We arrived in Chiang mai about 7am and headed for our hostel which was called City Capsule Hostel. The man who runs it was so lovely and so helpful organising trips and taxis for us and giving us recommendations for things to do. We had booked our cooking class for the evening session so we spent the morning exploring the town, looking at the temples (wat phra Singh, wat Chiang man and chedi luang) and had lunch in one of the cafes which Chiang Mai is famous for. It was called into the woods and it was fairytale theme and it was pretty cute. It was perfect for becki though so she loved it. The town itself seems pretty odd. In the centre is the old town which is a square and is where we're staying and there doesn't seem to be a real main area there, its all very spread out so you have to walk quite a way sometimes to find somewhere to eat.
The cooking school we booked into is called Basil Cookery and Apple (the lady who teaches the classes) picked us up from the hostel at 3. We were in a class with a couple who were lovely and two ladies from New York, one of them was lovely, the other was quite irritating. Before starting cooking Apple took us to Somphot market and talked us through the ingredients we would be using in the class. The classes were based in a sort of side kitchen to her house and when we arrived she gave us each a pair of slippers and an apron to wear. The course was split into 6 types of dishes - appetisers, noodles, curries, stir fry, soup and dessert - and from each course you could choose one dish out of three to learn to cook and then you ate it after. We all chose fairly similarly because we aren't the most adventurous. I chose spring rolls, pad Thai, Penang curry, cashew nut stir fry, coconut milk soup and mango with sticky rice. The only real differences between the four of us was in dessert and in curries. Becki and Amy had a green curry and Katie and Becki had fried banana for pudding. It was all delicious and so good to see how it was all made. The biggest surprise was how much sugar goes into everything, so it turns out we have been more unhealthy than we realised.
Monday night was also Chinese new Year so after the school when we are all definitely full from our six course dinner we headed into China town to see the celebrations. It was quite a small chinatown so there wasn't too much going on but there were a couple of stages with people singing and dancing and we watched what seemed to be a talent competition with some adorable Thai children.
Tuesday morning we were up early for a day trip to Chiang Rai. We underestimated how much travel was involved in the trip so we spent most of the day on the minibus, but we did spend some time at the White temple which looked like a mix between Elsa's ice palace in frozen and a scene from Harry Potter but it was very cool. We also stopped at the black house which was a museum and it was very odd. There were two huge anacondas in a cage and crocodile skins lying about the place, not really sure what it was all about to be honest. The last stop was at the golden triangle which is where Thailand meets Laos and Burma. We decided against paying extra for the boat trip down the Mekong river to Laos because its basically what we'll be doing on Saturday when we leave Thailand so we just spent some time wandering around the small town there. When we got back we were all knackered but had forgotten it was pancake day and pancake stalls are everywhere in Thailand so we set out to find some. Sadly, by this point everywhere nearby was closed because it was about half 9 and since we didn't want to catch a taxi anywhere we decided to cut our losses.
Wednesday was the best day and a day we'd all been so excited about because we went to an elephant sanctuary. The original elephant sanctuary we had wanted to visit (elephant nature park) was fully booked so after some hefty research we decided to go to the Elephant Jungle Sanctuary because we had read about how well the elephants were treated there as opposed to some of the others you can visit. It was incredible. We spent the morning feeding the 6 elephants they have there. We fed them bananas and sugar cane and I had no idea how greedy and funny they are. One of the elephants also kissed me on the face with their trunk and I'm still not sure how I feel about it, it was the slimiest thing. After we'd had lunch (a buffet provided by the company which was pretty good) we took the elephants down to the mud river and then the waterfall to bathe them, it was adorable and we all got covered in mud. After that we were all sat in the shaded area watching the elephants and drying off and they all walked over to us desperately trying for more food, rooting through our bags with their trunks.
When we got back we headed out to the night market to get some dinner and have a look around. It took us a while to actually find the market and by that point we'd given in and eaten else where which was a shame but it was fine. I had some gyoza and finally got my pancake (which was disappointing anyway because he gave me the smallest layer of peanut butter possible), Kate had some Japanese chicken dumplings and some spring rolls, Amy had a pad Thai and Becki had a chicken skewer. After that we went to a bar to meet some people from the hostel and ended up spending the evening listening to one of them sing some songs with his harmonica and guitar - he was very cliché traveller.
We spent the next morning at doi sutep temple which is high up in the mountains. It was really lovely but sadly Chiang Mai is also known as the city of three mists, so although the weather has been lovely the views from the top were still clouded by the mist. In the afternoon we took a taxi to the 'grand canyon' of Chiang Mai. It was basically a manmade quarry that you can swim in and the water goes 40 metres deep so people jump from about 15m into it. As you can imagine none of us jumped from any heights but we took a swim around. In the canyon there are rafts that you can lay about on although getting them balanced with four people was a bit of a challenge and for some reason the three of us were fine until Becki tried to join in. It was like titanic and if Jack is anything like Becki I can see why Rose hogged the door.
A couple of our friends had arrived in Chiang Mai that morning so when we got back from the canyon we went for a quick dinner and went to meet them for a drink.
We were up very early for a day trip to Pai the next day leaving at 6.30am. The journey from Chiang Mai to Pai is 3 hours and the road is famous for being so bendy. There are t-shirts you can buy that say I survived the 763 curves from Chiang Mai to Pai so the whole way on the minibus you're thrown from side to side. Having said that it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be or as bad as I'd heard it was. Becki and I had invested 5 baht on some travel sickness pills but I'm not sure they were even really necessary, although I'm still glad I took them for peace of mind if nothing else.
We arrived in Pai about 10 am and headed straight for pombok waterfall. It was quite pretty but the water was absolutely freezing, painfully so, so we didn't spend long there. We took a small trek up and around instead and walked to the top of the waterfall. It was a bit of a scramble at times but more so on the way down. I managed the entire way up and all the way down and then slipped over on flat land at the bottom, it was typical.
After that we got a taxi to another - very different - canyon. There was no water in this on and it was made naturally and you just walk around it. Again there were some bits that were a bit trickier and much more scrambling but it was nice. We then spent the afternoon wandering around Pai and getting some lunch at one of the many cafes there. Pai is one of the places that people get stuck, they plan to stay a night and two weeks later they're still there and I can see why. It's such a lovely place and its a shame we couldn't spend longer there but we just don't have the time. We were all so tired when we got back, 763 curves later so we headed out to the night market (albeit a different one than expected) for a quick dinner. Seeing as its our last proper meal in Thailand we all went for . Amy and I had pad Thai and spring rolls, Kate had pad thai and Becki had sweet and sour chicken.
Tomorrow we head off for our long journey to luang prabeng which is going to take 3 days. We haven't heard the best things about the WiFi in Laos so I'm not sure how often I'll be able to update you all but I'll try!
Lots of love.
