Chiangmai day 2

Did I happen to mention that there is an itnernational convention for 180 Jehovah's Witnesses happening at our hotel??? Ye gods, or should I say ye Yaweh??? Having had the great misfortune to have a JW mother-in-law who was as fruity as a bat - the old biddy's wedding present to us was a year's subscription to Watchtower magazines. Give me strength.  They wont' be making any converts out of me or my little kitten herd, that's a promise!
However back to the matter at hand.  The hotel was quite noisy as it is near the centre of the city and it is a very busy city, however it was still quite fine for our purposes.  Funny how quickly we got used to the 5 star restort lifestyle and expectations. After breakfast we were off to the Elephant campe and the day proved to be one of the absolute highlights.  We had rides on the back of elephnts which took us into a river bed and up stgeep enbankments into the jungle and down ssteep embankments back into the water.  Fantastic, although as was my lot in life I had to share with Frugal and she sat white knuckled the whole time, complaining that the ride was too long and when would it finish?  I reminded her that we knew that from the beginning it was going to take 45-60 minutes. Boy that woman is hard work!!! In true Karen form I kept carrying on that this was the best experience EVER, taking heaps of photos and getting the rest of the group to pose for photos whilst on their elephants, with lots of laughing happening the whole time. Our mahoot was only a young lad and he kept singing different songs to us in his very limited English (his version of the songs were based on what he thought the English words sounded like to him even though he didn't understand what he was actually singing.  It was hilarious.  He started off with 'in the jungle the mighty jungle.... and I joined in with the whimaway, whimaway.  This was closely followed by a few choruses of Happy birthday to the elephant, jingle bells, the wedding march, John Denver's County Roads and he even snuck in a 'Jesus loves me this I know'. How could Frugal not see the funny side of this? Anyway once back on land and off the elephants all the kittens were talking at once telling their stories of how good  their elephant was and what it got up to and what it's name was, gender, age and anything else they could think of. Clearly a roaring success. Then we wentbamboo rafting down the river for about another 45 minutes and it was jsut so peaceful and beautiful all at the same time.  I made sure I wasn't on the same raft as Frugal this time as she was doing my head in and my patience was about at its limit with her. Then back on the coach to take us back up river to the elephant camp again where we got to see them bathe and then watch their show as they put on a demonstration of soccer, disco dancing, sitting, hopping, standing on front legs, back legs, laying down and then painting with their trunks.  So many wow moments and cameras were going berserk.  I'm already onto my 2nd 8GB memory card.
Whilst we were waiting o watch the elephants get in the river to bathe there was an opportunity to have your photo taken sitting on the elephants knees while it was seated.  I had my back to the elephant trying to get some of the kittens to come and pose for a photo, and next thing I know the elephant's trunk is between my legs and it has lifted me up towards its head.  What fun and my kittens were cracking themselves up so much so that some of them couldn't hold their cameras steady.  After that they nearly all wanted their photo taken sitting on the elephant's knee, but I noticed Frugal was standing way back away from the group so I went up to her and asked her point blank if she was enjoying herself, to which she replied yes.  I then simply said, Well, it's hard to know with you, and then walked away.  Somewhat surprisingly I haven't heard her complain since, but then again she has probably been avoiding me.
However enough time wasted on my one problem kitty. Reluctantly it is time to get back on the coach and leave this wonderful place. But needs must and it is now time to head to our lunch location which is an orchid farm and butterfly house restaurant.  Once again a buffet lunch with great choices and great food.  I recommend the Pad Thai and spring rolls, especially as I had 2 servings. The orchids were simply beath taking, so many colours and varieties.  Puts my poor cymbidiums to shame. Oh well. The butterfly house was lovely too but my camera lens kept steaming up inside it so most of those memories will just have to stay in my head. Back on the coach and the skies are staying to get grey.  It has been a perfect day today, a bit cooler, perhaps mid 20s and no humidity at all with a gentle breeze. But now on the coach there is a light rain, the first we have seen since we have been here.  We then have a look through the largest temple in the old city. Every temple we have been in is so very different from the previous and one of us have had that feeling of being "all templed out" at any stage. Much of this temple was destroyed in an earthquake in the 1700s (keeping in mind it was built in the 1300s and was then left untouched for some 400 years) but since then there has been a steady renovation of it to bring it back to its former glory. One more temple to see beofre we call it a day and it is the oldest temple in the old city.  In the closed temple next to it is house a supposed hair of Buddha which makes it a very revered and holy place.  We have become accustomed to seeing young boys in monks orange robes as w now know that that are not monks for like and can start training with the monks from as young as about 7 years of age although most are more likley to be in their teens. The old traditions require all young men to be a monk for at least 3 month's training where a key learning is that of controlling their temper so that they will become very good heads of their own household. They are also required to do 2 years national service after they turn 19 (or ws it 21?) and so should not marry before they have done both their monks and national service training. The way of avoiding the compulsory national service is to go to university, but even then they have to do similar to the Army Reserves one day a week. Maybe this is something Australia needs to reconsider. Just a thought.
Just as we are getting on the coach to head for our hotel a light rain falls and once agin we are so darn lucky with the weather. Back to the hotel just before 4.30 and we have had another fabulous day.  There was so much chatter on the coach after the elephant camp that I know this has been a stand out day for my little herd, and I am super chuffed. We did manage to do our Melbourne Cup sweep draw on the coach jsut before the elephant camp but knew that we would have to wait until the evening when I could get online to check out who won. It was all a bit of fun organising it and at 20 baht per horse (less than $1) none of us are thinking we might win enough to pay for our trip, but we all want to have scored a winner none-the-less. I appointed a race steward to oversee that all horse names were entered and appointed a course detective to make sure there was no illegal activity or doping scandal.  She got the position as we said that as she was the only one who had slept with a real detective (her husband was a D) then she had the best credentials to fill that position. One of my kittens told me that she normally organises the sweeps at her workplace and another kitten wanted to be invovled so they became the offical "ball girls" who held the two hats with the respective names in. All this was done whilst travelling on the coach so there was much laughing, ooh and aahing as names were called out and yelled out repeatedly for those calling out, "what did you say" and "what's my horse number again?" I even wore my hand made fascinator (which in an earlier life was the foam webbing from around my bottle of scotch). Much mirth and jocularity over that.
So back in my hotel room I duly go on line and find out the placings in the race. Thankfully there are 3 different kitten winners as we all had more than 1 horse.  I didn't score a placing so have done my 60 baht (about $2.50). I told them all that I would announce the winners at dinner and all reckon that's a great idea.
I am actually going to finish early for today as I now want to get ready to go to dinner and most of us are then going to venture out to the night markets. It is likely to be a late night so rather than finish typing at midnight I shall leave you panting for more. However if I do manage to get back in at a reasonable hour I will attempt to upload some photos, but I'm not promising.