2007 - Asia - Day 17 - Chang Mai, Thailand

We had breakfast at the hotel, which was good. Jenny found a rice bug, a kind of big grasshopper, and put it on Bob’s plate. From there it went to Leon’s shoulder, my plate, and Mark’s. Funny! We left Chaing Rai at 7:30 a.m. I didn’t care much for our room, but I loved our hotel grounds and this area. We drove 2 hours to the village of the long necks. That was a cool place. They have a little village I the mountain tops, mainly now for tourism. We had to load up in jeeps to get to it. They used to wear the rings around their necks for protection from lions and wild animals. Their necks would get so weak that if they took the rings off, their necks would break from the weight of the head. They now take them off sometimes to keep their necks strong. I bought a cute bracelet there. We then drove about 2-3 hours to a restaurant for lunch. The restaurant was really interesting. It was called the Rubber triangle. They REALLY promoted safe sex. The food was excellent though. I was hungry. Oh, I forgot to mention that halfway in our drive, we stopped to buy pineapple at a street stand. Mmmmm! I’m really going to miss the pineapple here. The rest of the day has been driving and factories. We went to a lacquer works factory, umbrella making, wood, and silver factories. Ugh! We went to a dinner show at 7:15. It seemed very authentic. We had to take off our shoes and most people were sitting on the floor with cushions. There were tables along the outside of the room, and the stage in the middle. We sat on the tables and then most of us moved up closer to the stage for the show. The food was pretty good. I loved the sticky rice steamed in the bamboo bowls and some spicy beef mixed in. The show was good. They pulled Mark out of the audience to dance with them.