But before I do that, we'd like to say congrats to my dear friends Adam and Kelly Hook. They had a beautiful baby boy, Brady Adam, on March 1. He was almost a Leap Day baby but managed to wait it out so he can be sure to have a real birthday every year. Everyone is happy and healthy just outside of Madison.
Back to our trip. We had a full but relaxing weekend in Chiang Mai. The Shangri-la just opened a few months ago there and was offering special rates so we got to stay in the lap of luxury. We have both decided that it's hard to do better than the Shangri-la and are very happy that they'll be opening some in the U.S. Since the hotel just opened, we practically had the entire place to ourselves. We barely saw anyone all weekend and the staff was amazingly friendly and accommodating.
The city is incredibly safe so we headed out to have local food for all of our meals. Only breakfast in the hotel and then we gorged ourselves on delicious Thai food everywhere we turned. One day was spent at the Maesa Elephant Farm and then a trip to the biggest, most important temple just outside the city, the Doi Suthep. The overall experience with the elephants was cool but we ended up feeling badly for them because they've been trained like monkeys. Sort of sad in some respects but amazing when you consider that they are smart enough to play harmonicas, paint pictures and do a variety of other "tricks."
On Sunday, we headed to an all day cooking school at a local organic farm. We started out at a very local market where our teacher gave us a bit of a tour. It was different than the markets in HK so we enjoyed it. Then we headed out to the farm/school where we both cooked some very yummy food. Other than it being crazy hot (100 degrees F), it was a very fun day.
Monday morning we got up and went to see a few of the many, many temples that are located in the city center. The detail on all of them was incredible but we wished we both had a better understanding of Buddhism to really be able to appreciate all that we were seeing.
Since we seem to have a habit of going to places we've never heard of before we moved to Asia, I thought I'd include a map to give you an idea of where Chiang Mai is. Also, just FYI, Myanmar is formerly known as Burma.
Here we are on our way to dinner our first night. The tuk tuk was our main mode of transportation and you can get just about anywhere for less than US$2.
Here's me with the baby elephants at the Maesa Elephant Camp. Aren't they sweet! I was obsessed with them. We bought bananas and sugar cane to feed them. It cost less than US$1 so we figured it was worth it.
Part of the elephant show (the equivalent of a monkey show). I am thinking of recruiting this guy for Team Tryers.
Chris and I on our elephant ride. Until the 1920's, the only way to get to Chiang Mai was on an elephant. Let me just tell you that the "saddles" that they had were not comfortable. We were only on for an hour. I can't imagine traveling days but we loved our elephant.
At the local market we went to with our cooking class, you can buy pre-made food. For those of you wondering what this is, just take a closer look. Yes, those are deep fried worms, cockroaches, grasshoppers, frogs, etc. Needless to say, we saved our appetite for the actual cooking class!
