an almost extinct species ... was fun ... and the little one at mi feet is only 7 months old ...

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Photos

my bday fieldtrip
a giant amongst the Malasian giggling ladies ...

still somewhat smiling
however i didn't go one of those lines yet

still playing
as if m really scared

still playing right before jump
however my nerves started to play up here ;...

i can't believe m doing this
as sliding down the cablefrom one tree to another is called jungle flight and you zip over the jungle, sometimes 150 mtr high ... yes you read it well ... that's fucking high ... you couldn't even see the ground ...

here i come ...
aaaaaahhhhhh!!!!!!

zipping from tree to tree ..
wsn't the scariest part ... i was more freaking out standing on the little platforms ... hugging the huge trees in the middle (we did have safety lines, however tell that to your tummy ...)

always someone to catch ya
a team of 2 was accompanying us and helped us land back safely ... on the other hand they liked to hang onto the cable and move it so while zipping, you would go up and down ... NOT a nice feeling and after the first one with mi it was clear after one yell not to be done again ...

happy to go on little hike in between
the short trip cut about 5 long ziplines out (longest i did was 135mtr) - meaning from one tree to another ...) so we trekked over a small karst and climbed up a lttle platform as we were almost on the top ,. so all we had to do is zip from one tree to the next

those f*&%ing bridges
and this was the worst ... i stood in the middle with people in front of mi and in the back and they started swining and jumping ... i froze, litterally and only after i didn't move for a while everyone realized i was in total shock ... slowly step by step thinking of elephants i managed to reach the other side

not happy
however i was not happy ... anyway i did face my worst fear ... however i froze and m still afraid ... oh well

45mtr drop down ...
and that's being hooked at the back and not at the usual front ... my goodness i froze again ... i couldn't just jump 4ward, so i finally sat down on the edge and just kinda dropped mi ...

i was happy to be in truck
and back on the ground ... so i decided to go pick up mi camera and took some pictures on the way

elephants are everywhere in chiang mai
many a bridge have them ...

temple ladies ...
had not see this yet, the whole temple was surrounded by them ...

keep the streets clean
and wet ... otherwise they would crack with all the traffic which is on a continuous basis around the mote ... practically a traffic jam from 7am to 11pm ...

the bodhi tree
where i left a little glass marble which i had picked up weeks before in a remote part of Laos ... on mi bday wishing mi with help of the energy another healthy productive fun next 48 years ... :-)

home sweet home
the steps leading to my room ...

buddha likes mi
i think ... we had a whole exchange of energy here :-)

mi new/old friend Kleopatra
i just luv this woman ... it really is as if i met an old friend ... i had SOOOO much fun with her and on top of it she spoiled mi rotten picking up my dinner and massage and everything else the next 3 days ...

the massage
is always proceeded by a washing of the feet ... this was a more luxurious massage house, the ones i go to they just dip a little old washing cloth in a bucket and clean the feet like that