We woke early as the sun was rise over the hills, leading to
a spectacular view of the morning mist hanging over the tops of the
jungle. After a breakfast of toast and
jam (Paleo has pretty much gone out the window out here :-/ ) we headed of back into the jungle. After a couple of hours trudging through the
now very wet jungle we came to a small stretch of river in between two
waterfalls. We all took the opportunity
to wash the dirt of travelling of us and to cool down a bit… And wow did we
cool down, Mountain Rivers are not warm!!!
There was a not massive 8 meter jump from one waterfall, however all the
jumps I have done before I have known there is lots of clear water and no
dangerous rocks…. Here I had seen some other guy’s jump, so I roughly knew
where to go but not exactly. But been
competitive, I wanted to be the first from our group to go, so I climbed onto
the ledge, Ems ready for the great photo opportunity. I walked to the edge peered over, I could
just see the water crashing down, a great mass of frothy water marking the
bottom… taking a deep breath, I lunged out into mid air… My heart in my throat,
falling like a rock with just enough time to think “God I hope I don’t hit any
rocks…” Suddenly im in the water roaring
water and bubble all around, kicking towards the surface… Wow what a rush,
Incredible (Jump of waterfall… done J
I looked up Ems looking at the jump, I could see she wanted
to do it… but to much thinking time waiting for me to go… Not this time but
next waterfall it would be her turn (that’s what I love about being out here,
there is no rush, always the next amazing adventure around the corner!
We dried of and headed of towards the elephant camp. Always wanting to do a bit more, I had opted for a second jump, however this time when I entered the water I went much deeper… Ems said afterwards she started to worry as I didn’t surface. Obviously as Im writing this I did surface, but the pressure ended making my ears pop. As we travelled to the camp it wouldn’t clear and I felt worse and worse, at one point when I tried to clear it, I nearly passed out… Luckily I was sat down and managed to hang out but boy did I feel shit!! We got to the camp, and we went and fed the elephants, you can feel the suction on your hand from their trunk as the grab the food… Amazing!!
OOOOOOHHHH A bit of a stretch!!!
After this we got to have a ride on the elephant, with no
seat, which was a bit of stretch for my flexibility but was incredible!! The
trainer took the elephant and us around a large route, instructing it with loud
shouts, and when the elephant couldn’t see his trainer it would start looking
around to try and find him again (I should mention that each elephant has only
one trainer, so they form a strong bond with each other). As we navigated around, we where both in awe
of how nimble this giant creature could be, we would go down steep, windy
narrow tracks that didn’t look big enough for it to put its feet let alone
manage to walk down… Incredible!!! What ever we went across, river mud, rocks
and managed with ease.
I first saw this and I thought hilarious. However as I watched more, with how other
people where treating him, I just felt great sadness for him. He had a cuddly toy as his companion and two
English guys kept grabbing it which caused him to go mad at them. I couldn’t help but think that its captivity
on his own must have driven him a little crazy L
Final stop for jungle trek was a lazy cruise down the river
on a bamboo raft. Neither me nor Ems
where that excited about the prospect of this… as it had started raining again
as we left the elephants. However we
finally convinced ourselves to go, and we where pleased that we did, as shortly
after it stopped and cleared up. The
raft was just a big square of bamboo poles with chairs set to sit on, it was
controlled by two young lads one front, one rear with long poles to push us
along. I had a go at steering this as
well (my second boat), with Ems and the two German girls humming the tune to
Indian Jones… Very cool J
So the jungle trip was done, we headed back to Chiang Mai…
What an amazing couple of days!!
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