Christmas Day Fun 2022

Adventure water park Siem Reap.

Koh Chang half term

Scattered showers

Today was a mixed day, with scattered showers breaking it up - Kayaking, rain, Waffle break, rain, Walks along the beach, rain, Lazing around the hotel, rain.

Not sandy

Today we had a lazy day exploring the beach, and the sea life washed up after last night's mini storm (Blue starfish, various jellyfish inc a blue one, a stingray, various crabs and little fish), we then went on a bike ride to the end of the beach to a little fishman's bay. After all our cycling we stopped for refreshments on the beach, and whilst mummy and daddy enjoyed our Chang and Pina. Me and Diesel played on the beach, mummy said "You can play just try not to get too  Diesel heard was "take of your shirts off and cover yourself in the WET sand" and as you can see from his selfie he was proud of his achievements.

Caving

Today was a day of mountain climbing and caving, the first cave is a popular cave with both locals and tourists (what few there are) Phraya Nakhon Cave, this cave is both a burial sight for monks and houses the Kuha Karuhas Pavilion which was built for Rama V (The old old king of Thailand, we are currently on Rama X), this was more of a climb than we were was prepared for as we made the decision to hike from the starting point to enable us to also see the views from the local viewpoint as opposed to cutting the hike and taking the boat.

We had some refreshments afterwards and decided that we should visit the less known Kaeo Cave, as after all, it was on the route back.

Dan was excited about this cave as you have to enter it via a ladder, what he failed to inform us was that the whole cave would be pitch black and the only lights would be the headlights which the national guard provided us as the start for the 100m vertical climb at the base of

the mountain, or that once in the cave would be following some tiny little arrows deeper into the cave for 400m until we saw the sunlight shining through the ceiling, the cave was amazing and was a definite caving experience. As Dan said "there is no way it would have been just open to the public in England", we physically crawled through gaps and climbed Stalamites to avoid the pits and bats. Overall a great day, not sure if I will be saying that tomorrow with stiff knees.

Old logging bull

Today we took a wander and discovered an old logging bull elephant (this was the first elephant we had seen chained here but on enquiry, this was for his and the local's safety - look at the tusks they could do serious harm).

Bamboo raft

Today was spent casually watching the elephants around our bungalows whilst avoiding the stormy rain in the morning followed by an afternoon on the local bamboo raft (the river was more like a dirty chocolate river after the storm.

Chai Lai Elephants

From the city centre, we drove and stayed just outside of Chiang Mai centre at Chai Lai Orchid (an amazing Eco Lodge with rescued elephants and who also work hard to help the local community by fighting exploitation and human trafficking) in Mae Wang district. Whilst here we spent the first day with three elephants, three generations (Grandmother, mother and baby (1½ years old))

Local Dam

Today we went to a local national park, and visited a local Dam

Old wall

Today we cycled around the old city wall, and found a number of Geo's. 

Chiang Mai

So from Chiang Rai we travelled to Chiang Mai city centre, where we spent a day white water rafting https://youtu.be/pXJtnpDKlUk