Our time in Thailand is drawing to a close. We arrived back in Bangkok yesterday (16th August) and checked in to a "swanky" hotel for a bit of a treat. I dunno. It seems, when it's all said and done, that Ben and I are just not the swanky hotel types. The idea is always more attractive than the reality of these cheesy places. We've far more enjoyed small and friendly guest houses and wooden cabins/bungalows near the beach or in the jungle. Making good use of the gym as, somehow, we've managed to skimp on the exercise and eaten ourselves silly! We will desperately miss the Thai cuisine, and the inverse law regarding food: the cheaper and the more simple, the better!!

Our last few days since Cambodia involved us heading 'up north' to Chiang Mai. It's a great chilled out town, beautifully designed in that it is completely surrounded by an old wall and moat. The food was great (especially after Cambodia; but that doesn't say much for a bunch of folk that chew on deep fried insects such as tarantulas and grasshoppers), and the folk were good fun. It was in Chiang Mai that we had a go at Thai kick boxing for an afternoon. And as a complete counter to that, the next day, we did a Thai cooking course. It was here that we discovered khao neow ma-muang (sticky rice mango pudding - DIVINE). Absolute highlights of our stay there.

We bussed it on to Thaton and had some "monk chat" at a picturesque hillside buddhist monastery. We were tempted to book in for a few days of meditation, but after consideration, we decided we didn't have the patience for it, and actually stood the monk up! Uh oh, bad kharma! We'll probably reincarnate as insects in Cambodia now!

We then took a handmade bamboo raft and floated down the Maekok River (snigger) to Chiang Rai. We had a guide who negotiated the rapids extremely well. Given our experiences of up-ending a solid canoe within the first hour on the Whanganui River in NZ, we were impressed! Sleeping overnight on the raft,under a mozzie net, was a real treat and rather romantic (with the exception of the little girl who kept popping in for a visit and grabbing my leg over the side of the raft!) Once again, the markets were a highlight in Chiang Rai.

For our own independence, we hired a car and tootled off to the very most northern point of Thailand, including Mae Sai. Although it doesn't have much of a reputation, we really liked the bustling border town. We stayed right on the Mae Sai River overlooking Myanmar. It was too close not to just pop over the border for a couple of hours. So, hey! We've been to Burma. Was that politically incorrect of us? It was evidently much more poor and down trodden than it's neighbour across the river.

Aliens have abducted us