trekkin' it up.

Week 12.

So, we went on a vacation.  It was the only week that Dana and I were going to have off of work at the same time during our stay in Thailand, so we decided to explore.  First, we set off for the hills in the North near Chiang Mai.  We stayed with a lady there named Lisa who used to be a missionary in Senegal with the Mashburns', and Dana just so happened to have met her while Lisa was on furlough in the states.  They exchanged contact info, and whaddaya know, we had a comfortable, air conditioned, home-y, free place to stay!  That alone was enough of a vacation for us.  :)

But alas, we could not just stay holed up in Lisa's comfy house, we were there to explore!  So we went to a sweet night market (my favorite of any market I've been too!), and we left the next morning for a two-day trek.  Our guide's name was "Jungle Jimmy" who told us that he learned English solely from movies and songs... which was not too unbelievable, given his tendency to laugh after anything he said, as if it were the punchline to some joke we were supposed to know.

The trek was hard.  But super legit.  I absolutely loved stomping around through the jungle, ducking under downed trees, climbing over huge rocks, sliding down muddy slopes, crossing rivers on bamboo bridges-- if there was a bridge at all, all the while clinging to our bamboo staff for dear life, without which we surely would have never made it to the top.  Most of the time you couldn't even make out the trail and there was a continual drizzle, as if we were marching through a cloud.  I was intense, but oh-so-fun!

It was also great fun to experience it with people from all walks of life, from all around the world.  There were three ladies from South Africa (who tooootally had no idea what they were signing up for), two girls and a guy from Ireland, the funniest foreign person I've ever met-- "Crown"--from Korea, a young American couple, a lady from Germany, an artist from Spain, Jungle Jimmy... and me and Dana.  A strange bunch, for sure, but we laughed nearly the whole way.  The greatest comic relief came from Crown, who was asking everyone socially inappropriate questions, and also named himself our "platoon leader." [You would have loved him, Aubrey!]  After spending the night at a hilltribe, we trekked back down, stopping to visit a waterfall, then white-water rafting back to the camp.  I think this trek may be my favorite thing I have done in Thailand so far.

The scenery was BEAUTIFUL.  I felt like I was in a movie.  Unfortunately, though, it was raining most of the time and we were moving so fast that I barely got to take any pictures.  The ones I did take are blurry from moisture and movement.  If the circumstances had been different, this would have been an awesome opportunity to try to enhance my photography skillz.

So, without further ado, my favorite shot from the trek....

entitled: "what trail?"  We had just come from the waterfall where my camera got so moist that the lens didn't open all the way.  I like what it did for the picture, though.  :)