Like a rabbit in the headlights. Off an incoming SUV. Right on top of me. The basic thoughts as I arrived, bleary eyed, into Koh San Road at 6am where the previous nights stragglers were staggering home after the previous nights exertions. From an isolated beach hours and hours from anywhere without even a paved road to the tourist trap to beat them all, and what a shock to the system. Arriving in a few hours before Pete meant at least I could get a nap and a shower in before his arrival and try to adjust to my new surroundings. And arrive he did, and settle in I did, and reasonably quickly too, but still it was a matter of a starting and finishing point of the tour that beckoned only. The timeframe was just under 5 weeks and the agenda was to see as much of Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia as physically possible in this time. See being the key word here, as neither of us wanted to arrive into a town one day only to depart the next. Well except for Bangkok of course. So after a catch up evening Operation WhirlWind South East Asia (WWSE) was a go, and the next day we got the overnight train north to Vientianne, Loas. As if to set a trend for the rest of the trip, we hired out a lovely pair of (pink - see photos) bicycles for the day to see a bit of the capital and kill some time before hopping on another overnight bus to bring us all the way north to the popular tourist town of Luang Prabang.
Luan Prabang is a UNESCO world heritage sight and is famed for its beautiful temples, idyllic setting on a bend of the meandering Mekong, and a place of culinary excellence. Eh, after 2 months of rice, rice, rice, it was like Pete had read my mind. The street food is just delicious and it is fair to say that while it is a wonderful town, eating was my main pursuit while there. There is also a famous waterfalls 35km away, which in our wisdom, along with two recently made mates, we decided to cycle. The thing we didn't think of is that generally waterfalls are in mountains, so, a leisurely cycle it certainly was not...See attached pictures. Great way to see the country side though and for burning off the what had now become increasingly large and frequent meals! Another highlight in Luan Prabang was the invention of speed bowling....lets just say the pins dont matter....and the place where we met our soon to be regular rendez-vousers of the USA Trio of Collin, Lee and Beau!
Vang Vieng. Tubing. Pure madess. The pictures say it all. For those who haven't yet been, or like me, haven't even heard of it, well its kind of like the Baggot street walk, only on an amazing meandering river with sun, swings, scenery, and where as opposed to transport being on foot it is on a tractor tube on the river. You will therfore not be surprised to here that it is overflowing with Irish, and that it seems most cannot drum up the will power to leave. On day 2 of the tubing we met our USA trio again, and had a few small brews with them in between maniac jumps. Wityh a little bit of dutch courage I also seem to have gotten over my fear of heights and falling and by the end of thday was doing pretty much everything possible. It seems to have stuck with me aswell, as several times since I have now jumped from heights (sober) I wouldnt have contemplated beforehand! Unfortunately, or moreovoer fortunately, due to WWSE we had to after 3 days! Back in Vientiane, we somehow got involved in helping out with the Vientiane International Rugby Womens Sevens, with teams from Lao, Thailand and...Iran! Now the thing about Iranians is that they are pretty staunch Muslims, meaning of course that women cannot show more than their face. To get round this they wear a crazy outfit that covers up everything but it doesn't seem to bother them too much as they walked the tournament, swatting all the other teams aside. I think maybe it was to do with the fact that they are coached by this Kiwi ex prop who has two world cup medals in her back pocket and was voted world player of the year. The day was finished off with karaoke in which Pete ripped it up!
With more days than expected in Vientianne due to the tournament, we unfortunately didn't have as much time as we would have liked down in the wonderful 4000 Islands in southern Lao - somewhere were you could easily kick back and relax for a week easy. Here he Mekong river widens out to 40km at its widest point -yes 40km! - and is dotted with a lot (4000 though; I'm not so sure) of islands! If you do find yourself in Lao, pencil in down there as it is really super laid back (shock horror in Lao!) and super gorgeous.
Now because of WWSE, again our time there was limited to just 2 nights and one full day. We met up with a lovely pair of Canadian ladies from probably the most remote place on earth. That is an approximate 4 hour drive from Winnipeg down a Cul de Sac. Yes the road to their home - a place called Red Lake - only goes there. Deal with that. So on our one full day there all four of us, once again, hired out bikes and spent the day exploring the two islands of Don Det and Don Kong. There are a huge set of waterfalls, apparently the most volume flow in SE Asia, but since the Mekong is the biggest river in SE Asia, I think I am correct in saying that if any falls exist on it it must have the most volume flow, right? Anyway, no biggy really, but very nice. There are also the famous, almost extinct, Bottle nose freshwater dolphins that habituate the river. Unfortunately we didn't find the need to go see them for some odd reason!
Of course the nature of the beast being as it is, we once again bumped into our American cousins towards the end of the day.. We had farewell (or so we thought) drinks with them on the lower island before spending a rather interesting evening in the Reggae bar with an eclectic group of people with the most eclectic being a 50 year old disenchanted Icelandic man who - if i got this right - raved about the quality of his Chinese made silk pajamas, that, he was wearing not only at the time, but also everyday for the past 3 years. I hope I got mixed up, if only for his personal hygiene if nothing else!
So the next day and we are on the road again, back to Pakse, (bumped into America again) and decided last minute to get onboard what was probably the greatest bus journey of all time....