Back from the bush

It seems funny that we would leave Prince George of all places to end up in Thailand sleeping in the bush - doesn't it???

We just got back from a 3 day trek out in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. The trip began with an "elephant trek", which was really just like going around a go-kart track with elephants...not as fun or as "authentic" as we would have liked. The elephants are pretty funny though.

Afterwards we walked through the bush, up a mountain side for a couple hours to a waterfall. The water was a little cold, so no one really swam, but it was nice to stop.

We then had another hour or so walk to our camp for the night. We slept in a large bungalo made for groups to sleep in. It was pretty fun, considering the cold outside (probably 10 degrees or so???) We just had a mat on the floor and a few blankets, so not quite as nice as our North Face sleeping bags back home.

We had a fire, ate dinner, and just talked for hours with all the other people there (2 Ausies, 2 New Zealanders, 2 Greenlanders, 2 English, 2 Dutch, and 1 Belgain. It was a good mix of people, with basically everyone really fluent in English.

Yesterday we woke up, ate, and went out on another 2 hour trek to a village on a steep slope for lunch. After lazing around for a few hours we hiked to another waterfall, and then camped a short distance from there (in another bungalo). One of the Thai guys there (who was drunk) started hitting on one of the lesbians in the group, and she told him off. He then scattered the fire all over the place and stormed off (it was quite something).

This morning we woke up, ate, and hiked back down a hill that was just as steep as the one we hiked up. At the bottom we ate lunch, then went to a river where we rode in bamboo rafts. It was fun.

Now we are back in Chiang Mai, and are heading out for French Cuisine (well, we'll see I guess) in an hour or so.

Back to my previous thoughts, the one guy from England gave both Lindsay and I chance to share a bit about Christianity and our faith - on his asking and questions...we're going to be with them for the next couple days, so we'll see if he wants to follow up that conversation.

We think we're going to go to the zoo tomorrow, and maybe a zipline tour in the treetops the next day. That is not confirmed as it is expensive, but we'll see.

Anyways, we're going to go get ready for dinner, so chat with you all later.

PS - Heather and Colleen, Lindsay wants you to please put her clothes back (as well as Christmas CD's). She would like to see that any shirts, pants, skirts, etc. that need to be ironed are too.

Cheers!