Chiang Mai

Chiang Mai is definitely the hub of activities in Thailand and it wasn't long before we had booked ourselves onto a selection of trips. The first involved us careering down an extremely steep mountain side on bikes with full body armour...we had been told that we needed "technical" ability for this ride but decided that our experience riding to and from work would be sufficient! Oh how wrong we were, turns out they take their mountain biking pretty seriouly out here and we were out of our depth to say the least! Thanks to the very muddy, bumpy, rutted dirt tracks and the fact it was raining made for an uncontrolable experience - both of us falling off our bikes several times, thank god we had protection otherwise we might have been home to see you guys a lot sooner! As it turned out we escaped with only minor injuries - bruises, grazes, etc. Ouch! Nothing that a bargain 3 pound full body massage to heal our aches and pains can't fix! You make the best friends in the worst conditions and we spent a good evening drinking beers and retelling our near death experiences with our other biking buddies - sweet as!

All the gear, no idea!

Coffee Plantation enroute...

Admiring the view

Mission accomplished, still in one piece!

Our long awaited Thai Cookery course was up next, Georgie grinning from ear to ear at the prospect! It started with a quick trip around the local market to collect ingredients and then the fun began! Everyone getting their own cookery station in which to create authentic Thai dishes under the instruction of our genuine Thai Celebrity Chef (Jamie Oliver eat your heart out). We had a great time getting to make and eat six different dishes - you are all in for a treat when we get home, provided we don't forget everything we've learnt!

Our ever grinning TV Chef

Doesn't get much fresher than this

Rustling up a snack!

Hard at work!