Chiang Mai is a pretty cool town. It’s got a moat! we’re hanging out here for new years before cruising off to Laos via the mighty Mekong River. we caught the night train from Bangkok and ended up in a kinda seedy guest house (it’ll do though cause it’s cheap and we’re not here for long) we sepent the day yesterday getting our bearings before realising that it didn’t really matter cause where it’s at is the street infront of our place where this massive night market takes place every weekend. it took us good 3 hours to make it down just one side of the road, every stall is different and everythings so beautiful and amazingly cheap. the only thing lacking is space in our backpacks (that didn’t stop me buying two shirts and a funky pair of shorts though).

it’s new years and we’re about to head to the Night Bazzar which is supposedly even bigger and better that the markets which is hard to believe. at the moment we’re uploading photo’s as per usual, I swear when we’re not taking photo’s we’re uploading them! but it’s proven too time consuming to both upload them to our gallery (were we keep them all) and to trip tracker so if you want to see our photo’s you’ll have to go to http://www.madteckhead.com/gallery/main.php
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Sorry this is the first post in a long time. we’ll fill you in on what’s been happening ASAP!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
ellie

we’re beginning to master the unplanned stopover. on our way to Ko Tao and didn’t quite make it in a day. our hotel was very pleasant though. managed by an english guy it was all about the mash potato and cheese on toast!

We hung out in this low key provincial capital for a few days and went on an overnight boat trip to Ao PhangNga, sleeping at a fishing village on the water – and I don’t mean on the coast this place was on stilts sticking out of the bay!
very cool.