Last Days in Thailand

I drank instant coffee (with sugar in it) and my spork broke. Only those of you that understand and appreciate the beauty of a spork know what I am talking about.. . .

Our time in Thailand is drawing to a close. We will probably be here for about four or five more days then we are off to Cambodia. Not sure how our planned border crossing will go (I suspect not that smoothly) but it will save some backtracking - which I hate - and will allow us to go to at least one of Thailand's famous beaches.

We spent the last six days travelling to Chiang Mai, trekking in Chiang Mai and returning from Chiang Mai. The trek was quite touristy but fantastic. It was only three days and not arduous by any stretch of the imagination.

We had a bit of an elephant ride - big fan of elephants, would really like one. . . .then trekking and bamboo rafting which was surprisingly good fun. We stayed in bamboo hut type things which were very cool and the food was amazing. We met some nice people on the trek who we are hoping to freeload off in the not too distant future! Gotta love networking. . . .We went swimming at some beautiful waterfalls and saw some amazing scenery.

However, we were both quite challenged by the environmental (or lack of) considerations during the trek. It didn't spoil our experience but made us wonder how sustainable those trips will continue to be.

Our return to Bangkok was kind of fun in a really loud, uncomfortable, shaky, dirty kind of way. The train was a local overnight sleeper which is funny because neither of us remember sleeping really. A few times I thought we were going have a crash / did have a crash. Quite a painful tripreally. This does not bode (my favourite word of the trip) well for the Transiberian Rail!!!! Originally we were going to try and get to Ko Chang today but decided to spend a night in Bangkok to rest and relax and send emails before the next adventure. We are staying in a reasonable guesthouse for about $9AUD . . all good. We had three hours sleep this morning after the train extravaganza and have had nothing else to do all day. A rarity for us while we are on holidays. The adventure starts again tomorrow. . .early . . .who knows how far we will get. Bangkok seems unseasonably cool today which is a welcome surprise.

We have registered our Cambodia trip with DFAT and will try to continue update the registration as we go. Skype has been going pretty well but not all of the internet cafes have it so we have to search for it. Good to talk to Peta and Bwett and Jen today - reception was bad though. . . .