It is the last few days of our trip in Thailand. We will be sad to leave but are looking forward to the next part of our adventure, walking in India.

With that in mind we have always wanted to do the ‘monks walk’ along a rocky path through the forest to the Wat at 1060m near the top of Doi Suthep, one of the highest points in CM. This was the way the monks used to reach the temple at the top and still do, thousands on some occasions. It also passes our favourite temple Wat Pha Lat the ‘monastery at the sloping rock’ in the forest half way up.

This smaller temple is a real hidden gem; no crowds, food sellers and not many tourists. It’s not as bling and opulent as it’s big brother up the hill but is peaceful and serene with a waterfall in a very natural surrounding and a great view of the city below. It’s also a resting point half way up!!

The trail starts and after a few minutes uphill walking you are asked to enter your name at a little office, in case you get lost. The route is marked by strips of orange cloth attached to trees. You often see monks going up or coming down which is quite surreal and magical, wearing flip flops!

You need proper boots or trainers as the trail can be quite rocky and steep. You also need mosquito repellent as there are plenty of them about and at least a litre of water. We left early, 8 am, before the sun was too hot. The temperatures are now in the mid 30’s and rising with the humidity so early is best.

It took an hour to reach Wat Pha Lat clambering over roots and boulders along the way with some relatively steep bits. Passing small waterfalls and steep drops, stopping occasionally to look at lizards scuttling about and listening to birdsong (also to get our breath back).

We stopped at the small temple and used their facilities and had a quick sit down before tackling the more arduous second half up to the temple at the top. This part of the trail is more challenging and vertical in places and takes about an hour and a half. There are some tricky scrambles over rocks and big boulders and we took lots of breaks. At one point a guy in his 20’s just in a pair of shorts ran past us up the trail leaping over and around boulders. Gosh!! To add insult to injury he passed us on his way down and smiled as both times he found us sat on a rock catching our breath.

We eventually got to the top, 5.5 miles and 12,200 steps according to Chris and his Fitbit. We headed for a bite to eat and a sit down. We wished we had done the walk earlier on our trip. We climbed another 309 steps up to the entrance of the temple and had a look around . It was absolutely teeming with tourists unlike the wat below. It is Chinese New Year and very busy so we didn’t stay long and then jumped in a red bus and back to the city.

It’s the people of Thailand that make it such a magical place. They are friendly and inclusive with ready smiles, and a real sense of fun. The food and scenery is all fantastic but it’s the people that make us want to keep coming back again and again….

I thought I would like to talk a bit more about food as it’s everywhere here and it’s hard to resist. Which might explain my expanded waistline on my return home. A friend recently posted;

If I was run over on the road and they had to draw around my body it would be a circle!! If I stay here much longer it will be.

The food here is exceptional. It’s the freshest vegetables and meat or fish. Everything is bought and cooked the same day. You buy fish and frogs still alive from the market. The chickens are almost clucking. Thais would not entertain food that has a long shelf life or isn’t mega fresh.

If you buy meals to take home from the market they are normally about 50p (20 baht) and are packed in a small plastic bag, very deftly closed by a rubber band. There is a huge choice in take-away food.

There are a couple of places we frequent in the village. Friendly, very simple, great food.

We also go out to street food markets of which there are many dotted around the city. There are ‘street food tours’ you can go on but we do our own. They have many vendors and plastic tables and chairs arranged behind them on the side of the road. Like a very, very cheap Altrincham market night out (and far more interesting).

Here are a few of the dishes we really enjoy;

Pad se u. Thick flat noodles stir fried with Chinese kale and chilli with chicken, pork or shrimp

Pad Thai. Rice noodles, bean sprouts, tofu, spring onion, peanut, egg with chicken, pork or shrimp

Pad Kepow Kai Dow. Minced chicken or pork stir fried with holy basil and chilli with a fried egg on top (optional). It’s spicy.

Khao Pad. Fried rice with vegetables and meat

Penang curry with vegetables, meat or fish

Khao soi (egg noodle, yellow curry, chicken) with crispy noodles on top.

They cook pork until it is mega crispy with the crackling on and then really spice it up, it’s incredibly spicy. It’s lovely.

