Yesterday, we carried our chilled day on into the evening. We went over to see some of our friends, from the jungle, at their hostel (the Chang Gang reunited) and after a chilled couple of hours chatting, four of us headed off to the night market. This is a huge evening market stretching across atleast 5 different streets, on both sides of the road. Here Juliet and I put our bartering skills to good use, managing to haggle prices down by over half! The problem is we got so carried away, we’d barter on things we didn’t even want that much, and then would have to purchase them… But all in all it was a productive market shop and a cool experience wandering between stalls lit up by lanterns, at night.

After the market, we met up with the rest of the Chang Gang in the famous Chiangmai THC rooftop bar. On entering you’re surrounded by UV graffiti and rickety staircases, leaded their way up to the rooftop. Here before the last wooden ladder is a place to leave your shoes, as shoes aren’t allowed in the chilled bar filled with mats and pillows where people sit on the floor. The music was pumping and the bar was full and even though it closed at 2, we’d had a good relaxed night of talking and dancing.

Today after a lovely lie in, we got breakfast and having checked out, are spending the rest of the day by the pool. We have to leave about 3ish to get to our sleeper train and after such a nice stay at Top North Hotel, we will be spending the next two nights a bit more uncomfortably, sleeping in a bunk on a train. We stop off in Bangkok for a day, before reboarding the train to make our way to the Islands!!

Today after a not-so-early night of looking at jungle trek photos, washing obsessively to get rid of the jungle smell and just generally relaxing, we got up very early ready for our Thai cooking course.
We were picked up at 8.30 and taken to a local market in order to look at and learn about the Thai grown local meat, vegetables, herbs, sauces and powders that we would be using in our cooking.
After this we walked a short way to the local cooking school and we definitely knew the ingredients we’d be cooking with we’re fresh as the market was on our doorstep! Here we spent the morning learning about Thai cooking and learning ourselves how to make a chicken and coconut soup, Pad Thai, Thai Green Curry paste and the Thai Green Curry itself and finally, deep fried spring rolls!
While cooking each dish we learnt about the individual ingredients and tasted them throughout the process so that we could make the dish perfect for our own tastes. For example Juliet omitted any form of chillies where as the two German guys (who were trying to eat like the locals) added extra (and regretted it!)
All of the food we made was delicious (and this is not because I’m a good chef) it was purely down to the fresh produce, and easy but effective Thai recipes. We also got a recipe book at the end so we can recreate these dishes at home!

After we’d finished cooking school, feeling extremely full, we headed off down the street to find a massage parlour. On the way we came across a local festival, inside of a temple, with loud music and lots of food! We definitely couldn’t stomach any more food or even the thought of it so we listened to some music then headed to the massage shop and both had a very relaxing Thai Oil Massage.
As we are still exhausted from trekking we are definitely not brave enough for a traditional (and very rough) Thai Massage… Yet.. But we’re looking forward to getting one when we are more relaxed in the islands!
As for our oil massage, it definitely added to a relaxed day with the rest of the afternoon spent by the pool.

day 1
Our day began with an early start, alarm clocks set for 7am, breakfast half 7, packing 8am, bag check and check out 8.15 and then picked up at 8.30.
After getting in the bmp (our tour company) open back truck, we headed to the bmp lodge to pick up the rest of our jungle trekking crew, soon to be known as the chang gang, and headed up to the jungle.
On the way we stopped off at a local 7/11 and market to stock up on fruit and water for the journey and then reloaded the truck and set off towards the jungle.
Our trek started with.. A trek. I don’t think any of us realised how strenuous jungle trekking would be. 30 plus degree heat, backpacks, up hill through a jungle, our tour leader, machete in hand, clearing the path way for us to walk. After about an hour of beautiful scenery we came to a small Thai temple. All of the trees leading up to the point of prayer were tied with orange ribbons – the colour of the monks.
Soon after the temple we arrived at a small water fall, our first cooling down point of the day. We swam in the water fall and cooled down under the fountain until we were called in for lunch – vegetable rice wrapped in a giant leaf and tied with a piece of straw – and it was delicious! After about another hours walking we arrived at an even bigger waterfall with a cave behind the actual fall of the water where you could stand.
Here we swam and cooled off again before completing our last trek to a village high up in the mountains where we would be staying the night.
Dinner was made for us by the locals, delicious green curry, steamed vegetables, noodles and rice and after an evening of talking round the campfire we all went to our little huts so spend our first night.

