Sukhothai and Si Satchanalai

We spent a few days exploring the ancient capital of Thailand: Sukhothai. Ruins dating back to 1300-1400. We started by biking up to some ruins on top of a hill to see the sunrise and then biked around the city to see other temples. At sunset we biked around the historical park which was a great way to avoid the heat and the tourists. The next day we rented a motorbike and rode about 1hr outside the city to Si Satchanalai to see more ruins. The ruins here had less restorations done. Unfortunately we did not document the motorbike karaoke ride home for everyone! We took hundreds of great pictures but since our internet isn't so great here, it takes us forever to upload....so we are posting all of our pictures on kodak gallery. After Sukhothai we took a VERY long bus ride up to the Lao border and stayed a few nights at Nong Khai before crossing into our next adventure. We are in Luang Prabang, Laos now and will be here for a little bit. We'll post pics soon!

SI SATCHANALAI RUINS

Sukhothai historical park at night

Si Satchanalai ruins.....33 elephants surrounding the temple

Sunset at Sukhothai historical park

Sukhothai historical park

Early start...Ruins at sunrise

JUNGLE FLIGHT!

Want to send a special thanks to Kyle's aunt and uncle (Donnie and Muck)! They gave us some money for Christmas to do something crazy on our trip. We decided to go ziplining through the jungle outside of Chiang Mai. REALLY fun and REALLY beautiful. 34 ziplines, 4 abseils (straight drops). We had a great time and saw some amazing scenery. We have some great videos that do the day justice, but they are too big to email or publish. We'll send them out at some point.

Boat to Chiang Rai, Phu Lang Ka, & Valentine's Day!

After Thaton we took a boat ride up to Chiang Rai. The trip took about 4 hours and the scenery was beautiful the whole way up! We only stayed in Chiang Rai 1 night before taking off to Phu Lang Ka. We took the local bus which was an adventure in itself. The driver dropped us off about probably about 5 miles away from where we were actually supposed to be let off (keep in mind Phu Lang Ka is a mountain and he dropped us at the very bottom)! So we luckily found a Thai home where the entire family came out to help (18 give or take) and found a girl who spoke a little english....her and her friend lent us a ride up to our resort. We only stayed 1 night in a VERY basic shack but the view was breathtaking! After Phu Lang Ka we took yet another bus all the way back to Chiang Mai BUT had to stand for the 1st 2 hours (picture all Thai people, very small bus, Kyle's head was about to hit the ceiling at any moment!) We've been back in Chiang Mai for a few days now just enjoying the city. We had a great Valentine's Day and today we went ziplining through the jungle! We'll post pics of the ziplines later! Hope everyone enjoyed their Valentine's Day!

Our transportation to Chiang Rai!

Boat ride

River scenery

Our friends who were also enjoying the river..

Boat ride from Thaton to Chiang Rai

The view from our shack!

Early morning breakfast...view from our table

Valentine's Day dinner: Mexican restaurant..owned by a Canadian...in Thailand?!

Thaton, Thailand

Hi all,

It's been a few days since our last post and we've been busy wandering around northern Thailand still! Thaton was a small but beautiful town we spent 3 nights in and rented motorbikes :), went on an amazing trek with a local tribesman, and had home cooked breakfast and dinner everyday! Check out some of our favorite Thaton moments! I'm also making albums of all of our pictures on Kodak gallery, so if anyone's interested, we can send the links!

Northern Thailand and Burma border...motorbike adventure! (we also have videos!)

Trekking: Lahu tribesman cooked us lunch in his hut!

Trek with Renato our guide..

Trekking through rice fields and farms...

Hot springs

Waterfall that we motorbiked to

Pretty sweet motorbikers...

Thaton

The new Chedi in Thaton

More Chiang Dao pics!

Amazing!

Fresh off the local Thai bus in Chiang Dao

Lisu hill tribe village

Our views pretty much everywhere we walked

Northern Thailand mountains

Beautiful monastery on the side of one of the mountains....walking distance from our bungalow

Chiang Dao, Northern Thailand Mountains

We just finished a 2 night stay in the mountains of northern Thailand at Chiang Dao Nest! Our bungalow had amazing views of mountains on both sides of us and the whole experience proved to be more than we could have expected. The friendly Thai staff whipped up some amazing food that has so far been our favorite on the trip. We got to visit an amazing monastery situated on the side of a mountain (a 500 step hike), the famous Chiang Dao cave, and we did our first trek. The day started with a drive into the mountains in the back of a pickup truck with 3 other travelers, then we were dropped off with 2 Lisu tribesmen guide (zero English) to start our trek. They led us on an unbelievable hike through a Lisu hill tribe village, remote cave, waterfall, and a trek through the Thailand jungle with breathtaking views! I think we both agree that this was one of the most beautiful places we've ever been to and we can only hope our pictures will do this amazing place justice!

Chiang Dao Nest bungalows

Exploring a remote cave

Trek to the waterfall

Banana forest

The ridiculous view at the end of our trek!

More pics to come...we encountered a slight internet problem while trying to post! We are now in Thaton (northern Thailand) for 3 nights. We'll continue to post as long as the internet holds up!

Thai Farm Cooking School-Day 2 Chiang Mai

Today we had our first Thai cooking class at an organic farm a few miles outside the city! We absolutely loved it and had a great day! First we had breakfast at our guesthouse outside, and then we were picked up by Max (our thai cooking instructor)! After picking up a few more people, we drove out to a local market where we learned about Thai ingredients and saw some pretty interesting things. (Kyle also picked up some local Thai whiskey at Max's suggestion!) Then we proceeded to the farm which was beautiful and peaceful in the middle of nowhere. We got to walk around and see what was grown and try a few things out. Next up was cooking....we made our own curry paste, chicken curry dishes, soups, stir fry, papaya salad, mango sticky rice, and pad thai/big noodles. Food was amazing and we made everything from scratch. After we were done cooking, we sat down to eat outside with everyone and then headed back home!

The coolest tree ornament in our B&B lobby

Local market with lots of treats!

Our transportation!

Herb Farmer!

Sheri Peppers...my Thai alias!

Our food we made...

Mango sticky rice....yum

Gigantic lilly pads!

Kyle giving into Max's peer pressure to take multiple shots of disgusting Thai whiskey

Next stop....Chiang Dao in northern Thailand. We'll be staying in bungalows, mountain biking, caving, and hiking through a national park!