Back in Thailand

So here we are in tourist-town Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. After Laos everything seems so easy - nice hotel, proper plumbing, more English spoken and people vying for your custom, rather than having to be woken up. Everything laid on for the easy life.

Chiang Mai has lots of temples, but without the bright paintings of Cambodia and Laos. Packed with places to stay, eat and drink and lots of places wanting to arrange treks/trips. And a fair scattering if girlie bars and massage parlours.

Spent a day at an elephant camp and learned a few words of mahout: go, turn, back and stop. Then had to take an elephant round a figure-of-eight course. Went on a short ride in the afternoon, but not sure who was in charge! Then had to wash and scrub the elephant - bigger than a car. Spent the night there. Great experience.

Next day played in a waterfall, did a bit of not-very white-water rafting then floated down on a bamboo raft. Ended in a touristy village of long-necked Karen tribe women - bizarre!

Ambling around the back streets in search of somewhere not touristy to eat, came across a fantastic Yunnanese (SW China) restaurant - yum! Best food in Chiang Mai.

Then south to Sukhothai, a small town with an old ruined 14th century city nearby. Found a good guesthouse with pool (35C here). Old city much bigger and better than expected, really on a grand scale with buildings mostly of small bricks. Needed cycles to get around and even then didn't see it all, just the best bits.

Spent next two days on a motorbike touring around, first north to Si Satchanalai, another ruined town, slightly smaller but still amazing, and only a couple of other tourists. Very little infrastructure for foreigners here. Lovely textiles made here. Found the only guesthouse in the new town and managed to eat.

Amazing second day there! Heard about a possible monk ordination on elephant-back. Hung around the wat (temple) where monks were being dressed in superb costumes. Wandered down the main street and elephants were arriving. We had the T-shirts and got grabbed by the red-and-white team who insisted we join them dancing down the street to their band and being plied with Thai whisky. After all had arrived we had another grand procession in the afternoon, more dancing, drinking and the added bonus of regular drenching with water!