Ok so this morning after our excesses of the nigh before we had a sleep in, er, well we woke up about the same time and er we got up about 8ish… so I guess that even though we planned to sleep in we didn’t.  Wasn’t from the want of trying though. (edit from Cass… something about bloody noisy neighbours again…)

Still we did redeem ourselves and took our time lazing over breakfast, so we figure that is just as good.  We ran into the Canadian couple that we’d chatted to briefly the night before over beers and dinner so chatted again as one does over breakfast.

We headed out to the internet cafe to check out some of our options for accommodation in Chang Mai since they all seem to have websites.  Seeing one we liked, cost wise and it states it has free internet use for guests including wireless (so we shall see!).  We fired off a quick email asking if they had rooms available.  Then, since we had time, we checked on Chang Rai.  We found a great place online, owned by one of the local tribes and the profits get put for the most part back into the community.  Looks great so we are thinking of staying there and doing a hill tribes trek that looks amazing through them as well.  (edit from Cass… Cathy is really trying to break me with this one… we have to build our own house and catch our own food… heh heh… great challenge.)

After our internet search we meandered off down the road and paid for a boat to take us around the river (where we are staying in Ayuttaya is the old section and is an island in the middle of Ayuttaya).  A pleasant way to spend and hour or so, considering we only paid for an hour the ‘or so’ was a bonus ending up being about 1 hr and 45 mins with the owner pointing out temples of interest.

For the 2nd time in about 17 years travel I had something stolen.  Like last time it wasn’t much thankfully.  We stopped for lunch, I will not say where since it is hardly there fault, bag on one side, restaurant side and placed my hat and sunglasses on the table.  All I can say is when we went to leave the hat and sunglasses were gone.  Neither of us is certain when it occurred since neither of us noticed.  The only thing I can think of is that they were taken when we were distracted ordering food.  Now the hat they are welcome to, it was a about 50 cents in the markets of Vietnam that I purchased because I forgot my hat.  The sunglasses are a little more expensive, still about 2 - 3 years old now and well can be replaced so no big loss in the scheme of things.

Cass and I walked across to the local markets and I brought (what I assume / know given the cost) is a fake pair of Ray Bans and a blue Carlsberg Hat (bright blue, dear gods…).  all for the grand cost of about $3.80. (edit from Cass… at least I won’t lose her in the jungle.. heh heh heh.)

So armed with both sunglasses and a hat once more we headed off and ended up getting a foot massage, so worth it!  If you are in SEA and have not had a foot massage yet I highly recommend it!

On checking the email we discovered a room had been secured for us at our Accommodation of choice in Chang Mai and now here we sit in our favourite bar/restaurant in Ayuttaya the Chang House (if your heading to Ayuttaya, check it out and have some food or at least a beer, the staff is great - they are diagonally opposite Tony’s Place if you are interested) drinking beer, waiting for the time to tick by for our night train….