Leaving Vientiane on our mini bus we made the four hour journey north to Vang Vieng. It was an interesting journey as the roads are more like dirt tracks with some paved sections. Our driver was keen to arrive on time and so we had a few close encounters with cows and some driving manouvers which in England would make it onto Traffic Cops!!

The driver dropped us very close to our accomodation Thavsansouk Bungalows right on the Nam Xong river which had a perfect view over the beautiful limestone Karst and surrounding valley. The bungalows were ok but we were really paying for the view but at $20 who is complaining...

That afternoon we had some Laobeer and watched the sun go down over the river, walked the short distance into town and filled our plates for 10,000kip or £1.00 with local food.

The next day we checked out of the bungalow and checked into to another guesthouse, cheaper and even better than the bungalows. We then walked 3k to one of the resorts on the otherside of the river and visted the Nam Xong cave, which is easy to access and huge inside, much bigger than either of us expected and well lit. On the way back into town we hired some push bikes and cycled 6km out from Vang Vieng centre across the river towards the village and visited the Yong Cave.

We paid our fee and the cycled a further five minutes to the cave entrance and being a little unprepared we were not sure what to expect. We started to hike and look around when the local guide who we had paid to enter the cave turned up he showed us the way (for a small fee). It was pitch black in the cave so with the iphone torch in one hand and a head torch on Nikki we headed into the cave with a bare chested guide. Nikki was pretty relaxed until she nearly put her hand on a massive spider and then she began to question what we were doing! Every now and then our guide would stop and begin banging on the stalogmites. Our little caving journt suddenly started to get serious when the tunnel started to narrow and we were forced into a crouching position, and then momements later shuffling along at a 45 degree angle to pass a more difficult section. Then we entered a cavern with seemingly no exits, or at leasts that what we thought until our guide got on his belly and did a caterpiller shuffle and disappeared saying only 1 minute to exit!!!!

We did follow which was brave of us and maybe it would have taken 1 minute but we did stop at the tunnel centre point while Nikki had a small crisis of confidence about our guides ability to get her out!!! We did make it to the other end and it was well worth it although, at the time we might not have thought it but that was the end of caving for us!

Early evening we found a great little Lao resturant serving fantastic local food which in Vang Vieng is pretty hard, most places serve you western food while you sit back and watch re-runs of Friends! We had a great Penag Chicken dish, with steamed rice and Pad Thai with essential spring rolls perfect!