day 2
After waking up to hot toast and scrambled eggs, again made by the locals whose village we’d slept in that night, and discussing who had had the fewest hours sleep due to the freezing conditions up the mountain and the cockerel that decided to cockadoodledoo at about 5am, we headed off for day two of trekking. The serious hiking day. This day was our biggest and most strenuous in terms of tackling the jungles terrain. After visiting a local school, we walked accross farm lands, marsh lands, up steep sand hills, across rivers, bridges, through waterfalls and even walked in an ants trail across the different levels of the rice paddy until about 3 hours later we arrived at our lunch destination: A small village located right at the top of a very steep hill – granted it took us a long time to get there and we all collapsed at the top but it was worth it for the view! After a very very very long lunch of super noodles, coca cola and lots of water, we headed off again to trek some more! The afternoon hike, although long was not as hard, as it was mostly downhill and soon we arrived at the village where we would be spending the night. A desolate village right next to a small waterfall and wide river.
Dinner on this night was chicken and potato curry with roasted pumpkin and green beans, again an amazing meal made by the locals.

day 3
Day three in the jungle only included one solitary hour of walking, something that everyone was very pleased with. We started off the day with our first and only trek down to a road where we all piled into the back of an open-back truck (all fifteen of us) and headed off to see the elephants. Here we enjoyed an elephant ride and got to feed them sugar cane, it was actually quite sad to see them chained up but we were reassured that they are well looked after and we decided that we’d rather them walk around a paddock holding people then get exploited for their tusks!
After our elephant ride we reloaded the truck and headed off to our lunch spot – more delicious local food! And then again back in the truck, this time bagless and clothless (with bikinis don’t worry) as we were heading off to go rafting!
The rafts were five bamboo sticks wide floating devices which were very long and sat four people in a line behind one Thai man and a bamboo stick who pushes us along. The rafting journey started off quite peacefully until we came across locals bathing in the river, thinking it would be hilarious to splash us and try and tip us in! Then the journey got even more adventurous when the calm river turned into white rapids and our raft got faster and faster making it’s way between the rocks and narrow streams!
After a relaxing, exciting and quite scary at times raft journey we arrived back safety!

After the rafting, those who wanted got the opportunity to travel up to see the long neck tribe, a Burmese tribe who live secluded in the mountains and have the local tradition of wearing gold rings around their necks. They add an extra ring for every year that they live and so soon their necks stretch to the extent that if they took the rings off, their necks would collapse. So two of the couples that I had met while trekking, another girl I had just met and I travelled up to visit them and to learn about their culture! It was a truly amazing experience seeing the tribe and although it was sad to see how isolated they are by the other Thais, they were very friendly women and little girls, who were happy to show us their beautiful necklaces and pictures of their relatives with even longer necks. Now I know why they are nicknamed the giraffe women!

This evening Juliet and I honestly didn’t think we could eat another bite of Thai food and so went for a quick Italian before having a very needed shower – it’s extremely hard to stay clean in the jungle… But we have had a great three days and experienced a jungle trek we will never forget!

On arriving in Chaingmai, delayed by two hours, we got an open back taxi to our hotel in Chiangmai. A quaint hotel with a big pool and kind staff welcomed us and after leaving our stuff in our room and changing we headed down to the pool.
Literally as I arrived by the pool I suddenly felt very hungry and quite sick so I ordered some lunch. Feeling very much worse I tried to go inside where it was cool but my eyes went black on the way and I collapsed. A very scary experience, triggered (I think) by exhaustion from the train, dehydration and hunger, but I came around in the cool hotel lobby with some mint inhaler type smell being wafted under my nose and surrounded by little Thai people fanning me. It’s actually quite funny when I think back on it, also because I think I fell on top of a poor little Thai lady! After eating some food and drinking some water I felt much better and ready to sunbathe!
This evening Juliet and I headed into the city and were pleasantly surprised by how different it is to Bangkok! It’s a lot more open, more chilled and has a completely different vibe to it. The chilled atmosphere surrounds a central square with street food venders and street musicians. We bought some Pad Thai off a street stall for 40baht (about 70pence) which was honestly the best pad Thai I’ve ever eaten! Then we shared a Nutella rotee (Thai equivalent of a pancake) as it’s pancake day on England!

So all in all, first impressions of Chaingmai are very good! And we’re looking forward to coming back to this city in a few days.
Having an early(ish) night tonight as we have to be up at 7am tomorrow to head off on a 3 day and 2 night jungle trek! Let’s see what that part of Chaingmai has to offer! ☺️

Yesterday we had the once in a life time experience of seeing The Calypso Ladyboy Show, a musical slash entertainment slash comedy where the greatest lady boys of Thailand dressed up in elegant dresses (and not so elegant ones), bikinis and even very revealing diamanté pieces. There were also men in bikinis (that was quite bizarre). Unfortunately Juliet and I were extremely tired having not slept properly in the last 24 hours and so had to face the ‘my fair ladyboy’ musical while trying to keep our eyes open, but it was a great experience and even the theater was dressed up for the occasion with red velvet seats beside small tables with gold and red lamps, there was even a red carpet on entrance.

