Korea: my life, my story: Thailand

( Some of the best people I've ever met )

Chiang Mai
2013/12/17~20

After a couple days in Bangkok, I hopped on a plane and headed for the cooler northern part of Thailand. I spent three days in Chiang Mai, which turns out is kind of the more adventurous area. There are lots of treks, rafting trips, and various excursions that you can go on. It was a wonderful city where I met lots of really good people. I was able to see Muay Thai, rent a motorbike for a day, and ride an elephant. If I hadn't already purchased a ticket to return to Bangkok, I would have stayed there for the rest of my trip. There was so much to do.

Woody's Elephant Training

( The guide wrote my name in Thai on my hand, and I wrote all of my Thai elephant commands. )

( The elephant park had six adult elephants and a baby. )

( Jai was explaining how the park works. Two elephants get the day off, so that they can rest and are not overworked. )

( We were told to be very careful around the baby, because she just wanted to play and didn't know her own strength. )

( I tried to get a photo, but she was pretty rambunctious. )

( I was so impressed by how damn big they were. )

( They offered a few different photo opportunities throughout the experience. )

( This was the candy team. It was pretty funny actually; the group was divided into two smaller groups. The other group was a 10 dude group of New Zealanders, and my group was the Asian group. They all told me that I fit in perfectly, because I live in Korea. )

( Jacob & Emily )

( That's me with my riding partner. )

( For some reason, I can't remember her name. I remember that she was born in Japan, but currently lives and works in Las Vegas. )

( I got to ride up front for the first half of the adventure. )

( We were pretty darn high off the ground. )

( The two dudes in the back are Brian & Grant. )

( The elephants wanted to stop every couple minutes to eat. That's fair, considering their massive size. )

( We took the elephants on a stroll through a creek. )

( That baby elephant was always trying to run off and play. )

( We washed and scrubbed the elephants in a little pond. We played around a little bit too. )

( As the candy team, we got to go out into the fields and cut sugar cane. )

( Our team had way more fun than the poop team who had the pleasure of scooping elephant poop. )

( Brian & Grant found a fun way to use the machetes. )

( We took turns throwing sugar can stalks at each other and trying to chop them in half in mid-air. Here's Emily taking her turn. )

( Grant even made some machete art. )

( This was the last group photo op for the candy team. )

( Elephant Chair! )

Around Chiang Mai

( I like that this temple was primarily black. )

( It really made the gold pop! )

( It even had some cute baby Buddha statues outside. )

Muay Thai

( The girls and I made some friends and when to a Muay Thai fight. )

( The arena was pretty neat. The boxing ring was in the middle of about twenty bars. )

( Some of the kids fighting were surprisingly young. I'm pretty sure I placed a bet on this guy and lost. )

( Blind-folded Muay Thai was definitely interesting. )

( The ref definitely took some punches. )

( After the Muay Thai fight, Scott and Matt rode up next to us in a tuk tuk. I had had a little bit to drink and made the terrible/fantastic decision of hopping on the back of the tuk tuk to meet up with everyone at a bar. It was super dangerous, but extremely fun. )

Aoi Garden Hostel

( This was definitely the best hostel I've stayed in. )

( The courtyard was super chill. )

( The staff was super friendly, unless of course you are talking in the courtyard after midnight. )

( Scott is a rad guy from Australia. We actually ended up staying in the same hostel back in Bangkok. )

( These two lovely Brazilian girls are Maria & Juliana. )

( I honestly miss these two a lot. I hope that I get to see them again someday. )

( Right around this time, they were getting ready to head down to the beaches for a couple weeks. )

( Matt is a great guy from Canada. We spent my last day in Chiangmai together after Juliana, Maria, and Scott departed. )

( You can buy these awesome pants in any of the markets. )

( We actually spent quite a bit of time playing around with the camera, trying to figure out all of the settings. )

( Hanging out at that table with a few beers was one the highlights of the trip. )

( I don't remember this guys name, but he was staying in the same dorm room as me. He liked trekking. )

Motorbike Rental

( Matt and I rented motorbikes and rode up Mount Suthep. )

( On the way up, I was almost hit by a car and had to bail on the bike, but soon after we took a detour. )

( It was an excellent detour; there was a waterfall! )

( That's me next to the waterfall. When Matt was getting lined up for his photo, he slipped a bit and sliced open his ankle. It wasn't terrible, but I'm sure it was annoying for awhile. )

( One more with a little more waterfall in the photo. Thanks for taking this photo, Matt. )

( There were a lot of viewpoints along the way. This is Chiang Mai. )

( At the top of the mountain, there was a temple. These dragons lined the large stairway to the top. )

( These hill tribe photos were so cute, but I realized that they are all dressed up to get money from tourists to help out the family. It is actually pretty sad. They chased me up the stairs, and I couldn't resist giving them the change in my pocket. )