Arriving in Laos is like stepping back 100years. The border looks like is was a Blue Peter 'make' costructed out of crisp boxes and sticky back plastic. We spent many an hour here waiting for the staff to finish their lunch before they could charge us overtime and let us into the country. Laos works on a whole different timescale to the rest of the world. Buses with child-size pleather seats, puking locals, 1 tonne of rice, 3 tonnes of melons, 70 passengers and 4 chickens take 5 hours to travel 150km, on a good day. The toilet stops are by far my favourite part of the journey though as everybody squats elbow to elbow at the side of the bus. And the Karaoke they play never ceases to amuse me.

Laos is also eaily the best country in the world, one day we cycled to China - it took over an hour of uphillness the way there and we freewheeled it back in about 5minutes. I was scared i was gonna crash over the handlebars as it had no brakes. But my feet worked a treat. The local kids come over to us and dare each other to touch the white person whilst a local tribe woman comes over to offer us bracelets, scarves and a load of other multi-coloured items that looks great in tribal villages, less so on the streets of London, anyway, after refusing the tie-dye (i will not be broken) she offers me weed, seconds later she ups the game and offers me Opium. Just your average breakfast in Laos.

We decided to do a trek up in Northern Laos, it was just the two of us and our local guide, who doubled as a mountain goat. We headed into a village and disturbed a Shamen who was banging a drum and dancing on a table whist talking to the spirits (not the alcoholic variety but i dare say he'd had a few, and was dancing to the music in his own head), it was like walking into an episode of the Mighty Boosh, only without Bollo and not a jumpsuit in sight.

I was hoping the trek as going to be more of a stroll through green fields and whatnot. I could not have been more wrong. The first two hours were pure torture as we ascended up to 2000ft, a near vertical climb in the midday heat. I thought i was going to die, and tried to pretend i was asthmatic, not just unfit. By sundown we reached out destination - the likely setting of an oxfam appeal: Bamboo huts, no electricity, no running water, just pigs, goats, dogs, naked children and women passing babies to the one with the fullest breast.

The settlement that we were staying in has been there 140years but i put money on them never having seen the modern invention that is the wheel. We were told to wash in the local water hole, poo in the forest, and take a wee wherever we wanted. Just like Reading Festival, minus the washing. The local men soon came over wearing Sherlock Holmes-type jackets, smoking the local substances, drinking lao-lao (home mede alcohol [a new hobby for me]) and we feasted on some of the 15eggs that the guide had brought along for us for one day.

In Laos I think i've drunk some of the worst cocktails ever made, shopped in markets where knuckle duster, guns and ammunition lays side-by-side with silk scarves and wooden toys, and travelled on vehicles that i'm convinced are the inspiration behind theme park rides. The nightbus being my favourte: single beds are suspended in the air, 2 people are rammed into it and adorned with Winnie The Pooh blankets and expected remain motionless for 15hours. Naturally I hit my head on the metal railing within 3 steps onto the bus and almost knocked myself out, I walked on and tried to sidle up the aisle which was about 30cm wide, ony to find two locals snugged up in our bed. What then followed was akin to playing musical chairs in a cupboard.

A highlight of Laos was Vang Vieng: home of the tube. The general idea is to grab a tracor inner tube and float 2km down the Mekong River. Easy you say. The wooden bars, complete with shoddy swings and zip lines, make it less so, and substantially raise the chances of an insurance claim. After 4 hours we had barely travelled 200metres, and already had a plethora of injuries, bruises, mental scars and new best friends. We just about made it back to the village - having to run the last 500metres, tripping up, breaking my flip-flops and covering myself in mud whilst doing so. I do remember floating past some bathing water buffaloes and winning a few games of charades en-route too. Happy times.

Too much excitement, and possibly some parasites form the Mekong, left me well in need of some relaxation, so after a ride in an elephant and 4 hours in the back of a pick-up peace was found on some river islands. I also got to expeience my first proper rain since November. The rain turned all of the water brown for the next few days, a good excuse to wash if ever one was needed. The islands are powered by a generator that comes on for 4 hours per day, so siting in the bar after this time makes you feel like you're in the olden days. I love Communism.