Originally, we set out to spend a couple of days in Bangkok, then go up to northern Thailand, away from the traffic and pollution. We took an overnight train up to Chiang Mai, the largest city in north Thailand. We were going to spend a few days to a week there.
	Northern Thailand is famous for "trekking": going hiking into the back woods and visiting with some native hill tribe people. Normally, these treks are from two to five days. It is kind of an invitation to go gawking at some native folks. Maura loves hiking and being out in nature, but didn't like the ogling part at all. I wasn't too keen on the idea either, so instead we went on a one day "tour", where we went out into the countryside, and did very little gawking at people.
We stayed there for a few days, then we started to make our way back down to Bangkok. While we were in Chiang Mai, Maura had found an interesting place in one of our guide books called "Khao Yai". It is a huge national park in the northeast of Thailand, a couple hours outside of Bangkok. However, in order to spend some time there, we would have to forfeit some of the open traveling time that we had.
	The trip to Khao Yai included going to Phitsinulok, then taking a day trip to nearby Sukothai. We then took a night train to Ayuttya (a couple hours north of Bangkok,) got off at 5:30 in the morning, wandered around there and left on an afternoon train for Pak Chong, near the Khao Yai part. When we arrived there, we were very tired, but ready to go hiking in the park the next day.
After visiting Khao Yai, we made our way back to Bangkok and spent a relaxing day or so there before leaving for Bali.
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