17/10/10

Border crossing into Laos

Got woken up at 6am by some laos dude singing, only 3hrs sleep. Someone was singing in the night as well, but no one else heard it so I'm starting to wonder if its the malaria tablets! Apparently we all have 20mins to have a shower then he is going to take us to the border and put us on a boat, a bit of warning would have been nice. We all decided to go with him and before we know it we are on a slow boat down the Mekong. That was our plan anyway, just wasn't planning on doing it after 3hrs sleep and wearing the same pants I had on yesterday. Wasn't the most comfortable journey but we met some cool people, played some cards. The scenery was beautiful, loads of small villages you would only see from the river, mountians, fisherman. It's good to see some of the country before the drinking begins again in Luang Prabang! Stayed over in pak beng before we carry on the second leg of the journey tomorrow.

18/10/10

Day 2 of mekong slow boat to Luang Prabang.

Woke up by singing again, I hope this is not a sign of things to come in Laos. Got the boat ant 9am, was already full when we got there, then it didn't work so we had to switch, ended up sitting on the floor...again. Was more sociable sitting on the floor, met a girl from Plymouth who knows some people I do, such a small world...again. We were carrying chickens ontop of the boat this time and passed a boat full of pigs. We decided to have some beer lao to make the time go quicker, then everyone sitting on the floor decided to join us, the last few hours went really quick. As the sun was setting we arrived in Luang Prabang and our friends who left us in Pai were waiting for us. Was really good to see them, plus they have booked us a room at their hostel so the old gang is back together, this time with extra members, think we are about 17 of us now! Went to a cool bar called Utopia, was pretty classy, even by english standards and it had a volleyball court. Problem here is the 11:30 curfew, so ended up playing charades at the guest house, which ended up getting pretty loud and us all getting told off, that seems to happen to us alot!

19/10/10

Luang Prabang

17 of us for breakfast today, epic, the most yet! A few of us decided to hire bikes and cycle round and see some stuff. Met James and Ryan who came with us, thank god beacuse the chains kept coming off the bikes and we didn't have a clue what to do about it. Visited a really old temple which is a world heritage site. We cycled past this random street party where this drunk old laos guy was singing and somehow I got dragged up to dance. After cycling to find a market we couldn't find we decided to give our crap bikes back. Luang Prabang was really pretty thugh. It sits on the river and used to be owned by the French so has lots of old colonial building with shuttered windows and awesome bakeries! As it got late we headed up tp Phu Si which is a temple on a hill to watch the sunset. We took some beer laos with us and sat around chatting as the sun went down, was really pretty. Hit the food night market for dinner, all you can eat buffet for a pound!

20/10/10

Luang Prabang - The perfect day and then the massacre happened.

Just the girls today as the others left this morning. Headed to a waterfall called tat khang si, it's one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen, my search for the perfect waterfall is offically over. It looked man made it was so perfect, the water was such a bright blue and elephants came and joined us in the water. We did the tyre swing and jumped from the waterfalls, was so much fun. Went shopping in the night market, was to much stuff to choose from there, beat market yet. All the girls went for dinner at lao lao garden and we all did the out door bbq which you cook at your table, ate water buffalo, was ok. Thats where the perfect day turns black!! We got back to the guest house and there were 3 cockroaches in our room, which after alot of screaming we killed them. But then we got the hotel guy to spray stuff down the whole outside our door where they were living. Not the best idea, thy all started running out to get away from the fumes, we couldn't hit them quick enough, it was like whack a mole a the fair, there must have been 50 of them. Then he told Ami and I to go inside and they were running at us from under the door, it was petrifying. When they finally stopped I got him to move us to another room, we were shaking and laughing hysterically so we didn't cry. He had to hose the dead goo away. Very bad times!