Dec. 29, Chiang Mai

Greetings from Northern Thailand. The night bus from Bangkok was scheduled to depart at 9:50 PM, but instead re-parked a few spaces down, started a very C-rated Thai flick, and served cookies and milk and waited for an hour for us to digest before actually heading out. We joked that many people might have enjoyed the entertainment and meal while staying stationery.

Chiang Mai is the 2nd largest city in Thailand, but is a lot smaller than Bangkok and less noisy. We are staying at Pun, Pun Guest House which is on the river a little outside of town, but still within walking distance. Yesterday the 3 of us walked around Chiang Mai. Had lunch at a British Pub and then Richard treated us to massages. We are getting spoiled having Liz's parents around which is very nice! In the evening Jeff climbed the huge climbing wall - he boogied up to the top within 2 minutes and since the harder routes were only for lead climbing decided instead to save his climbing baht budget for the beaches. Afterward we went to the night market, ate and walked around.

Because the food at the night market was so good we are actually here again eating tonight. Today Jeff and Liz went on an all-day trek outside of town. The trek went by a number of waterfalls. Liz swam or should I saw dipped and froze in one of them. We also went by two villages that had seen too many tourists as the kids were asking for money and one pesky one kept trying to pick-pocket Jeff. Lastly we saw a bat cave that was really neat. We walked far inside and could hear the bats surrounding us. Jeff thought it was pretty cool until our guide pointed out a huge spider that was much closer to us. Today Liz's Dad went to another market in Chiang Mai and ended up talking to a guy that recommended he go this annual flower show out from town where Asian countries have their typical gardens and flowers on display. He said it was huge and analogous to Epcott Center.

Tomorrow we leave for Chiang Dao by local bus. Hopefully we can update the blog again soon. We'll be in Chiang Dao for the New Year and have already gotten emails from various hostels there asking if we'd like to book our New Year's Eve celebration with them.

Happy holidays - Love Liz and Jeff