On Friday night we took our first sleeper bus to Pakse, a small townin the south from Vientiane. After having to get a local to explain to our bus company on skype the name of our guesthouse we were pleased to get picked up at 7.30 as planned to take us to the VIP sleeper bus. Ash had done his usual last minute '"adrenalin rush" by deciding to put a film on his iphone 30 minutes before we left! On arrival at the bus depot we were pleased to see some bi...

At 9 am we ere were on the VIP (VIP=reduced chance of breakdown???)10 hour bus to Vientiane (Capital of Lao). A coupe of local pick ups later we were straight into the mountains heading through amazing bamboo hut villages perched on the edge of the mountain side-these people put a lot of trust in bamboo round this part of the world! It was great to see but we didnt pass through quietly. Our driver was intent on using horn on every corner and as we passed on ...

We have both decided that we really like Laos, especially Luang Prabang. After our long boat ride we decided to chill out on Tuesday and go to a waterfall with some guys we'd met from the boat. After a nice tasty breakfast from Utopia (everyone who has visited Luang Prabang will know this little piece of heaven) we headed over to the guys hostel and took a tuk tuk ride for about an hour. We even met a 'northerner' from Blackburn who was hilarious and him and Ash ...

We were really sad to say goodbye to 'nine' at Green Tulip House in Chiang Mai but was looking forward to our slow boat ride into Laos. We got picked up around midday and spend 6 hours chlling on a mini van chatting to some fellow slow boaters and reading on our way to the border town of Chiang Khong in Thailand. As part of our deal we got one nights free accomodation which was nice and we were both really excited about having a real hot shower as we`d previously...

Got picked up for cooking course by a man named Pot. After a couple of stops we dropped into the local market where we were introduced to a few local ingredients that would be used during the day. Then we were on our way to Pot and Nancy's house, our teachers for the day, just outside of Chiang Mai. Once we had strategically selected our dishes so there was no overlap we were straight to the high powered Woks! There was only 4 us us sometimes can be up to 10 ...