Chiang Mai and Elephant Trek!

---

Hiya all

So we are still in Chiang Mai but not for too much longer! We are all packed up and ready to move on to Chiang Rai this afternoon.

I've really enjoyed being in Chiang Mai... but Dury has not had such a good time! He was really sick in the night after I last wrote so we had to postpone going on the elephant trek by two days. Those two days were ok but we couldn't venture too far from the guesthouse in case Dury was felt sick again! LAME! lol

But by Sunday night he was feeling lots better so we left for the elephant trek on Monday morning! It was really fun! There was another English couple and an American girl from our guesthouse going also, and 4 American students from another place and then three Spanish guys. What with the Euro final showing at about 2am here on Sunday night those guys were not in the best state to go trekking on Monday! They were struggling! Anyway, we all piled into a kinda pick-up truck with a roof on it and drove for about an hour out of Chiang Mai. Then we got to go on an elephant ride for about an hour! It was really fun. Then the hard work started and the trekking began! We trekked for about 3 and a half hours in the heat through the jungle (uphill!) which was pretty hard going. We finally arrived at our village, called the Lahu village. We stayed in a proper bamboo hut on stilts. There was one big room with 12 mattresses. When we got there we had a shower - aka a scrub down over a bucket! - and we had a Thai massage from the ladies in the village. Then we had some time to look around the village. Dury and some other guys joined in a game of football/volleyball with some villagers and me and the girls gave piggy backs to some kids! We didn't realise how filthy those kids were until they got off and our clothes were brown with dirt! We had dinner in our little hut and our guide told us about the village, the people, the area, and began some fun circle games! We sat up chatting for a while and then all went to bed.

In the morning, our guide woke us all up and we had some breakfast before starting an hour long hike downhill to the waterfall. The waterfall was really beautiful and refreshing! Then we hiked for maybe another hour along the river to where we could do some white-water rafting!! This was really fun. We were in a boat with the other couple from our guesthouse. It was pretty cool. The first part of the river was actually the most exciting but from then on it was pretty tame. Got seriously soaked though! A little way down the river, we got out of our boat/dingy thing and got onto a bamboo raft and sailed blissfully down the last part of the river. Then we got off, had some lunch all together and got back in our pick-up truck thing and headed back to Chiang Mai!

Last night was a pretty lazy night. Dury felt sick (again!) and so I went down the road for dinner and managed to even watch a little bit of Wimbledon on a restaurant tv! I was in desperate need for some western food after a couple of weeks of curry-this and pad-thai-that so I ordered a jacket potato and a banana shake! Mmm!

So, now we're just looking up bus timetables and hostels on the net and then we're gonna get our bags from Julies, say goodbye and make our way to the bus station to get a bus to Chiang Rai! The plan is to only spend a night in Chiang Rai before going onto Chang Khong and into Laos. So the next time I write, I should be in Laos!

Hope everyone is ok back at home! Missing you lots.
Cheers for reading.
Love Naomi

PS - * Danielle * - Appendicitis?! Good grief! I hope you were well enough to go to Sri Lanka and had an awesome time! Message me again when you get back and tell me all about it! Missing you!

---