Sawasdee Ka!

Monday - 9 June 08

Hello to everyone out there still reading this blog daily. Today has been a brilliant day. We have seen so many things that were beautiful, funny and awe inspiring. We have been entertained to the max today, let me tell you.

Rick and I were both up early this morning as this was our big day of really going places and seeing things. We had our driver with car that took us only where we wanted to go to see what we wanted to see and let me say its the best way of doing it. Our driver was a really nice and friendly gentleman who runs the small travel agent in our hotel and he was very informative, easy to understand and answered all our questions.

First stop was the Butterfly and Orchid farm and that was really nice and the colours of the butterflies and orchids were absolutely beautiful. I took heaps of photos but don't know what I did cause I lost the photos of the internal memory and the memory card. Bugger! Why don't they make cameras idiot proof for people like me.

Next stop was the Maesae Elephant Camp and what a treat! It was wicked! First we watched the Elephants have their bath and swim in the creek and they were so funny. They had 2 people standing down a little bit further in the creek with baskets to catch the elephant poo as the end of the creek is a waterfall which services the town below. What a shitty job!

For the next hour we were in stitches watching these elephants, they did their tricks and the baby ones were so funny with the hoola hoops, then the older ones had a game of soccer and man can they kick that ball, they had one of the bigger elephants as the goalie and he was showing off, of course. Then they all set up their tressles and painted and the pictures when they finished were awsome. You could buy their actual painting but you had to get in quick as they were lining up before the show was even over to buy them.

We then met our driver back at the main entrance and he drove us to Doi Suthep temple which apparently is on the highest mountain in Chiang Mai. It was a nice drive up the mountain along the windy roads and it reminded me a bit of driving through the Sunshine Coast hinterland. This temple really was something, I have been to hundreds of Buddhist, Chinese and Hindhu temples over the years but this one really took our breath away, the energy and atmosphere was something out of this world. Our driver dropped us off at the entrance to the cable car and we caught the cable car to the top to the temple which took about 2 seconds. We the went to the lookout at the temple to take photos of Chiang Mai and until then I didn't realise how big a city Chiang Mai is. Its the second biggest city after Bangkok. Bangkok has 5 million people and Chiang Mai has 3 million. WOW!

We spent an hour walking around in the temple and watching the people giving their offerings and praying in front of the golden buddhas. We watched a couple of people receiving blessings from the monk in the main temple and then stopped and had an ice coffee at one of the many cafes there surrounding the actual temple. We did what I have always done and gave a donation in the donation box. I got some wicked photos. In all honesty you need at least half a day just at the Doi Suthep. Hopefully we can visit there again before we leave Chiang Mai.

On the way back our driver, Toa, pointed out a few places of interest as we went past them and I asked him many questions about the King and the Royal family which I find quite interesting. We got back to our hotel about 2.30pm and it was such a good day, we treated ourselves a quick Nanny & Poppy snooze. We were out and about again by 4.30pm. We caught a tuk tuk to the Airport Plaza shopping centre which is near the airport and man what a shopping centre. We went to the supermarket and got some supplies like more coffee, sugar, salt and of course our daily chocolate bar. Then Rick decided we should have KFC for a change for dinner to have a break from Thai food, which I agreed we needed. We walked around a couple of floors of the shopping centre and since we had a big day and it was getting dark decided to head home to the hotel, got ourselves a tuk tuk and were home in 15 mins. Rick is now lounging around ( probably asleep) or watching his beloved Bloomberg channel while I am down in the lobby doing emails and this blog.

Today was such an awsome day I really don't know how we are going to top it. Perhaps our visa run trip to Chaing Rai might do it but I doubt it. There is another blog before this one where I have posted a small sample of todays photos and as usual still not having any luck lining them up on the page so hope they don't look too messy. Anyway everyone its 10.30pm and I have to head down to the 7/11. Hope everyone is having a wicked long weekend even with the high fuel prices. Until tomorrow enjoy!