Hello! I don't know why i've started writing this because I have no time left but i'll try and speed-type. Si Phan Don is at the very southern tip of Laos, where the Mekong River splits into hundreds of tiny islands. I have no idea why this happens, but its incredibly gorgeous anyway. So, we set off from Vientiane by bus overnight to get to Pakse, which I slept like a baby and Colin didnt sleep at all. We thought we might stay in Pakse for a day, but took one look at it and hopped on a tuk tuk, pronto. The rather overpriced tuk tuk took us to the ferry port, where we hopped on a ferry on our way to Champasak, to spend the day. We were accompanied by a coach tour of Vietnamese tourists who weren't ashamed to tell us,in turn, that each of them was a doctor and that they were good people because they were there to help the poor people in Laos. The extremely camp men of the tour took a particular liking to big Colshy, and they were all lined up to meet him, elbowing me out of the way in the process. Anyway, Champasak is one long street in the middle of the most rural place you've ever seen. Swans, geese, wee gorgeous chicks and random water buffalo wander around the street, dodging the occasional motorbike and aww it was just so gorgeous. I loved it so much! We went there to see the ruins that are at the very end of the street. Its a UNESCO world heritage site, with ruined palace buildings, and an ancient temple at the top of about a million dodgy stairs. We tried to cycle it intially, however a monsoon started and we had to turn back, completely soaked, within 5 minutes of renting the bikes, much to the amusement of out guesthouse man. So we went back, got changed and dired and tried again. However, while we were there, another monsoon started and we got stupidly soaked again. A tuk tuk driver felt so sorry for us that he stopped us and gave us shots of lao lao whisky (which isnt actually legal) that had spiders and snaked in the bottle. MMM. That night (after the guesthouse owner had eventually stopped laughing that we got soaked twice) we settled down in our hammocks and went to bed by 8pm! Hmm, just realised this journal was supposed to be for Si Phan Don. Ok, i'm getting to that... so the following morning we were told by the guesthouse owner that if we waited for him for 10 minutes, he'd give us a free lift to the ferry port. By this he meant, wait here until the public bus comes along and you'll get to sit beside some grumpy locals and some live birds with their legs tied together. Smashing. The bus dropped us off on the middle of the motorway and we sat on our bags for half an hour, until anoither bus with a local english speaking man came and saved us from melting in the sun. From the bus we got another ferry to Si Pan Don! Horray! Don Det: Very lovely, guesthouse on stilts over the river with hammock and no electricity. We went on a bike ride from one island to another (Don Kon) through paddy fields to an amazing waterfall, and to a wee beach where you can sometimes see dolphins. But not today. That night the scariest strom ever happened and I thought I might die. I didnt though! Horrah! The next day we went to Don Khong by boat and I got sunburnt and moaned alot. It was a bit s*** and there wasnt anything to do so we hired a motorbike and spent the afternoon going up and down one street trying to avoid the chickens. That was a bit rushed... but I did it! Lots of love, Jenny xxx