Day Trek and More - Chiang Mai

So picture the scene. In the jungle hills surrounding the city of Chiang Mai, there is a river. Not dissimilar in size to The Dee when it's a good bit full, very peaceful, a nice gentle flow. Now take eight trunks of bamboo and tie them together with a rather dubious piece of material, place it on the river and there you have an afternoon of fun. We were bamboo rafting down the Mae Wang river.
From the pictures we had seen, it looked like a very relaxing cruise down the river, admiring the countryside....oh how we were wrong. Their moto is "more wet more fun", you can guess what it was like. Basically you have four people to a raft with a guide at the front with a long stick to steer. What we were not warned about was the craziness of the the guides. Ours in particular (who later called himself 'Mr Professional') was intent on getting us as wet as possible. With the help of his comrade on the raft behind us (his rafters were a little tame, not really aprreciating the wetness) would hit the water with their sticks creating a huge splash from all angles. Their particular favourite was to tip the raft. Unbeknownst to us, the guide from the other raft would step onto ours at the back and signal to our guide at the front and they would put all their weight on one side to tip the raft causing Emma and I plus the other two girls on the raft to clamber to the opposing side to tip stop from tipping. It was so fun! The two guides got great delight in mocking our girlish squeals.
The river had little rapids which would have been pretty tame in any other vessel but on these things, every bump was a thrill! The guides also loved shouting "crocodile!" so we would look their way and not see them about to give us another huge soak. Very clever. At the start we had been told that at one point we would have to get off the raft and walk a little as a bit of the river was too strong. We saw loads of people walking along the bank as we came near to this part, a small passage between two massive rocks, eek! The funny thing was our guide didn't even give us the option to get off, he just pulled in, waited for the path to be clear and off we went. We had seen the raft before us go down and guide almost fell in! As we went down the raft was so low in the water, the water was up to our waists, is was ace!
Once we began to relax again, we saw up ahead elephants crossing the river. Even though we'd been on one in the morning (that's another story) it was amazing looking up at them as we cruised past. The incredible thing was they were given a command to stop walking so we could go past and they just stopped dead, their legs still in mid walk, and didn't move a muscle, wow.
So far this experience has been the highlight for me, it was just so much fun in beautiful surroundings.

Thai Farm Cooking - Chiang Mai

So today we thought we'd see a bit more of the Thai culture and went out into the country for a day spent learning to cook Thai. It wasn't something I had planned on doing but we saw a brochure for it and thought it looked like some fun.
We were picked up from our hostel and then before we got to the farm, we stopped at the local food market to pick fresh ingredients for the day. Our guide/chef was called 'Nice' and she explained the different products and what to choose when thinking about cooking something Thai. The market had everything from rice to spices to dried fish to pigs heads (I took a picture but i'll refrain from putting it on here, might scare some people away!)
Once we had a look around the market we headed up to the farm. It was set in such a beautiful location and it was so peaceful. The plan was to make 5 dishes, three to have at lunchtime and two to take home....so we were basically eating the whole day! The farm uses a lot of its own ingredients so we were shown around the garden and a little bit about the vegetables/herbs etc.


And then the cooking began...There were ten of us altogether and we each had our own little station although the we made our curry paste (which I made from scratch!) outside on the deck, it was so pretty!

So anyway, by lunchtime I had made Red Curry, Thai Vegetable Soup and Chicken and Cashew Stir Fry...and that was lunch! There was so much food and (not to blow my own trumpet here) it was really good. Because we were so full from lunch, we had an hours rest to walk around thegrounds and relax. It was great to talk to the other guests too and hear all about their travels.

In the afternoon we were to make another two meals, Phad Tai and Coconut Sticky Rice with Mango, probably my favourite two, the mango here is soooo yummy. You could choose which dishes to make so Emma and I chose different ones so when we return we're going to cook and impress you all with our new culinary skills!

Bangkok and Chiang Mai

Well it's been a long time coming but the time is finally here for me to start my blog, yay! (Hope you're all excited!)

Our first stop was Bangkok and what a cool place to start. We decided to just embrace our obvious touristness(!) and head for the main sites on our first day. Our hostel was a wee bit out of the centre which was actually really good as it meant we had to take the Skytrain (monorail) everywhere so saw a lot of the city. So day 1, we jumped on the Skytrain and headed towards the river, west of the city to get a boat that dropped you off at different places. We had a look around Chinatown and then hopped back on the boat to go to the Grand Palace, the Kings residence. What we didn't know was something was going on there. There were loads of people about, not just tourists but locals too lined up along a road inside the grounds, just waiting. So we thought we'd join in. We took a seat and waited too. After about 15mins some soldiers marched past and then a few cars drove by...and that was it. Must have been someone special but we still have yet to find out who it was! I'm going with the King though. The Temple within the grounds was absolutely stunning, everything was just glistening in the sun.

On day 2 we headed for the market. Not just any market though, Chatuchak Market which according to our guide book has over 8000 stalls! Wow, it was enormous! We kind of got a bit lost in it. Everywhere you looked there were passage ways and little corridors, it was so much fun. Beside the market was a park so once we manged to find the exit we bought some fruit and sat out for a little while. We spent a lot of time just walking around the city, trying to see as much of the culture as possible, from the historical temples and shrines to the markets and shopping centres (which were incredible!)

On Monday we took a bus up to Chiang Mai. It took us about 12 hours, but the journey was a great way to see the countryside and we were supplied with snacks throughout (a bun filled with Thai custard....a bright green paste, was one of the delights, yum!) , including a stop for lunch at something which resembled a service station. We almost got off at the wrong stop much to the despair of the lady incharge of the bus but thankfully she was there to keep us straight. Once we got to the right stop in Chiang Mai we got a Tuk-Tuk to our hostel (our driver had a friend from Aberdeen!) . Day 1 in Chiang Mai began with a walk around the city exploring different areas. Its a much nicer city to be in than Bangkok, because of its size and location. We found a few more temples to look at and then we were going to up into the hills to the biggest temple when we were stopped by a man from Japan. We chatted to him for a bit just about what we were up to and what he was doing in the city and when he found out we were from Scotland he said his wife from Aberdeen. He couldn't believe it when we told him that's where we were from. He told us not to go up to the temple because today something was happening with new young boys joining the Temple (kind of an initiation ceremony I think) and that in the evening they would march through the streets. It was happening tonight because it was a full moon. So in the evening, we posistioned ourselves strategically in a restaurant to see the boys march but we saw nothing. Still not too sure if we misunderstood because there was no sign of this big ceremony at all! So we ended up going to the night market (called Night Bazar) which was alot of fun. I'm really getting in to bartering in the markets, you get some good banter with the locals. It was a crazy place, packed with tourists, I think we spent about 2 hours walking around this market. It's just so hard trying not to buy anything!

I could go on but I'll just say a few more things:

1. The Thai people are incredibly patriotic. Everywhere you look there are photos, paintings and structures of the King. We've even seen a lot of people wear bands (the coloured rubber type) that say Long Live The King.

2. Since coming here we've heard that Thailand is called Land of Smiles...and it really is! The people here are amazing. They are so friendly and especially helpful. There have been a number of times when people have helped us out (including stopping the traffic for us...you've no idea how hard it is to cross the roads here!)

3. Thai food is amazing!!! And it's so cheap. The smells when you walk past the street vendors are so incredible...coconut, mango, all kinds of spices mmmmm.