Chang Mai (day 1 2, and 3) and bus back to Bangkok

Okay, so after the trek finished we chilled out in Chang Mai and went to the night market (by we I mean claire and I, the girl who I meant whilst sharing an elephant ride). The next day we went to chat with the monks at the Wat Suan Dok temple.. we grabbed a tuk tuk, and enjoyed the ride.


view from the tuk tuk, which is essentially a motorcycle with a carriage around it.
Inside the temple we took off our shoes and went to the main statue of buddah

You're not meant to touch a monk if you're a woman, and you have to dress modestly, and never point your feet at them!



all over the temple grounds were signs written on the trees in thai and english.. i took loads of pictures of them, but this was my favourite:


We then bumped into some monks playing som esort of chess with rocks, so we sat and chatted a while.. though only one spoke english:


After that we saw you could buy buckets filled with food, insense, toothbrush, etc for the monks, so we chipped in and bought one for the monk who blessed us. He wasnt about so we left a note :



Got back in our tuk tuk and headed into town to wander


That evening we went out with a few australian guys who were staying at our hostel, and i saw my first lady boy! yay!
We ended up hanging outin a pub and making friends with the bar owner, who was this lady who was killer at pool. I won 100Bat off one of the aussies because I bet she'd kick his mates ass at pool, and she did.. this is her kissing my winnings..


The next day claire and I woke up early for our tour to see the giraffe women, the big buddah, a cave that's famous but whose name escapes me, an orchid farm and butterfly farm. The highlight was definitely the giraffe women.
This is claire at the butterfly farm, with a sad little butterfly all broken that landed on her hand..



((apologies again for the blurry wings, if i had a macro lens...............))




The orchid farm had loads of different kinds of pretty orchids..




Then at the cave entrance we saw loads of kids staring at fish.. they were too cute!




We went to see the giant buddah statue at a viewpoint, and claire and i sat under it to show you the size..



the beautiful view

Then we finally got to meet the tribe.. the first person we met was this cute kid.

then the stretched ear women:






Then we went to see the giraffe necked women, who have these coils put on them at the age of 5 and continue for their entire lives, so much so that to take them off their necks would not be able to hold themselves up. Their necks are stretched alot with them, and covered in bruises.. the coils are super heavy too!



this girl was 4 and already wearing her coils..






We dashed from the tour to catch our evening bus, without eating.. and then ate croissants at midnight because there was only a random petrol station stop point. Arrived in Bangkok at 4 am and went about finding a hotel on the Koa San road..
woke up at 11am from a nap, and just wandered about with Claire, as she's leaving tomorrow for Koh Tao, and I'm heading to Cambodia..