Two families, Nine wheels.........Cycling in Chiang Mai

Liddy
So, we have met up with Kathie and Alistair and family again, and are now in Chiang Mai, the 'capital' of Northern Thailand and currently ranking as one of my favourite places in Thailand. There are hundreds of small 'sois' (alleyways) all around the city which are fun to explore and take you to all kinds of unexpected places.
Kathie and Alistair have hired bikes to join us cyling so Sebastian (4) has been riding around in a chair on the back of Alistair's (mountain) bike whilst the girls got the bum deal with Mathilda (7) perched somewhat precariously on the back of Kathie's (one gear only) bike, on a flat seat with two fold down foot supports. She was so bounced around that by the end of day 1, the flat seat had lost a crucial nut on one side and we had to tie it on with a piece of plastic. What with Kathie's helmet being a strange shape and poor fit (such that it sat at a jaunty angle like a beret) they made an interesting sight......
Anyway, equipment aside it has been really fun to explore the area on two wheels. Yesterday we explored a few of the less visited wats (temples) which were lovely. Low point of the day was when Mike and I had ignored Meg's request for the loo once too often and she created a huge puddle on the floor of a temple. High points were the children running around pretending to be archaeologists, banging the bells in the temple compounds, and Alistair finding a stash of money in the road. Not mega bucks but enough for a big round of cornettos which kept everyone smiling.
Today we went off into the countryside to visit some ruins which were beautiful at least in part because they were completely deserted. High point was stopping at a random hairdresser for group hair cut. Low point was the resulting hair cuts. Suffice to say that you might not see any pictures of Sam for a while..........
We have a few more days en masse before Mike, I and the kids head towards Laos and some mountains. I read some cyclist's blog the other day, and they described the route........100km between towns and 20km ascents of steep mountains. Hmm, sounds interesting.
Last but not least, the good news on the culinary front is that Meggles had her first mouthful of rice today. Its taken two and a half months but a breakthrough nevertheless!!