Crossing Borders

Our bus to the Laos border was fun - a little 18 seater with 31 passengers some how stuffed into it.  Rach and I were lucky to get little wicker seats in the aisle, giving us prime seat stealing positions when some people got off half way.  Luckily the road to the border has recently been completed, making the expected 8-10 hour journey only take 6 hours, though I thought we would have to get out and push the bus on some of the up hill bits.

The shortened journey meant that we were at the border in plenty of time to cross on the same day, and we even managed to get on a bus to Chiang Rai that evening, making up for the day we lost in Luang Nam Tha.  Being back in Thailand was a shock - by crossing the border (a river) you are in another world - a very rich one.  I couldnt stop staring at the houses as the bus passed them - real houses, just like at home!  I had complete choice paralysis trying to choose between the 5 different types of water on offer at the 7-11.  Even the bus was beautiful, 5 seats across and almost empty so Rach and I got 3 seats each to spread out on, what a change from our previous bus!

real houses, just like at home!

At Chiang Rai we looked into a few tours to do our long promised trekking, to find that they were even more expensive than in Laos - we really should of spent our money there.  We also found out that the monsoon had arrived 3 weeks early - trust our luck.   We decided after one night to head straight to Chiang Mai.  I could leave you thinking this was due to the rain or us being cheap, but actually we fancied a night out in the big city.