Bangkok - Siem Reap - Vientiane - Vang Viang - Luang Prabang - Luang Namtha - Chiang Rai - Bangkok

And so back to Bangkok once more. This city is a shock after Laos, with its miles of malls and flyovers and traffic jams. In Laos roads are all single carriage and there are, as yet, no golden arches. That's not to say Laos and Cambodia hadn't changed in the 10 years since I last saw (a very little bit of) them. The roads in Vientiane, Laos's sleepy capital, are now paved and 4X4 pick-up trucks, rather than motorbikes and bikes, are the vehicle of choice. But the people are still laid back and the whole country exudes a sleepy but slightly rebellious feel. As a tiny landlocked state, I guess you have to have some attitude to shrug off China and Thailand on each side.

But first Cambodia. The temples at Angkor haven't changed in 10 years - they are still as beautiful, imposing, time-defying. The people are just as wily and manic as I remember - we got ripped off changing money after a dose of Cambodian creativity at the Thai-Cambodia border, before being subjected to hours of Cambodian wit from our escort for the journey, who found his own jokes hilarious. Siem Reap, however, has changed. More than a dozen huge hotels line the main road through town, like a sort of Vegas, and the roads are all paved. I remember a quiet place with a few backpacker hostels and, despite our best effort to find one, no bars. There are now cafes seeling pain-au-chocolates and restuarants with steak-au-poivre and, inevitably, an Irish bar.

Despite misgivings about tourism and what damage it can cause, Siem Reap, with the thousands it must now employ, must surely be called a success story in a country with such a desperate past. We spent two days touring Angkor and some of the surrounding temples and climbing what felt like hundreds of steps, before taking a flight to Vientiane.

After a night in Vientiane, we took the first of another series of painful bus journeys north to Vang Viang, a small town on a river that nestles between the unfeasable jutting mountains. It's beautiful and I've never had such a fantastic view in the shower, but it's not just the scenery that attracts people. Vang Viang has become famous for its water sports - primarily 'tubing' down the river - and is now a mecca for semi-clad twenty-somethings. At times feels more like Ibiza than Indochina. As we sat and ate in one of the many outdoor cafes on our first night, we tutted and b****ed about the state of the drunks in bikinis who staggered past on their way back from the river. The tubing, it emerged, was really a glorified, water-borne pub crawl.

The next day, after weeks of temperatures in the mid thirties and excruciating bus journies, we were desperate to get in the water. We hired our tubes and hitched a ride upstream for our own tubing experience. After a couple of hundred yards and no more than about 50 seconds of tubing we came to our first bar. It was Beer Lao all round as we, somewhat snootily, surveyed the crowd. We also - girls included - had a bash at the aerial slide, with much hilarity from Chris and Fred. I, despite repeated instruction to let go at a specific time, was so overcome with fear (or beer) that I didn't, and did a sort of reverse belly flop, back first as the slide propelled me forward. Lucy managed a full on butt-flop. Fred and Chris giggled and pointed. Nevermind, Chris's time would come.

So back on the tubes and on to the next bar. More Beer Lao. And an even bigger, trapeze-style swing. Needless to say, Chris and Fred just couldn't help themselves. They were straight in the queue up the ten-or-so metre ladder climb to the platform. Lucy and I were sitting in a prime vantage point in a different bar on the opposite bank. People floated past on tubes. More people drank in the bar by the swing. People queued and made the jump. And then, Chris's turn. He takes the bar and leans back slightly and then, more suddenly than he should, jerks forward and then he's one-handed and then, well, he's in the water. Slight panic - is the water deep enough where he fell just yards from the bank? It is, and so we can't help but giggle. So Fred goes and does a reasonable effort, lets go at the right time. And Chris goes again, and lines it up properly this time and is really holding on and then - there's a sort of hushed gasp from both sides of the river - he's done it again!

Lucy and I erupt into gaffaws. Chris emerges sheepishly. Fred gives Chris a pep talk, something along the lines of 'hold on, really hard this time' and Chris climbs a third time. I am now feeling a growing sense of trepidation: I have at least some idea how much pride is at stake here. But he does it and swings out over the river before letting go, out of choice, at the right spot. There's a cheer from a crowd in the bar. Lucy and I recover from the laughter from the second jump in time to applaud. Oh, it was so funny. Such a shame that none of us had cameras, what with all that water (and beer).

Anyway, so we tubed some more and drank some more. Too much. Chris danced. We got chatting to some Irish girls who, after a moment of recognition, all chorused 'oh it's you - that guy on the swing' - it emerges they had been his hearty supporters, the ones who cheered when he got it right. Chris is famous, or infamous. Lucy lost her sunglasses and I lost my T-shirt. So just 24 hours after scorning the semi-clad things parading through Vang Vieng, I have to do a walk of shame myself through the streets and back to our guest house. At least I was wearing shorts, so wouldn't have offended the locals quite so much as those who wandered around in just their bikinis. But still.

The next day we cleared away the cobwebs with a bumpy cycle ride to one of the many caves that dot the mountains nearby, where there was also a large pool of cold blue water where we could swim.

Then we then took another bus north, this time to Laos's old royal capital, Luang Prabang, a leafy city of rivers, faded french colonial buildings and temples. Normally quiet and relaxing, Luang Prabang was heaving with anticipation for the upcoming New Year celebrations when we arrived and it did not disappoint. Three days of water-throwing, paint-smearing, flour-chucking, dancing, singing and a lot more water throwing ensued.

I left the others one day to head back to the room looking damp and recently floured but not too dishevelled. A five-minute walk and a couple of gangs of over-excited Laotians later and I was smeared in something black and oily, soaked from head to toe and freshly coated in flour.

We did manage to get some sightseeing done, despite the constant threat of attack, and swam in the pools at a local waterfall and visited some of the city's temples. They are really different from anything else we've seen in southeast Asia, beautiful paintings and mosaics - Buddha-fatigue didn't feature.

From Luang Prabang, yet another bus trip and more winding roads took us to the far north and Luang Namtha, where we took to the water once more for a two-day kayaking trip. Despite blistered fingers and a whole lot of arguments about how to steer a kayak over rapids (it's low water now so it was quite tame but there are lots of rocks to get stuck on and we did get stuck on a lot of them), sailing downstream flanked by the towering jungle of a nature reserve on one side and tribal villages on the other was amazing. We didn't capsize but Fred and I were both forced to bail when our steering let us down on the top section of some rapids. Lucy didn't notice Fred had gone and was happily chatting away to an empty seat, while Chris just looked on mystified and slighly angry -- he took the whole thing rather seriously and was not impressed by the steerer's performance. Ah well, I did improve.

From Luang Namtha, another bus to the Thai border, then another bus to Chiang Rai and then, the next day, another bus back to Bangkok. We're here earlier than we wanted but needed to allow time for our Indonesian visas, which it turned out we couldn't get in Vientiane, despite what we were told. Tomorrow, for the first time, Chris and I and Lucy and Fred are going our seperate ways for a couple of weeks. We take another bus (the train was booked up, much to our disappointment) down to the Malaysian border and on to the Perhentian Islands for some snorkelling, swimming and diving. Fred and Lucy head to Singapore to fly on to Bali where Fred's family is joining him for a couple of weeks. So, with bruised bottoms, and in some cases pride, we head south.