The journey home was also an experience as the taxi driver demanded 600baht even though the journey there was 200 and we literally had no choice and so after a hard (and generous on his behalf…not) barter to 500 baht we started our journey back to our hostel. On the way, a huge amount of the roads were shut off or had police or police camps blocking them, again due to the riots, and so it was quite difficult to get back, however we did eventually make it back (and our taxi driver demanded 600 booh but we were just happy to be able to finally go to bed!) It’s like stepping into a different world when arriving at Kohsan road as it is filled with families, backpackers and holiday makers, every bar was full with loud music and every market stall had customers. (It even woke us up enough to make a list of what we want to do on our travels, play cards, and enjoy our personal radio we could hear very loudly from out of our window!)

Today, having made the decision to leave Bangkok, we had a lovely lie in, got some late lunch and headed to the train station to board our sleeper train to Chiangmai. There was an eery feel to Bangkok due to the riots, I feel like it’s more in my head than actual life but I’m glad I got to experience Bangkok with my family a few years ago and happy to have spent a night on the very buzzy and completely uneery Kohsan Road.

I am now on the sleeper train, second class, top bunk, tucked up in my bed (slash mattress thing), with my bunk curtain as my door, my suitcase wired to the staircase next to me and the two train attendants right outside having a nice natter. We have spent the first part of the journey trying to talk to the two Italians opposite but when the language barrier failed us, Juliet and I watched two films, had some dinner and as it’s now 11.45 are planning on getting some sleep… How that plan will work out is yet to be found out. (Trains rock around quite a lot, I never realised!)

Very much looking forward to the next part of our journey!

After what seemed to be a very quick flight from Dubai to Bangkok (as we were sleeping) we arrived in Bangkok… Finally!! We went through a very slow customs line to find our brand new backpacks on the conveyer belt, waiting to be worn. After backpacking-up (big one on the back, small on the front) we lugged ourselves and our luggage to the taxi rank.
We were definitely scammed on our first taxi ride into the city – 500thai baht and he covered the metre with a cloth, even though there were signs everywhere stating to pay via metre! Although it seemed like a lot, the journey was quite lengthy and he took us and our backpacks safely to our destination.
After walking down Koh San road, the backpacker haven of Bangkok, we found a hostel that we’d heard of and booked for two nights. After a very happy change out of our black jeans and hoodies, into shorts and tee shirts more appropriate for the 30degree heat, we headed out to explore the markets.
Quickly putting our bartering skills to good use we managed to buy some sunglasses and baggy cotton trousers at very discounted prices! (Two happy girls right here).

Then after ignoring about a dozen tuck tuck drivers shouting at us to go with them, we got drawn in by one very excitable man, promising to take us to three temples, swearing that we could only go today as tomorrow there are riots planned. Two of the three temples turned out to be blocked anyway because of the riots, so after exploring the golden mount temple, a beautiful temple on a hill surrounded by greenery and rivers, we headed to the travel agents to book the next part of our adventure.

We’ve made the decision to leave Bangkok tomorrow, even though we paid a whopping £7 for tomorrow nights room, as a lot of what we would want to do here is unavailable to us due to the riots. We heard that a lot of Thailand are heading up to ChangMai just like us, as there is a flower festival there at the moment and so going to the travel agents was a good move since we now have our trains, ferrys, hotel and jungle treck all booked.
Currently waiting in the travel agents as someone from the train station is driving here on a motorbike to bring us our tickets that we just paid for! Very bizarre!

And so it begins, the 5 months of travelling we’ve all been waiting for!
The start was not so great, a 9.30am flight from gatwick means a 7.30am check in at gatwick… Which means a 5am wake up. But the morning swiftly improved with some back pack photos before checking in and heading off for a BIG last breakfast with the family. A great start to our travels and a good way to say bye to the family.

Luckily for me, I wasn’t alone in saying bye and the fact that Juliet was in the same position as me helped keep back the tears!! So with some long hugs and then a second round of swifter ones (or I definitely would have cried – holding back tears at this point) we headed off to airport security…. In the wrong direction! A quick turn around sorted that (we’ve very on the ball and ready for travelling) and finally (and thankfully) made it to the plane in one piece. (First mission accomplished!)