And the traveling continues: A Trekking Adventure

One of the more, likely most, popular things to do in Chiang Mai is to go on a "trek". Treks are basically guided walks that may include elephant rides, rafting, visiting hillside tribes and "trekking" through the rainforest surrounding Chiang Mai. They can be a day long, or up to 7 days.

Chiang Mai offers a variety of elephant "treks" that I did not want to sign up for because I had concerns about how the elephants were treated. It was surprisingly hard to find a trek that didn't involve an elephant camp or ride in one way or another. After flipping through 3 tour guide books with a tourism agent we finally found one. Though it turned out that the company we went with also did elephant treks if you purchased a different tour package.

We opted for a two day only walking tour. We started with a group of 4 others, though all of us had signed up for a slightly different tour.

As we drove out to where we would have lunch before starting our trek we passed a group of elephants. Each elephant had a small, sided platform tied to its back with two tourists sitting inside. Two of the elephants have large chains tied to their ankle. That confirmed why I didn't want to be involved with elephant trekking. Though I should note that I've now been told not all of the elephant mahouts (owners/trainers) mistreat their elephant.

Our first night we stayed in a beautiful bamboo hut on the hillside. The site came complete with pigs, piglets (that were adorable!), chickens, multiple dogs and a very loud, but friendly, cat. There was no electricity and running water came from pipes flowing out of the streams.

I would have liked a bit more walking, but our group was great and it was nice to get out of a city for a while. We ended up taking a shorter hike and then rafting on the second day instead of a longer hike. It worked out well as it was pouring in the afternoon and hiking may have been miserable.

Photos will do the trek more justice than I could.