Having a hot time

We've spent the last few days in Sukothai, one of the ancient capitals of Thailand, and Mae Sot, a town on the Myanmar border. Moving around more has given us a picture of the diversity of this country--Chiang Mai and Chiang Dao were in a more mountainous area, with lots of hill tribe people in native dress. Sukothai was really 2 cities--the "new" city was unremarkable, but the old city is a World Heritage sitebecause of all the ancient temples. And Mae Sot has the most diverse population: Thais, of course, Burmese men in sarongs, Indo Burmese in Muslim dress, and also Karen tribespeople.

It has been really really hot. We wondered why we were feeling so hot and lethargic till Len read in the paper that the temps have been reaching 40 degrees Celsius--if I've done the conversion right, that's 104F! So that has tempered our interest in walking around outside. The air-con room and lots of cold water are keeping us OK though. But the non aircon bus and minivan rides are not so great--especially when there are 12 people crowding into 9 seats. But hey, we wanted the real experience.

Tonight we take the overnight VIP bus to Bangkok (with our very own assigned seats), and tomorrow evening we fly to a Thai beach resort for 2 weeks. We're ready.