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Khao Kha Moo. Succulent pork leg served over rice with sides of pickled mustard greens and a chilli garlic sauce. Found at the Chang Phuak night market and served by this lovely cowboy hatted woman. Yee Hah

With most rice dishes you get a bowl of clear broth on the side which is also delicious.

Then there are all the soups;

Tom yum goong (spicy shrimp soup)

Tom Kha Kai (chicken in coconut soup)

Som Tum (spicy papaya salad)

And a whole raft of noodle soups with pork balls and assorted meats and veggies.

In northern Thailand there are lots of different hotter dishes than in the south, and some quite different.

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There are Chiang Mai sausages, Sai Oua, which are hot and spicy, every one is different and mostly home made. They are too lumpy for my liking, but tasty. There are sausages with vermicelli inside. They are all a ring shape like a big Cumberland sausage. You buy them by weight and they are on every market. Some market stalls more popular than others

My favourite snacks wandering round the markets are curry puffs. Crispy, flaky, buttery pastry. It’s like a mini Cornish pastie filled with salted chicken, taro or peas. Yum. Chris likes the coconut little round things hot off the griddle, not sure what they are but are delicious. Very nice lady on Worrorot market who makes them.

There are many temptations including the roti woman, in our village, who does the loveliest roti filled with egg and banana and drizzled with forest honey chopped up into chunks. I have just had one and I’m still sticky…and I don’t really eat sweet things!!

There are lots of sweet things wrapped up in a leaf, it looks like a milky jelly wobbly thing!

If you do get fed up with rice and noodles there are lots of places for western food. A good breakfast can be had at the UN Irish bar or a place called sausage King just out of the city. They supply all the bacon and sausages for the hotels and some supermarkets. It is run by a guy called Robert from Bolton, who cures all his own bacon and makes the sausages.

You can get French, Italian and all styles of European food here as well as Korean, Japanese and all the other world foods. It is a food lovers heaven.

The fruit here is lovely. Sweet juicy oranges, strawberries, tamarind, dragon fruit, grapes, pomelo, guavas, papaya, mango, avocados all grown locally. I should eat only fruit and leave the curry puffs alone.

No wonder we’re getting fatter!!!

It is an endless culinary delight here, love it but need to run round a bit more. Feeling hungry just writing this……

With only 2 weeks before we leave CM we thought we should visit a couple of places we haven’t been to before in the north. We packed a small rucksack and set off to Chiang Dao which is 90km away. We have wanted to go since last year.

We set off early and had a lovely trip stopping at a couple of places along the way. The scenery as you get further north gets very mountainous, different to the mountains around Chiang Mai. There are larger verdant valleys, full of crops and small villages bubbling with rural life. There were many enormous Buddhas and stupors glinting gold in the sun sat atop many hills, we stopped and looked at a few. Lots of wows spoken.

We arrived in Chiang Dao and headed for the cave. You have to have a guide (200 baht) who takes you in with a large kerosene lamp which gave an eerie light to the journey inside. Some of the caverns were enormous and some very tight places where you squeezed through really small gaps. We have been in many caves on our travels and without fail the guide always says; this is a horse, or elephant, or snake and they never really look like anything. This one had an elephants lung!!! It was fun and bigger than we thought it would be.

Doi Chiang Dao is one of the biggest mountains in Thailand and the cave is part of the mountain. A friend said to go through the wildlife sanctuary in the National Park which surrounds the mountain and ride all the way to the other side, around the base. It took 2 hours to get to the other side, the scenery was amazing. We stopped for lunch in a tribal village and word must have got out because lots of small children turned up to look at the ‘strange folk’. It was a good lunch and very entertaining surrounded by dogs, cats, chickens and children!!

I don’t think I have the words to describe it but the pictures do. The best scenic 4 hour bike ride ever.

We stayed just below the mountain in a small bungalow on a farm stay by a small river. There were only 3 bungalows, the other 2 had friendly Korean couples in. The bungalow was very simple but perfect and only £10 for the night. Breakfast was an omelette with tomatoes and onions, a large salad which was gorgeous and lots of toast and marmalade. All the produce was from the farm. The picture below is of the owners.

We were heading from Chiang Dao to the Burmese border. We stopped a few miles from the border at a little coffee shop. As we pulled up we could see the girl panic; oh no farang…… this happens a lot. She called her friend who spoke a little English and then relaxed. They are so kind they brought us bananas with our coffee and couldn’t do enough for us. We set off for the border.

