We learnt a very important lesson yesterday... trust no-one!

Last night we did a 10 hour bus trip up from Ayatthaya to Chiang Mai, we were promised 'VIP bus', 'very cheap' and when we enquired how busy the bus would be they said, 'no worry, lots of seats'. Hmmmm, well when the bus came it was obviously packed and there was a scrum for seats. JP managed to secure a pair for me and him, but our new friends Gordon and Fiona were not as lucky. They were the last on the bus... there were two of them and only one seat!

So Gordon spent the entire ten hours to Chiang Mai on a tiny green plastic stool wedged between the back rows. He was offered his money back, 350 baht (about 6 quid) but insult was added to injury when the rest of the bus burst out laughing and told him they only paid 40 baht (75p) for the same trip. And in case you're wondering we too had paid 350 baht... suckers!

When the bus pulled into Chiang Mai at dawn, we hoped the worst was over, but no, there was more. We were taken to a particular guesthouse (owned by the same tourist mafia who had ripped us off with the bus ticket) and given a hard sell on their jungle trek at 6.30am! We were weak with exhaustion, but we held out against the sales pitch and are going to shop around for a trek in the next few days.

On the plus side, we don't have dodgy tummies yet and amazingly have no mosi bites. Although I'm sure the jungle trek will change all that. I was really looking forward to the jungle trek with bamboo rafting and elephant rides until someone starting telling me about leeches getting into your shoes and I also think I might be scared of elephants (saw some yesterday in Ayatthaya and was terrified!).

We probably haven't got ill for the reason that we have been eating McDonalds and pizza hut instead of local grub. Every time the heat gets too much we head for the air-con shopping malls, and although everyone else is raving about the thai food, we seem to be happier with pizzas at the moment!

The whole theory about travellers losing weight appears to be rubbish, we weighed ourselves yesterday and seem to have put on about 3kg since we arrived. Could it be something to do with all the pizzas and the couple of beers each night? Anyway my thoughts are that if we pile on a bit of excess weight now it will mean we'll be prepared for the inevitable stomach bug. Just like David Blaine fattening up for his 44 day fast in London. And yes we have been following his progress on the internet every so often, and we loved the stories of Blaine-baiting (cheeseburger dangled from helicopter etc). In fact those stories made me miss the UK a tiny bit for the first time since I arrived!