Back in Thailand. And… breathe. So organised! So clean! So easy!

I checked myself into a hostel (my last hostel. I’ve already started doing that: “my last… my last…” Stop it!); picked up an English girl called Lucy and a Dutch guy called Jerone, and hit Chiang Mai’s nightlife. Started with a few gay clubs (…) and found some new friends who were on a gay package tour. Their tour guide was a complete hoot and included us in the group for the evening, tempting us not to go home with the promise of a straight club. Straight it was, classy it wasn’t, but really good fun, complete with “pashing police” (not official name, obviously) who go up to you if you’re having a snog, shine a torch in your face and wag their finger at you. No smooching allowed!

The next day started too soon for my liking and delivered a pretty feisty hangover that only kicked in at about 1pm. A very mooching sort of day that ended up with a cookery course with Lucy in the evening. It was a test to how much food any one person can squeeze in your stomach: all the food was so good (as I am now a brilliant chef), and the enormous quantities sorted out my hangover.

Over the next 2 days Lucy, Jerone and I did a trek in the jungle, 2 hours north of CM. We were skeptical on the first day regarding how much trekking we would actually do: we were taken to an orchid & butterfly farm, went elephant riding, a local market (blah blah) and only started walking at 2pm. Early enough! Stunning, gorgeous, beautiful scenery, but so steep! And hot! All contributing to a very sweaty Alex. Eeeugh!

That evening we stayed in a very rickety bamboo hut in a tiny hamlet on top of a hill, lulled to sleep by too many Chang beers and the echoes of “Why Why, Miss American Guy”; “Hope, Jovanna” and other mispronounced popular round-the-fire-even-if-there-is-no-fire songs, which the guide and his friends (er, and some of us too) warbled out.

The second day was less of the inclining variety of walking (having stayed at the top of the hill), but no less taxing was the descent, stopping at a waterfall on the way. Note: standing under a waterfall is not glamorous: it is very painful, cold, messes up hair, and has the capacity to remove bikini bottoms (not mine, thankfully).

After a spot of white water rafting and bamboo rafting we headed back to CM.

On my last day in CM, Lucy and I dragged our near-paralytic legs out of bed and hired a motorbike to visit a wat on top of a mountain and another in the forest. (Perhaps my last wat? To be honest, that’s not such a catastrophe), and then off to Chiang Mai Prison for a massage. I was a little nervous when I saw a strapping woman lumber towards me with her meaty hands (how many people’s necks had she wrapped them around? I kid), and my trekked-out thigh muscles trembled when she looked at them… but it was a really good massage, probably the best I’ve had in SEA.

Ended the evening off with the night market (fab, but SO many people) and a few drinks.

All civilized and well-behaved: off to Pai the next day early-early.