Braving another bus out of Bangkok, we found ourselves many hours later in the city of Chiang Mai, north Thailand. Booking into one of the many guesthouses, we quickly book ourselves in for a night of Muay Thai boxing - apparently a very vicious martial art. Unfortunately this was let down by the apparent amateurish play acting we saw, however it did finish well with three guys entering the ring blindfolded which was good comedy.
As most people do when they come to Chaing Mai, we organised a trek up into the jungle mountains and up to the hill tribes. Joining 10 others (a good mix of Dutch, Canadian, Chilean, French, Spanish, English, Australian and Romanian) we started early in the morning by all squashing into a jeep and heading out of town a couple of hours.
We started the trek by all getting on some elephants, where I was able to jump on the head and be a mahout which was great! After which we trekked up through the jungle to our first hill tribe where we met the local hill people. "Lovely Jubbly" seemed to have permeated their vocabulary and they sang us some traditional songs on their local instrument. We taught them one of ours as we all renditioned Happy Birthday many times for one of the "Moms" on our trek.
The next two days consisted of more trekking through the dense jungle, frolicking in the many waterfalls on the way, staying at another hill tribe, and then bamboo rafting for a couple of hours down the river which was great fun. Stopping at a village on the road for lunch, we found Song Kran had started early and we soon got involved in heavy warfare of water throwing with the locals.
Coming back into Chiang Mai we needed to celebrate our achievement by a big get together and painting the town red. The next day was dedicated to taking it easy and checking out the local Sunday market. Some market! There were thousands upon thousands of people there - it was immense. And I got my first look at the response to the national anthem. Amongst all the hustle and bustle of noise, the anthem was heard playing over the loudspeakers, and I swear you could hear a needle drop. Everybody stood up and froze for the entire duration - it was kind of eerie in such a busy place to have everything stop dead still.
Then, we prepared for war! Song Kran (Thai New Year and water throwing festival) was beginning. This festival kills many every year as bikers have buckets thrown in their face as they cruise past, its easy to see why there are so many accidents. But man, it was so much fun! Everyone was out, buckets and waterguns at the ready. Standing by the moat and by the roads all soaking everyone in so much dirty water. It was hilarious fun, but I made the mistake of falling in the moat and having a swim - that water is not the most sanitary going around - I fell sick the very next morning.
So, leaving Chiang Mai we took the bus, the boat and another boat over three days to make it into Luang Prabang, Laos. Arriving in Luang Prabang, we found accommodation hard to come by, as Laos New Year had just begun - they celebrate this exactly the same way! So again, we check in and deck ourselves out, ready for more war. These guys are very festive in their celebration with a parade and then covering everyone in flour, charcoal, water, food dye and even egg. Having our first taste of this, the next day we hired a truck and all jumped in the back - declaring war on anyone we drove past.
The Laotions are so much fun and very laid back. Always smiling and having fun and without any pretenses at all - I really enjoy being here. Luang Prabang has French architecture everywhere and feels just like a French provincial town - easy to fall in love with. The festival is now over and this place is just so beautiful and the locals so friendly.
Yesterday we (have formed a nice crew here) taxied out to Kuang Si Falls which are a multi tiered waterfalls as well as a bear and tiger sanctuary at the bottom. The waterfalls are stunning and dip into bright torquise water. At the top we ran into some very friendly monks and we did some cliff dives with them into the water which was awesome.
Tomorrow I think I will move on to Vang Vieng and get stuck into some tubing! Will follow this up next time. ;)