There is a road that runs parallel to the border with Myanmar. It twists and turns and some really steep bits where I had to get off and walk to the top of the hill many times. We need a bigger bike!!! There are many hairpin bends and potholes. It made for an interesting ride especially when Chris informed me that the front brake wasn’t too clever. We went slowly which was good to take in the absolutely awesome scenery.

We came across the highest campsite in Thailand with the most breathtaking views across the mountain ranges. We have said we would like to stay there next year. The only problem is that it gets very cold at night and in the morning, you would have to take lots of warm clothes. After a full day on the bike we needed to get back to a town and get new brake pads. With help from a very friendly girl in a Honda garage we found a Yamaha agent who changed the brake pads £7, sorted. Only then did Chris tell me how worried he was about the brakes.

We had planned to go further which wasn’t possible because of the brakes so ended up back in Chiang Dao, just before dark looking for somewhere to stay. We didn’t want to be out on the mountain roads in the dark, it’s scary enough in the light. We looked on Expedia and got a very posh bungalow on a resort all mod cons for £20. It was a bargain last minute deal, should have been £60, it was lovely.

Before we left to come home we wanted to climb to the top of the mountain to see a temple called Wat Tham Pha Plong. It is 510 steps to the top and was well worth it. The Wat at the top is in a cave. All the way up the stairs are sayings pinned to trees:

I would put Chiang Dao second on my favourite places in Thailand, we will be back.

‘To me a mountain is a buddha. think of the patience, hundreds of thousands of years just sittin there bein perfectly perfectly silent and like praying for all living creatures in that silence and just waitin for us to stop all our frettin and foolin.”

― Jack Kerouac

The flower festival parade is in full swing. We see it’s on the TV in reception at the hotel as we are leaving and we manage to weave our way through road closures and tons of traffic to nab a parking space close to Thae Pae Gate. There are floats and dancers, bands and drummers in fantastic traditional and Hill Tribe costumes working their way round the city to their eventual destination of Nong Buak Hard Public Park on the far south west corner of the moat. We stand and take photos, along with hundreds of tourists and Thais jockeying for position for the best pictures.

I am amazed that no one ever loses their temper here, it is a Buddhist thing, I’m hoping it’s contagious and I will try and bring it home with me :-). People stand in front of people when they are trying to take a picture, people bump and bang into each other but no one gets wound up everyone is patient and kind, it’s lovely.

We then jump on the bike and head to the park which is on the opposite side of the city. We wander around taking in the vibrant colours and aroma of thousands of lillys and other aromatic flowers beautifully set out. A lot of work has gone into all the displays, it’s breathtaking. Set against a background of a small lake with bridges and fountains, a perfect backdrop for the show. This time of year is when all these blooms are at their most perfect.

The stalls on the outside of the park house all the entry’s for the competitions. There are bonsai, air plants, cacti, orchids and many others too numerous to mention. Fantastic bonsai and air plants, wish I could get one or two home.

There are lots of families with picnics and food stalls all around the park. It’s a proper family day out. Everyone who was in the parade is in the park taking a well earned breather after their long walk. I sat with these guys who were in the parade and were all very happy to have their photo taken, most of them Manchester United fans it was easy to persuade them…..The Flower Queen is chosen with everyone having consumed lots of liquid refreshments and eaten their fill. A good time is had by all.

We arrive back in the evening after eating and freshening up to see the festival in the dark. During the day we noticed thousands of lights around the displays and around the park. We were stunned by the amount of fairy lights and its transformation to an atmospheric, magical flower paradise. It’s amazing how lights can totally change the illusion. Fantastic.

All in all another fantastic flower show. Looking forward to number 43 next year. Many thanks to Chris for all the fantastic photos.

We can’t believe we have been in Thailand 60 days and now it is time to renew the visa. We got up early and drove the 20 minutes to a large shopping mall called Promenada where the immigration office is. You need photocopies of your passport, immigration card, entrance date, a photo and 1900 baht (£43). You then queue to give all this information and payment to an official who gives you a number. When they call out your number they then take another photo and then it is just a waiting game. Last year when we did this we got here at 9am and it was 4pm when we left. It was such a long stint we felt we had got to know a few people, also waiting, really well. Hurray, less than 2 hours this time, almost unheard of. What did help was knowing what they needed and we brought it with us rather than more queuing and doing it there. There are definitely less tourists here this year.

