DAY 14 - 29TH SEPTEMBER 2010 - SLEEPING, EATING AND MORE NIGHTBUSES

As the receptionist didn't speak English we didn't know when we had to check out. Sean woke me up from a deep sleep just after midday! Just what the doctor ordered. We had a couple of hours to kill before our night bus to Luang Prabang, so visited another Temple at the top of a hill and sat admiring the views of Lao and Thailand.

The night bus left around 5pm and the start of the journey wasn't too bad. It was interesting to see Lao life as we drove along the so-called highway. Lots of settlements on the road side, most without water or electricity but every now and
then you'd see a huge satellite dish and power cables!

We were told it would be a 13 hour journey but this of course turned into 15 hours. I think we had about an hours sleep each as at least 50 percent of the time, the road gave way to gravel, rocks and mud with drops into the valley at the side. The drivers had to get of the bus on several occasions to find the best route through. Still, it was another interesting experience, Thai pop music on the TV, chickens and motorbikes in the aisles! Having said all of that, I still felt safer with these drivers than the Thai crazy drivers!

DAY 15 - 30 SEPTEMBER 2010 - MORE TEMPLES, MARKETS & LAO LAO

So after our first (and not last) experience of the Laos road system, which seem to have been built by a 3 year old with a bucket and spade, we arrived in Luang Prabang. Lonely Planet describes this town as 'majestic' and it's easy to see why. After the complete nothingness that was Huay Xai, LP was like a little paradise. Nestled alongside the Mekong and surrounded by jungle mountain landscape, it's a beautiful place with a lot of French influence (they used to own the place) and the entire town is listed as a World Heritage site.

We set off, as we always do on our first day in a new town, to explore on foot and get our bearings. After breakfast bagels we explored Wat Xieng Thong temple and visited a small exhibition of photo's taken by Buddhist monks. The architecture in LP has a very colonial feel to it, which is odd to see in Asia, but makes the place really distinctive.

That evening we made our way to the night market, ate a very cheap dinner at the food stalls and perused the offerings on sale at the colourful textiles market. We also purchased our first 'souvenir', an image of monks in vivid orange robes painted by a local.

We finished the night off with cocktails with names like 'Pink Gay' and 'Orange Funny' in a bar called Lao Lao Garden, popular with the backpacker 'falang'.

DAY 16 - 1 OCTOBER 2010 - TEMPLES, MASSAGES & MOVIES

We set off up Phu Si, a big forest-covered hill in the centre of LP that dominates the landscape, to visit the temple at the top and see the views. The temple was built on the site of a Buddha footprint which is preserved to this day (and only looks like a footprint if you squint a lot) and the whole place is populated by young monks sneaking off for a crafty fag, which i'm sure is definitely not one of the things permitted by their 261 commandments!

After Phu Si we wandered around the Royal Palace museum, which is essentially the Royal Palace itself but no longer in use since the communists came along and overthrew the monarchy in the 70's. It was interesting but as Palace's go, not actually very palatial, I've seen nicer hotels, it's no Buckingham or Versailles!

We ended the afternoon with a Laos steam massage (the 'steam' part involved dipping a filthy cloth in boiling water and scalding you a bit with it) it was different.

That evening we started out by making our way to a cool little place called L'Etranger Books and Tea, a second-hand bookstore downstairs with a little attic room upstairs where they show movies every night. It was a very chilled out 'backpacker-y' experience sitting on cushions with a bunch of other westerners watching 'The Hangover', which was enhanced by the hilariously badly translated subtitles.

DAY 17 - 2 OCTOBER 2010 - BUS STATIONS & BREAKDOWNS

So we checked out of our guesthouse on Saturday morning and headed to the bus station to catch the local bus to Vang Vieng at 11am. We got there around 10.20 and went to buy a ticket only to be told that the 11am bus was not going and we'd have to wait until 2pm. Great. We're a few km out of town, no other 'falang' around, with 3.5 hours to kill. We didn't want to pay to go back into town, especially when we were stuck with our backpacks, so we found a bench and got the cards out. I never knew that a few games of 's***head' would draw such a crowd of locals, no matter how long they watched, I still don't think they had a clue what was going on. Thankfully there were no pigeons in sight at this station!

A while later we had lunch with the locals, and finally boarded our bus along with some chickens and motorbikes to Vang Vieng. The bus wasn't too bad, comfortable enough for the 'six' hour journey we had ahead just a major language barrier between us and every other person on the bus.

Although the bus was ok, the road was awful! It started off ok and we got to see a lot of Lao life which was good but then the journey into the mountains began. Bumpy, rocky, muddy dirt roads winding up and down the mountains. Great. And this time the driver was not so slow. As always there were several stops so the men could pee on the roadside (what are us girls supposed to do) and others for food. After about four hours it was obvious the journey would take more than six hours. We had prepared ourselves for eight anyhow. I was getting more scared by the minute, with the narrow roads and trucks passing us. I thought I was going to die that night!

It gets dark pretty early over here, and then around 7ish whilst on the top of the mountain our coach decides to breakdown! Great! The three bus guys all got out and stared at the engine with some torches. To begin with we thought that with those journeys one of them must know something about the mechanics, how wrong could we be! After about half an hour the bus started again and off we were...only to break down 5 minutes later. This happened a couple of times and then we came to a halt at a sharp bend when another coach was coming the opposite way, next to that a digger had fallen off the mountain. Oh joy! After a lot of Lao men shouting we got through and guess what? We broke down once again.

By this point we were pretty fed up but finally another bus came past and stopped. We grabbed our bags and ran to this bus for the rest of the journey. This man thought he was the Lao Lewis Hamilton! Luckily we arrived in Vang Vieng safely, four hours late and havinkg nearly had a heart attack! It was gone midnight now and with the Lao curfew being midnight most of the guest houses were closed up for the night. We woke a couple of owners up only to find out they were full. Not sure how true this was as the resort was pretty quiet! Luckily we found somewhere and get our heads down for the night!