Just to start, I missed out the fact that my family sent a card, with a camera memory card enclosed with Jade at the begining of the trip and she gave it to me on my birthday. Ok next day, although the thunderstorm should have cleared the skies, it didn't and after waking to a fairly over cast day we were treated to a good two hour poor down. This was the worst rain fall I think we've had on this trip, accentuated by the corrugated metal roof of our bungalow ...

My Birthday!!!! We woke, well me later than the other two, but still early, having been well rested. I spent my first hour or so of awake time reading in bed firstly, and then in a hammock. The girls were no where to be seen, although Linnea had told me she was going for a swim, in part of the river Lena had shown us the day before, just outside their bungalow, where there was a large rock in the middle of the river about half a yard under the water where one ...

So after a fairly heavy and late night, we were up farrrrrr to early to go a trip that Dennis and Lena had invited us on the night before. The trip involved meeting at 8.30 to catch a bus and boat to go and see the rare fresh water irrawaddy dolphins, before going to what I believe if the biggest waterfall in South East Asia, that could be a lie, but I think I read that, and it's the biggest (if it is at all) by the amount of water that goes over it, not height ...

We got a mini bus mid morning from Pakse to the 4000 islands. This place had kind of gained a mythical image in my head, from the things people had told me. Like Laos as a whole before I got there I didn't hear one negative thing about the place from anyone who had been there. OOhh excepting the fact that the electricity is turned off at 10pm!!! having only been on since 6pm!!!! The bus journey was a couple of hours, and we then transfered on to a a long boat...

We arrived in Pakse at 6 in the morning, it was pooring with rain, and we were to realise, that Vientiane isn't the dullest city in Laos, nope that title should surely go to this small, fairly dirty, very uninteresting place!!! After finding a hotel (finally), Sean and his girlfriend/wife (the South Africans) had found one but the rooms were abit too pricey for our selves, so we had to continue our search, eventually settleing on a Chinese hotel, which turned ou...