If you don’t want to renew in the office you can leave the country. If you fly back in you get 30 days, a waiver on arrival visa. If you enter the country by land you only get 15 days. If they didn’t have very strict visa requirements you would not be able to get into Thailand it would be teeming with long stay tourists. If you want to stay on a retirement visa you have to have income or cash in the bank.

Tonight a lunar event the Super Blue Blood Moon is about to happen in Asia, Australia and parts of the US. It is a full lunar eclipse and a Blue moon as it’s the second full moon of the month. The Blood moon is the red colour of the sunlight through the atmosphere and a Super moon as it’s as close as it gets to the earth and so is 7% bigger and 15% brighter. Here are some photos.

These photos were taken from the top of a building where Chris had sweet talked the security guy to let us go to the roof. The building was all ripped out ready for refurbishment but the stairs were intact. He very kindly led us to the top with his torch, even though I suspect he was a bit tipsy. Slowly we climbed 8 floors and chatted in broken English and any Thai words we could think of….. The moon was rising.

We had tried to get in our gym which is on the 7th floor to take pictures from their windows which fully open. The manager said we weren’t allowed to take photos because the Burmese Embassy was opposite and the police said no photos. Ok then…

The temple where we ended up to take more pictures is called Wat Suan Dok, which has a huge gilded dome. It has a large population of monks and is a large teaching Wat for both local monks and foreigners. A few local people had the same idea and turned up with their cameras to catch the spectacle. It was a good place to try and capture the image as there is lots of open space around it and the stupors are well lit.

Chiang Mai known as the ‘rose of the north’ hosts the annual ‘Chiang Mai flower festival’ this weekend. It is always at the end of the cool season, the first weekend in February. We came last year and it was fantastic. We missed the parade last year but we won’t this time. It starts from the train station and slowly makes its way to the Thai Pae Gate (one side of the moat) and has walking bands, floats and dancers. The dancers hand out flowers to people watching and later in the day they pick a ‘flower queen’. The park is transformed by flower displays, miniature trees, orchids, landscaping with waterfalls and patio plants all judged with prizes. The local grown damask rose is only found in CM. We are really looking forward to it. Here are a couple of pictures from last year and more to come.

After posting pictures on FB from Ayutthaya, a friend said there were some ancient ruins just 10 minutes from CM. We looked it up, Wiang Kum Kam, and decided to go having never been to that area. There were lots of flattened ruins in amongst shops and houses, suburbia had grown around the many sites. The main and most complete ruins are next to a big Wat that had an old Lanna house and a folk museum on-site. In one of the smaller buildings was a fabulous bronze Buddha. There was a mural that showed the sites origins as the people started growing crops and colonising the area around the Wat. It took you on a pictorial journey for 700 years and as it got to the far end of the mural and into present day, there were archaeologists and finally tourists taking pictures and selfies and looking round the site. It was great and something I haven’t seen before. You can tour all the sites in a horse and carriage, also on the mural. Unlike Ayutthaya it took just an hour or so to see it all.

In the temples there is often fortune telling where you shake a bundle of sticks until one drops out and it has a number on. You then take the corresponding numbered sheet of paper for your fortune. I have done this in Doi Suthep the big temple on the hill overlooking CM. In this Wat there is a fortune telling machine and you put in a small coin and a dial spins round and again you match up the number. I did this and read mine; not good….

Then Chris did his;

I realised when Chris picked his that I had stupidly picked out the wrong one and so with great joy I found the right number. Thank goodness I was very disappointed with the first one!!! This one was much better.

