Temples and Cooking School

     Our first full day in Chiang Mai began with a little bit of walking, a little bit of eating, some reading, and a couple drinks. We decided to just wonder around the city and see what there was to see. We found a couple of temples just down the street from our hotel, so we started there. It was a little odd being there with no other tourists. Every temple we have ever been to is always full of people. At the two we went to on this day, we were the only ones. It led me to believe we were not supposed to be there. I totally thought we were trespassing and I kept waiting for someone to come and yell at us. However, I was put at ease when a monk came out and began to talk to us, so then I figured we were fine. Here are a few photos from them.

 I don't know the name of any of these. There were no signs in English. I thought this one was gorgeous!

 I tried to be like the dragon...

 It was actually locked, so Travis couldn't go in either. :)

 The details are amazing!

 LOVED this one!

 Lots of little Buddhas

 Up close, this one was about the size of my hand, maybe a little larger.

They are just amazing!

     The next day we went to a cooking school at night. I am really glad we did it in the evening because it is much cooler then. The days are really hot and when you are cooking, it can be a little too much heat! We found the number one cooking school in Chiang Mai called Siam Rice Cooking School. It was perfect! We really enjoyed the one we did in Cambodia and we were looking forward to this one. We were picked up from our hotel and taken to the market to learn about the foods in Thai cooking. Then we went to the school and began. There were 10 people in our group, four of us from America and six from Holland. It was a fun group! We made a soup, a noodle dish, curry and veggies. Here are some photos.

 At the market

 Our teacher, Mink was fantastic! He was very knowledgeable and fun!

 This is where we did most of the cooking.

 Travis hard at work.

 Making Drunken Noodles! I was afraid of the fire, but Travis was a champ! The noodles were delicious.

 My Drunken Noodle dish, yum!

 Making curry paste by hand is a LOT of hard work!

 Making curry

 Taste testing

 My Pumpkin Curry and sweet and sour veggies, I rocked them!

Travis make another curry (I can't remember how to spell it though) and holy basil veggies. Yummy!

     Today we are just relaxing in our room until we move to our new hotel. After that I have a 3 hour spa appointment! What a lovely way to celebrate Christmas Eve! Then we have a date night to eat dinner and watch It's a Wonderful Life. So far we have done a lot of reading and relaxing, which was really needed! On Christmas we are out to explore mountains and waterfalls. I can't wait! The day after we are headed to an Elephant Farm to learn all about the animals and play with them. I am super excited! I fell in love with elephants when we went to Bangkok two years ago and I can't wait to see them up close again. December 27 will be our last full day here and then we are off to Luang Prabang, Laos. More updates to come...

Merry Christmas Eve!

C & T