Our Finishing Touches on Thailand and Introduction to Oz

Before heading to Bangkok we made one last stop in Chiangmai to the Tiger Kingdom where we got to play with the cats.

loving the tummy rub

baby cub

the big guy

Briana and I playing with the tiger food

I can easily say I have never seen anything like Bangkok. It has to be one of the craziest cities in the world.
We spent our time there shopping arround the markets, taking advantage of the low priced spas, eating local cuisine and street food (yummm and thankfully avoided getting the Bangkok belly:)! )

One of the markets that we went to is the largest market in the world, with over 2 million civillians walking through it! As you can imagine it was absolutely nuts.
(by the way those bunny rabbits weren't actually tiger food, they were from a pet store in the Bangkok market)

It sad to say that the Asian part of tour is over, time is going by way, way too fast.

We spent the last three nights in Sydney. We both really love the city, great food and sites. Unfortunately Sydney is having the worst weather they'ved had in 51 years but a little rain and cold weather never hurt anybody!

 

Briana and I are leaving today on a roadtrip up the east coast to the city of Cairns. We rented a campervan and plan on stopping at certain destinations a long the way. We will keep in touch and post more pictures through out the road trip.

sorry for the short blog post but we are in a rush to make it out of the city before rush hour

Take care!

Ziplining in the Northern Thai Jungle

Our third day in Chiangmai we took another taxi out of the city for about an hour and half to another part of the jungle. We spent the day zip-lining through the canopys of the jungle. Originally we had no intentions of doing this, it was some what of a spontaneous decision, nonetheless we were very happy we did it!  It was very exhilarating and the views were breathtaking. Other then the pictures and these few words I don't really know how to explain it anymore. I hope you guys enjoy the pictures!

 

Bri was so pro she went backwards

this was one of the longer stretches of over 130 metres

me coming in "superman" style

amazing view from one of the canopys

The high pitched voice you hear is our instructor filming us haha. He was lots of fun and definitely added to the experience!

Cooking School and Elephant Trek

We are back in Thailand now…but this time we are in Chiang Mai, the northern tip of the country.  We’re spending 5 days here before we head to Bangkok. So far it has been incredible and full of activities!  

Day 1: Cooking Class

We signed up for a cooking class at Sammy’s Organic Farm. In the morning we went to the local market to learn about all the different herbs and spices, then we drove into the countryside to this small organic farm. We spent all day learning about how make homemade thai food from scratch.  Between Briana and I we cooked both green and jungle (red) curry with chicken, coconut and vegetable soup, cashew chicken, pad thai, papaya salad, chicken wrapped in pandanus leaves  and coconut sticky rice with mango. By the way, the answer is yes! If anyone wants us to show-off our new found thai cooking skills when we get home haha. Overall it was very relaxing and enjoyable day. There was even an allocated nap time, where we got to hang out (or pass out) on hammocks over-looking the rural paradise.  It is safe to say, that the cooking class provided us with the best meals on the trip thus far. The bonus was that we were so full that we couldn’t even eat dinner so we were able to save a bit of money lol.  We REALLY enjoyed our day with the cooking school and would highly recommend it to anyone who travels to Chiangmai in the future!

Bri's greem coconut curry

my jungle curry

our massive lunch

nap time

wrapping chicken in pandanus leaves

sweet sticky rice with mango

Day 2: Elephant Trek

We took an hour and a half truck ride to the thai jungle/mountains as far as we could where we then trekked 20 minutes through the bush to a campsite called Ratong. There were 7 elephants including a little 4 month old baby that were all one herd/family. They provided us with a set of “elephant training clothes” and then let us spend some time feeding and playing the elephants. After we acquainted ourselves with the friendly animals, we were taught how to ride and command them; everything from moving backwards/forwards to turning left/right and mounting/dismounting. We were very impressed with how obedient they were.

A little bit of information about the Ratong campsite…

Although we met with these elephants at a campsite and they were fully accustomed to people, these elephants were not captive. When people are not visiting them, they roam freely in jungle (as we witnessed during our trek). I suppose I can understand that they enjoy the free food and baths that they get when people come to visit, I mean who wouldn’t?! haha It was nice to know that they were not prisoners. The Thai trainers seemed to have the best interest of the elephants in mind.

During our trek through the jungle on route to the campsite, we spotted this little guy roaming the jungle

ready to go in our uniforms

little munchkin

Bri riding the mamma elephant followed by the baby

view from on top Tao (Tao is the name of the elephant I was looking after for the day)

its bath time!

Bri getting soaked by the all natural organic water gun

I can't tell if she was more grossed out by me or the other guy

They loved the water

this guy really wanted a kiss

I'm prepping for the circus

nap time

this guy was pro hoola hooper

Below is a video of us playing in the water with the elephants. Notice how big Bri's smile is after the kiss ;) ...sorry for the shotty camera skills it was hard to stay still with so much going on