5 Hours in the Short Bus

Safe house, chiang mai, 9;20 am

leaving this morning for laos. the plan is to catch a short bus (aka hell on wheels) from our guesthouse through chiang rai to chiang khong, the border crossing closest to chiang mai with laos. we'll stay the night there, then head through immigration and into laos the following morning, to take a two day float terminating in luang prabang. if i can make it through the 5 hours of short bus time, i think it will be a grand adventure. i'm traveling there with a friend i've met who is likely to be very hungover this morning, so it should make for a good laugh at the least.

the last few days in chiang mai have been fantastic. i would highly recommend this city over bangkok any day...not that one should skip bangkok altogether, but a city is a city is a city - and bangkok really isn't much of an exception. yesterday i did the touristy single day trek, which was terrible and great at the same time. my hate of zoos has now extended to a hate of the idea of riding elephants. it seems like a fun theory, but when you realize that the elephants are there just to haul your lazy butt around - loses some of it's flavor. we did do a great hike into the mountains to see a couple of the hill tribes. the hike was the first thing in the morning, and was all up hill on the way there. funny how the tour group took it - everyone was complaining, and huffing and puffing...i got a good laugh. some people even had to stop because it was too steep and too hot! really wasn't that difficult - maybe american's truly aren't the most out of shape people in the world! (thanks tony!)

my favorite part of the day was swimming in the mae wuang waterfall (spelling is iffy on that one and the shift key is spotty on this computer, thus the lack of caps). our tour guide, noi, took me up the side of a cliff and we jumped off in order to get close enough to the waterfall to climb behind it. it was only about 25 feet (and he went first) so i felt pretty safe. the waterfall was amazingly powerful. i swam against it at the base as hard as i could and made no headway whatsoever. anyway, we climbed up the rocks and sat behind the waterfall and watched the tourists dangle their toes in the water. definitely more my style than sitting on the sidelines!

from there we took bamboo rafts down the mae wong river. it's close to the thai new year hear (songkran festival around the 13th of april) and the tradition is to splash people (tourists and women especially) with water. it was great actually - we were floating down the river, two to a raft, with our very adept 14 year old raftman. we'd turn corners in the river and see groups of thai kids just waiting to attack with buckets and hands filled with water. we found the trick was not to make eye contact. any eye contact made for a little splash...and a hello (sounds like kap koon ka in thai) was a death wish! we ended the day very soaked and very tired, but it was generally a worthwhile experience. met some folks from germany, some aussies, and a gal from LA (the first american i've met since i've been here).

time to have some breakfast...then get on the death trap for the 5 hour journey. should prove to be another beautiful day!

cheers -
genevieve