About a year ago David and I couldn't wait to get married. One more month until a life time of marriage bliss, but also a long awaited trip to Thailand. We had two weeks to visit the ancient temples of Bangkok, the mountainous terrain of Northern Thailand as well as the pristine beaches of Southern Thailand. We accomplished 2/3 of our itinerary, but due to lack of time we realized we had to skip one part, which ended up being Northern Thailand. So no elephant ride for me!
A year later, here we are, in Southeast Asia and only a two hour flight to Chiang Mai, Thailand! With a three day weekend we accomplished exactly what we were not able to do last year and some more! The fun thing about returning to Thailand is the fact that we had been there once before. With so many places to visit, so many things to see and do we usually skip from one country to the other. This time we got both, a new place but same old Thailand. There's a warmth amongst the people, a slower pace of things. There is comfort in that.
On Saturday we arrived around noon, and got picked up by a tour company and headed 30 km north to visit an elephant camp where we got to ride on top of an elephant! It was not as exciting as we thought it would be, but now we can say that we rode an elephant! Ha! After a bumpy ox-cart ride and a quick float down the river on a bamboo raft we headed back to the hotel. On the way back we dropped by Tiger Kingdom to pet the tigers. You know how I look so comfortable in the picture? Well, I'm scared sh#$less that this animal is going to turn around an bite my hand off! I don't know what I was expecting, but hey! now I can say I pet a tiger! We end our night with a wonderful dinner which included three different curry dishes, one of them being frog legs! EEWW!! But tastes like chicken. Opposite the restaurant was a night market where we watched a fire dancer almost burn his face off and taste tested all sorts of foods at the hawker stalls.
Sunday morning I wake up early and ask David in good spirits, "are you ready for some breakfast? We've got a long bike ride today!" David replies with, "umm, I'm kind of still full from last nights food binge.." I should've called the downhill mountain biking company right then and there to tell them we were not able to go, because there has to be something wrong with David if he says he doesn't want to eat! And yes, I am right! There is something wrong with him, because David ate the wrong thing last night. It must have been the sausage! Urggh, food poisoning. I experienced that in Borneo!
Being tough Dave, we continue our mission to ride down the tallest mountain 5700 ft in Thailand, and it was a continuous struggle. Imagine while extremely sick, exercising for 5 hours straight! One hill after the other.. Thank goodness we arrived safely at the bottom of the mountain and David gets an award for pushing himself so much. Personally, besides worrying that David was going to pass out on me, I thought it was a wonderful and exciting ride! The views were spectacular. At parts we had to pick up our bikes and hop from rock to rock in order to cross a creek. Finally at the bottom we rode (very fast) through small towns and crop fields, and watched the local people hard at work. Nice stuff. I would love to go back and do it all over again! Next time David only gets to eat bread and water beforehand. He! He!
Posted on Flickr are more pictures of our weekend
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