Arriving in Bangkok was a little intimidating, after heavy travel I just wanted my bed so stuck to the hotel restaurant rather than exploring. All the Thailand Gadventures trips start from the Bangkok Centre Hotel, located close to the main train station. The hotel was more than I expected with reasonably priced food, clean, decent sized rooms, a pool and free wifi.
Prior to the first group meeting and investigating the area using Triposo I found the golden buddha, the world's largest solid gold statue - Wat Traimit just a short walk from the hotel and on the corner of China Town.
The group meeting was held on the evening with First our tour guide, who gave us an overview of the trip. The next morning before leaving for Chiang Mai we explored Bangkok via a boat trip down the canals with a stop off at Wat Pho, the reclining Budha.
We were upgraded to flights for the journey to Chiang Mai as during the wet season trains are derailed. In the evening we arrived at the Chiang Mai Gate Hotel & tried some of the local street food and a bottle of Thai beer - Singha to kick off our trip.
Visiting the temple Doi Suthep, the golden temple and seeing the emerald budha was on the agenda whilst in Chiang Mai. The temples were always incredibly quiet and peaceful and it was interesting to learn that your feet should never be pointed towards a buddha as Thai people see feet as the lowest part of your body. We were given a bracelet by the monk and blessed with water on our cultural journey around Thailand.
Our trek guide Gan collected us the next day and took us to the local Mae Ma-lai market to buy the ingredients for cooking on our trek and gifts for the children. The heat was intense even so early, First coaxed us into trying silk worms and crickets from the market, which were unusual!
After stopping off at the Mok-Fha waterfall for a swim, we were dropped off at our hiking point in the afternoon ready for the 4km stretch of hills through the rainforest, avoiding mosquitos and leeches. We arrived in our first village and were greeted by children. The village had no electricity and we were cooked for by the people of the village, Gan and First who made a delicious green curry and rice. The thai style toilets and showers took a little getting used to but the trek was definitely one of the best parts of the trip.
Day two of the trek meant an early start, breakfast (or bre'fa as Gan used to say, so cute!) and trekking for four hours over 9km to get to the elephant camp. The group helped wash the elephants and ride them to the next village. Such calm creatures considering the sheer volume of them, although ours did take us over a ravine to grab bamboo - little scary. The next village on our trek was slightly larger and with our free time enjoyed a shower in the river and a log fire with games.
On our final day, we rode on bamboo rafts down the river through rapids. Apparently it was fairly quick (4 hours) and after lunching at our final stop, we were taken back to our hotel. A bonus for anyone going to Thailand, in Chiang Mai a bag of 4kg of washing cost only 140 baht to do, which is around 1.50 in GBP.
One of the best things I did whilst in Chiang Mai was the thai cooking class, through Smart Cooking. Albeit slightly hungover, we were collected from our hotel and taken to the local market. Mid journey we were chased down the street by a slightly mad looking woman who turned out to be Pear - our chef for the day who explained all the ingredients. After selecting our menus, we went to prepare our food. My choices included hot and sour prawn soup, thai red curry, chicken and cashew nuts and spring rolls. This was possibly some of the nicest food I ate in Thailand, Thai chefs use an array of ingredients for the curry pastes and cook fast and hot.
Chiang Mai is definitely an area I'd return to in Thailand. The people are warm and food delicious, with a whole heap of buddhas thrown in.
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