We then went for a walk around the city had a coffee and sat watching people walking past. There seems to be lots of space cadets in CM. Too many people look as if they have been to too many festivals and taken way too many substances. There are New Age travellers, masses of dreadlocks, people with more tattoos than skin and piercings in all sorts of places. Older people who still dress like they are teenagers but have changed shape and maybe they don’t realise that the Mohican they sport doesn’t look too good with a big bald patch in the middle. I am not being judgemental, each to their own, but come on, let it go….there are jugglers and artists, fire spinning space cadets aplenty who wouldn’t look out of place with a dog on a rope and a paper cup in Chorlton. If you go to Pai further north, this is the main headquarters for all the space cadets and elephant pant wearing tribes. There are circus schools and every weird and wonderful variety of yoga classes and retreats. You see them ‘deep’ in meditation with one eye opening occasionally to make sure people can see them. It’s got to be good for the FB picture. There are the yoga space cadets who do unfathomably tricky postures while drinking their mocha matcha lattes in the cafes and other public places. Thailand attracts them all.

“There are many digital nomads; people who can work anywhere as long as they have a computer and good wi-fi. They can be bloggers or computer programmers, writers or internet sellers. It is a warm cheap place to park yourself. There are many communal work spaces you rent by the hour/day/month and cafes full of computers for the same thing. There is no shortage of work spaces.

Lots of tourists come here for a few days to hike, cook and other activities. Then there are the expats, sexpats and other miscreants who find themselves here. Tax dodgers, criminals and the general lunatic fringe, all can be found. There are lots of young backpackers enjoying their travels and gap years, they only stay a few days passing through to their next destination. Don’t get me wrong there are many “normal” people here just wanting a different lifestyle and many retirees who come from all over the world, it’s a fab place to be. I am not too sure where we fit in with all this. However you view yourself before coming here, even if you think you are a bit strange, when you see the people here you feel very, very normal more normal than you have ever felt!!

We arrived at the train station for the 9:45 train which true to form is delayed. This is the norm, no Thai train is ever on time but never very late, 30 minutes. A very officious guard herds everyone onto the correct platform and the train arrives, they don’t hang about, it is on the move very quickly. There are comfortable reclining seats and cool air conditioning. Once you are sat down a stewardess arrives with a bun filled with custard and a cup of coffee, lovely. There are 3 carriages with one cleaner who arrives and sweeps and mops the floor, a stewardess in every carriage to serve food and drinks, one ticket collector, it runs very well.

The landscape is flat and industrial for the first hour and then opens up to rice fields and villages. Occasionally you notice an enormous Buddha on a small hill, glinting in the sun. More crops, not just rice appear and more undulating land and trees.

Lunch arrives. It’s a pot of rice; egg stew with spice and chicken and red curry (chue chee) with mackerel. None of it looks very appetising.The egg is black with a bit of gnarly chicken floating in a grey viscous looking fluid. The red mackerel curry smells and tastes too fishy so I eat a bit of rice and I will have a banana. I won’t starve. Chris wolfs all of his down like a local, he is getting very adventurous with his food. I admire his tenacity but I’m not going there!!!!

According to Chris, my font of knowledge, the train is South Korean and made by Daewoo. It is 22 years old and travels at 110km an hour. The train runs very quietly, it puts our trains to shame. It cost £15 for a 9 hour journey, very reasonable. Only 7 hours to go I might have a snooze.

We pass an immense lake which seems to go on for miles with lots of tributaries and again edged by vast swathes of paddy fields. Some are just planted with a shimmer of green and some brown watery mud awaiting their transformation. There are also big open waters full of lotus plants, not yet in flower it must look fab when they bloom. This central part of the country is where a lot of the rice is grown, between Bangkok and the northern territories.

Rice fields, shanty towns, concrete towns: Rice fields, shanty towns, concrete towns; ad infinitum. It was interesting for the first 2 hours but after 5 hours it was tedious, and then at last, the railway line started cutting through the mountains. It was a good job as I was about to try and bludgeon myself to death with my plastic coffee cup….it’s Chris that likes the train journeys; 9 hours on a train or 1 hour on a plane it’s a no-brainer in my world and not much difference in price but I like to keep him happy 🙂

We then got biscuits and coffee, all good, the scenery was spectacular. Steep cliffs and jungle, it was worth the wait. The train follows the Mai Yam Nom river with its forested steep sides all the way to a town called Lampang. Last year we decided to ride to Lampang on the bike, it took 3 hours of hard riding in horribly busy traffic that was mostly big trucks. It was scary. When we got there we realised we could have got the train return for 100 baht. We nearly put the bike on the train for the return but wanted to go to the famous Thai elephant hospital on the way back so we didn’t get the train and saw the nellies instead. It was worth the very flat bottoms we both had.

