The monkeys rush through the forest

Hello

, we are currently sitting in our hotel room in Chiang Mai and praising the inventor of air conditioning systems.

After satisfying our need for western lifestyle in Krath, we immersed ourselves in Thai life again and visited a night market. This market opened at sunset and offered everything from food to clothing (bras with WiFi connection) to electronics. By chance, while buying a hat, we witnessed an extortion action between a stall owner and a police officer.

The next day, we went to Phimai to visit a temple complex of the Khmer civilization. Although the architecture was very impressive, the lack of background knowledge did not impress us much. Nevertheless, we spent a few cozy hours here.

It got more exciting the next day: In Khao Yai National Park, we went on an elephant search in a pick-up truck. Unfortunately, we only saw deer, giant spiders, turtles, and monkeys blocking the road. What bad luck. The beautiful view over the dense forests and a short hike to a waterfall rounded off the eventful day.

The day after, we had a lot of fun at a water park, as the name suggests. We slid, chased each other on the water bounce castle, and let the sun shine on our bellies. All of this made it easier for us to sleep during the 12-hour night bus ride to Chiang Mai. The VIP bus had seats with massage function, personal entertainment with Thai movies, and a buffet that didn't quite suit our taste (quote from Konrad: 'What do you mean it didn't suit our taste? Ice-cold and rock-hard has nothing to do with taste!').

Arriving in Chiang Mai, the 'capital of the North', we explored the old town and checked into Baan JaJa, a small but cozy backpacker hotel.

In Chiang Mai, we have so far spent time visiting various temples (there are more than 300 in the city, but there is a little bit of the principle: if you know one, you know them all!), a night market, and our highlight, a cooking class.

Within five hours, a very sympathetic Thai cooking teacher showed us which ingredients are best for cooking Thai food at a market and taught us the processing at a school located outside the city. Each of us could create our own menu to cook, and the teacher showed us various tricks for working with the wok. The cooking teacher pointed out Mara and David's cooking skills, apparently Konrad could have sold his Pad Thai dish for half the price. Stay tuned to see what we can serve you in Germany!

We are going to continue getting tanned now, have fun shoveling snow!

M&D&K