Slumming it (Not!)

Monday, November 5

Ahhhhhh, what a great place this is. I have to admit that the fluffy towels, pristinely clean sheets, and abundance of pillows are so greatly appreciated. It's nice to be clean again, after three weeks.

So, today we grabbed a couple of mountain bikes from in front of the hotel and rode out to see an incredibly beautiful orchid farm. It's so hard to keep one orchid thriving (let alone flowering) back home, and here there were thousands of them. Spectacular. I think I took a hundred pictures. Speaking of pictures, I decided to spend an extra day in Chiang Mai, in order to get into the photo class that I want to take (the guy was booked up through Thursday). Then, it'll be the overnight train (12 hours) from here to Bangkok, getting in on Saturday morning. There will still be time to see my friend, Nils, in Bangkok, then out on Sunday morning for home.

The weather up here in the hills is so much different from what I've experienced over the last three weeks - it's cool and misty in the morning, never gets too hot during the day, and then rains a little each evening. At dinner, the electricity kicked off, which means we were limited in food selections, but the cook still managed to whip up some really good pad thai for me, and I was happy as a clam. I wonder how cold San Francisco will seem, after a month in heat and then thinking that this 75-80 degree climate is "cool?"

On the way back from the bike ride, just inside the gates of the resort, I came upon a couple of oxen staked at the side of the road, grazing (very common here). I took a picture of them, and didn't realize until I was looking through my photos this evening that even the oxen are fatter here. Chiang Mai is kind of a "health spa" type of town, on the outskirts were we are (Mae Rim, it's called), and the extra income base shows.

That's about it - tomorrow, I have the day to myself, and plan to nap, read, walk around the grounds here, and have a sea salt body scrub. It's a rough life, but someone's gotta do it.

Cheers!
Janine