We arrived back in CM, took a tuk tuk to our guesthouse, went out to eat and then fell into bed. It is nice to sleep without the AC on, the temperature was a cool 16 degrees. We slept like babies.

Friday was a day of planes, trains and automobiles and a ferry thrown in for good measure. It was slightly worrying on the ferry as we squeezed on, the back wheels of the bus hanging over the ferry’s open (not supposed to be) tailgate. I kept saying to myself ‘well if you have to die, here’s a good a place as anywhere’ AARGH. We survived and from then on it all went very smoothly until we got on the train which was heaving. We should maybe have realised when it was only 40 baht for both of us for a journey of 80 miles; less than a pound. As we boarded the train which didn’t hang about there were no seats and people had to shuffle up to let us sit, 3 people on 2 seats. It was slightly claustrophobic and very humid but we arrived in just over an hour. We immediately booked our train back to CM for Monday and booked 2nd class air conditioned where you get your own seat, it’s a 9 hour journey, food and drinks included. Phew.

We booked a room which is great, basic but clean and comfortable. We were starving so wandered out and found a blue plastic tablecloth establishment to eat some authentic Thai food, my lips are still zinging and I was thinking it might be a savlon moment the next day. It was nice to get proper Thai food and not the dumbed down version on the tourist beaches. Spicy.

The guesthouse rented us push bikes, by far the easiest way to get around and cooler than walking in 34 degrees. Most of the temples and museums are within a 3 mile radius so we set off and saw my favourite one called Wat Maha That. It was very reminiscent of the Angkor Wat Temples, very Cambodian in style but much smaller. We just managed to get round it before bus loads of Chinese tourists arrived.

We needed a coffee and found a small coffee shop away from the temples. We ordered in our best Thai, which always gets a giggle, and sat down. They brought us home made biscuits and made us feel very welcome. One of the girls asked if she could have a photo of us. I don’t suppose they get many pale eyed, pale skinned ginger aliens in that part of town!! Children stare and we had one kid almost fall off his bike, mouth open looking at us. It’s all good fun. It happens a lot.

We cycled to a very big Temple called Wat Na Phra Men which was having a big celebration. Everyone is so inclusive. A girl came up to us and said it was a big day and there was free food and we were very welcome. There was a huge array of fruit in front of the temple and lots of blessings and inside the Wat all the monks were sat waiting for something, we know not what ( that’s a temple joke)……We looked at one stall and someone said free ice cream and asked where were we from. We said England and the whole long queue said welcome and have ice cream. We moved to the back of the queue; we know how to queue in England, but we were still given big pots of mango and coconut ice cream before everyone else got theirs, they are lovely, kind people. Even the very smart looking policemen queued.

Leaving the temple we cycled past many elephants with tourists (mostly Asian) on metal cages on their backs. I was incandescent with rage and almost fell off my bike. One of the girls on an elephant smiled at me and I growled. I am turning into a real grumpy old git. Maybe they don’t realise how much the cages injure them, or don’t care grrrrrr. Tourist money.

We stopped at a small Temple and had a wander, looked in and a monk motioned us over and asked if we wanted a blessing. We dropped to our knees in front of him and he splashed water over us and did the lovely sing songy thing. I am never sure whether you are supposed to look them in the eye but I did and got an eyeful of water, that will teach me! He tied our bracelets to our wrists and we dropped some baht into his bowl. He said we could take a picture of him if we wanted, he then excused himself and went outside for a quick smoke. I love this place.

We also went to the ruins of the Royal Palace and right next to it a brand new Wat under construction. They had tents set up as a temporary measure and as we passed a monk started doing his thing into a microphone and I am sure he started by singing ; numb nuts fuck wattoo. I wondered who Wattoo was. I laughed for ages. I will never go to heaven.

We had lunch and then we went to Wat Chaiwatthanaram. It is right on the river and the furthest out of town. It must have been spectacular in its day but like all of them apart from a few stupas and prangs they are mostly piles of bricks and rubble and broken Buddha statues. It was a long cycle back and a cool beer was greatly appreciated.

