The truck ride up to the star point was an interesting one which reminded me of The War if the Worlds Jeff Wayne. Laos is in the process of leaving the list of 20 poorest countries and one way is through infrastructure and building proper roads. Consequently, half of the trees are covered in red dust and look like the red weed from TWOTW an the other half are silver from the newly laid gravel/cement.

Food 1: We got breakfast on the truck consisting of many new fruits, some broken open like walnuts, some peeled like grapes, one like a polystyrene pear and really nice baby clementine complete with a sprig of leaves; rice pudding in banana leaves and a yoghurt.

You may recall I moaned about the ease with which I did the last trek and was hoping for more of a challenge this time. Well my body, specifically my stomach, took it bat home and decided the night before the trek would be a good time to let its guard down... If you know what i mean. The 5 hour trek was in fact just what I wanted and luckily I saw the funny side and powered though. (With the aid of caffeine empowered paracetamol).

The hike was beautiful and we saw lots of interesting rock faces (me the geologist and Chelsey the climber), big spiders, giant leaves and picked up some coriander-like herbs to go on dinner. One part of the jungle contained a herd of cows, some of them had bells (only the ones on our right strangely) whereas he ones on the left felt like making a variety of grunting noises would do the job.

We stopped in a 5 family village to eat lunch where I deciphered a local kids' game which requires a lot of seeds or similar and a hole in the ground. I couldn't ind out what the game was called but I will be excited to teach anyone when I get back! The strange going about this village was how well fe the pigs, dogs an cattle were. It made my happy, if I was gonna live in a tribal village, that would be it. When we got to the community we were staying with it was comparatively upscale to the ones in Chiang Mai. Everything was more well built and organised and our bedroom was nicer than some of the hostels I've stayed in.

We played football with a growing number of kids in he evening and other tour groups joined us for a full variety of skill and no one brilliant and everyone willing to pass it around (apart from mini-beckham who kept a strict eye on the score). It was nice to have the girl involved too. It was a change to my hokey skill set as I tried to control the power if my boot and not take off a child's head. Our team had Fairly and a local girl in net and they made a formidable team and mini-beckhamette stopped a goal with a blow to the nose from Mark the Aussie. She kept playing though and was man if the match in my opinion.
[On a side note my knee/ankle must be getting better because I didn't notice them with all the running and turning... Either that or hockey is just a more demanding sport.]

Our guides didn't know much so I adopted another group's guide when I wanted knowledge as he also took a stint in goal for us.

Food 2: Sticky rice is a huge thing in Laos. You pick down out of a woven basket squeeze into a ball with one hand, pick up the other thing whether it be veg and/or meat, put them together and throw in in your gob. I prefer Luang Prabang sandwiches you get on the street for 80p with a free banana.

After a leisurely evening of infuriating the other trekkers with campfire riddles and games which turned into listing as many celebrities and famous characters whose first and second names start with 'T' and a fantastic sleep we walked on to get some kayaks.

The trip down he river was blissful and a great work out for my forearms. I wasn't able to catch up the 2/person kayaks when we raced but my endurance was higher if we were all Top Trumps cards... Half way down I saw done elephants crossing so I powered ahead to get a photo and as I got there one I their guides invited me to come closer, so i kayaked with the elephants which was the highlight of the day. Maybe of the weekend because it was so surreal!