Photos...

Marcus says:

Well, it seems that Blogger wants to put the images all at the top of the page and in reverse order to how you insert them, so you may need to interpret what commentary goes with which photo. I'd redo them, but this computer is running ME with a slow wireless connection and I've lost posts over the last two days, so I'm not inclined to mess with it too much.

California Highway Patrol, then Erith sitting on the scooter - I'm pretty sure that she could have driven it, but she didn't.She loved riding it though - she did that thing that everyone does when they first ride a motorbike, of putting her arms out like wings as we're hurtling along a country road at about 65 km/hour. She didn't ever really want to stop and look atthings - just cruise around. I don't know how, but we found our way around without any problems. I feel as though I've taken a course in defensive driving after two half days on a scooter though. Whew! You really have to watch what's going on. I still don't get the rules - scooters take off well before the light turns green and red lights generally count for little, it seems.

Erith and I at the waterfall. You may not be able to see me - I'm sitting in the waterfall, if I picked the right photo.

First, a picture of Erith with the baby elephant. He's small, but he can kick up a fuss. Then, Erith in the van on the way to the elephants (sorry about the sequence), then a couple of elephants lining up for bananas and sugar cane. We have plenty of elephant photos, but we don't want to turn this into a slide show. The next is a self-taken photo of Erith and I on the back of the elephant.

The cable bridge is at least as dodgey as it looks. We had to cross it during our hike up to the Hmong village. It was quite high, unstable and it wasn't hard to imagine putting a foot through the bamboo. Excuse the photo - our guide took it. Erith was on the lookout for UBOs while we were hiking in the jungle - Unidentified Buzzing Objects...

Erith and I have spent plenty of time in the pool, particularly in the late afternoon when it's too hot to be outside for any other reason. I don't know what the chemical is that they use, but it's very hard on the eyes and turned Erith's hair into something akin to a fishing net - it was as dry as a bone and impossible to get a brush through. We got some decent conditioner after the first time and Erith has now used the whole bottle, but it was money well spent, as it made her miserable the first night it happened.

This is one of the many temples around Chiang Mai. We hired a tuk tuk the first day we were here and went around to a few of them. Tuk tuks are an okay way to get around, but if you're too tall you spend a lot of time slouching in order to see something other than the inside of the roof.

Wrap-up of Thailand

We're leaving tonight - we fly to Bangkok and then up to Rome, where we will probably post from next. There's no end to the odd sights, even just from watching traffic. You get used to seeing a family of four on a scooter going the wrong way up the freeway, or seeing a scooter driver cooking on their mobile barbeque in traffic and I wasn't that surprised at our Bangkok cabbie doing 140 km in an 80 km zone on the way to the airport. Our tour driver seemed to favour a move I coined the "double double", where when he'd pull out to pass, you'd see someone doing the same thing from the other direction, so there were two vehicles in each lane lined up at each other. Seeing a ute filled with chicken pieces with chicken juice pouring out the back was a bit stomach churning, but not the strangest. The strangest was seeing a flat-bed semi-trailer with someone standing on the huge earth mover on the tray as the whole thing rumbled down the highway. Now that was cool...

Erith says:

Day three

At 8:30 we got picked up by the elephant lady. We drove about one hour. Our first stop was a forty minute hike. At the end they gave us cold bottles of water and then set off to the elephane farm. Dad and I had the biggest elephant out of all the people in our group. Our elephant jockey was a terrible singer! It was soooo fun. I got lots of photos with the baby elephant! After the ride, we drove a bit to a restaurant where you had to eat with your fork and spoon! I found it EASY! Straight after lunch our group went to a waterfall! We played around there for one hour, but then we went rafting. While rafting, we stopped at a tyre swing and a plank of wood through a long rope. That was the best day I've had so far!

Day four

Today dad hired a scooter and we went around on that for 4 hours. I had lots and lots of fun. When we got back we went in the pool. Then dad and I went to the night bazaar. I bought some nice things then came back to the hotel and went to bed.

Day five

Today I was soooo excited about flying to Rome! But, in the morning we had a buffet breakfast and went on the scooter and came back and started blogging.