Again we had bikes and set off for another day of sightseeing. It was an even hotter day. We visited the places we missed yesterday after my elephant riding rant…we also visited the museum which was fab. In 1957 looters had stolen an enormous amount of treasure from one of the temples. The police knew they were there the first night and sent 4 policemen to watch out for them. The policemen got greedy and decided they wanted some of the booty but one of them got drunk and they were rumbled. Sadly they only got a small proportion of the treasures back. It is fantastic what they did retrieve especially a ceremonial sword encrusted with jewels. The workmanship is amazing for the time, the 1500’s. There was lots of interesting stuff there and it was well worth the visit.

We are leaving Ayutthaya tomorrow so an early night is in order. Have enjoyed the trip here and met some nice people. We are also looking forward to catching up with friends in CM and feeling a little cooler. Even the tuk tuks are different here, really cool. This will be our transport to the station.

We are just about to leave the island and just wanted to share a few more photos from the other half of the island, the very southern part. There are some real Robinson Crusoe beaches here, very beautiful and deserted. There is a National Park right at the tip; all jungle and monkeys roaming around.

We also came across my favourite animal, ever

The sunset on Wednesday night was spectacular and so was the storm that followed, it thrashed it down, had to buy a fetching poncho

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I wasn’t sure about this island when we first arrived but having had a good look round I know we will come back. We have made friends here and we never got to the animal sanctuary so I think we may well return….

Arriving on Ko Lanta on the ‘Harry Potter mini-bus’ from Krabi, just off the ferry and wondering why places look a bit shabby when you first arrive. The towns we drove through looked shambolic and scruffy and it didn’t help that it was bucketing down and when we were dropped off at our guesthouse the road outside was all dug up and a big digger right outside. It all changed when we were met by the owner and given fresh juice and shown to our lovely clean and spacious room with a tropical garden just outside our little patio, now it’s looking better.

The beach is a few minutes walk away and is a long sandy beach. We wanted a quieter beach, some are party central with new moon, old moon any old moon parties all the time. This beach has more families and is more chilled. Lots of small bars line the beach for lunch or a sunset cocktail and the water is warm and shallow for a long way out. There are surprisingly few people around, lovely.

We have rented a motorbike. The roads are full of holes and the first bike we rented had no front brake or suspension so we changed it. The new bike is marginally better, it has brakes but is a bit ropey, we will go slowly. Yesterday we went half way round the island it took 30 minutes, it’s not very big. The capital, The Old Town is charming with lots of cafes and places hanging over the water on stilts. The shops have lots of handmade leather goods and different things to your average holiday wares. We watched a couple of fishermen on the long pier throwing round nets out and catching handfuls of small fish with each throw, very skilful. There were fish eagles who were also fishing, we watched them for ages rising and falling majestically.

On our way back we passed a couple of tourists down a side road, one girl lying on the floor so we turned around and went back. She had fallen off her bike and had injuries to her foot , legs and arm and looked really shocked. There was a hospital a few miles back and when we asked if we could assist in any way they said they needed help taking her bike to the hospital. She then got on her boyfriends bike and I followed Chris, very tentatively, on our bike. It brought back our accident a few years ago, it’s the law of averages, you will fall off at some point. Out here the scars you end up with are called a ‘Thai tattoo’. We drove really slowly…..

However far you are away from home you always meet someone from Manchester. We met 3 guys on the beach, 2 from Whaley Range and one from Gatley all looking up at a darkening sky saying it looks just like Manchester…but not really, it’s mostly sunny on a lovely beach!! We have been swimming most days, well floating really, it’s fab.

We have been to a jungle party. It has a DJ, a bonfire and a bar that sells alcohol and all manner of things. It’s called the Mong bar and the guy that runs it does extreme knife tricks, he is just mental and so are his bar staff. He does the trick where he stabs imbetween his fingers very quickly with a big knife. So far he has managed to keep all his fingers, I don’t know how. It is very entertaining but worrying…..

We have booked a flight back to Bangkok on Friday. We then get a train to Ayutthaya which is 80 miles out of Bangkok and was the capital city of Siam and a prosperous trading port from 1350 until it was razed by the Burmese in 1767. The ruins now lie in a historical park and contain Buddhist temples, statues and monasteries between 3 rivers. We will be there for 3 days exploring the site before we return to Chiang Mai on the train.