No rest, we journeyed straight on the next morning towards Ban Khoum Khan, the usual overnight stopping point for the renowned Kong Lo caves. It was a memorable journey! Conscious that buses didn't leave that early, we didn't go to pick up tickets until the morning of travel, and with many miles to cover, we opted for the "VIP" bus (air con, minimal stops, a capacity that can actually be reached) over a local one (none of the above). Normally, we wouldn't necessarily do so, as it's good to travel with locals, but at seven to eight hours travel instead of eleven to twelve, a further connection of an hour or so to make after that, and a difference in price of only eighty pence, it made sense. Strangely, however, after making a couple of phone calls, the tour agency came back to me and said "sorry, I won't sell you a ticket, better for you to go to the bus station (about 3km from the centre of Pakse) and get it yourself". "Um, why?". "If takes longer than eight hours then you complain, so better you buy ticket yourself". "That's OK, you've just told me it might take longer, so no problem, we won't complain". "No, sorry, I no give you ticket". Duh, I'm offering you business - ticket selling commission not of interest? What it transpired he should have said, however, was "sorry, our sign is wrong, there is no VIP bus, you'll have to get a local bus instead, I'm afraid". So why didn't he?! It never ceases to amaze me, the lengths that South East Asians will go to sometimes to avoid saying "sorry, I can't help you with what you want". The logic of a small, initial disappointment being better than a bigger disappointment later on doesn't seem to register.

So, we got to the bus station, subsequently found out what our only option was, and set forth on the slowest bus journey in history. Thirteen hours, we sat on that bus! We didn't even get as far as our hoped for destination, but gave up at about 10pm and found a roadside guesthouse. I swear, it stopped at least every ten minutes, and probably spent more time stationary than actually moving. And I also realised during this journey why locals always sit towards the front of the bus; because the engine is at the back, and sitting on the back seat can be a little bit warm! Also, as I mentioned earlier, local buses don't suffer from capacity issues. And the solution, when even the aisle is full? The roof! And not only were some of these young guys sitting alongside our luggage on the roof, but they were clambering up there, out of the window (right next to us), in darkness, while the bus was rattling along at full speed! Huge Western sighs of relief each time one of these manouevres was successfully completed. Old hat to locals, of course.

So we got there in the end. Our intended full distance was completed early the next morning, an hour by sawngthaw, and we booked into a guesthouse for that night (a brand new one at that, with polythene still to be removed from door handles, etc!), before heading off to the caves. They were a further hour and a half by sawngthaw, and I believe it was on this leg that we set the current world record for fitting people into one. For those who don't know, sawngthaws are small, open-ended trucks, with a row of seats along both sides, facing inwards.Which should each comfortably fit about five people, so with a driver and front seat passenger I'd say a standard capacity of twelve. The world record, however, is now thirty-two! About five in the front cabin, eight squashed along each side in the back, five or six down the middle, facing the road behind, on a bench that materialized from somewhere, a couple of babies (useful, for record setting!), and the remaining four or five on the roof (Western, not local, in fact; some Israelis who'd been with us on the bus the day before, an American and a Brummie Brit)! I'm very proud to have been part of it.

Anyway, finally, the supposed subject matter of this blog entry, Kong Lo caves! Very much worth the effort to get there! They consist of about seven kilometers of spectacular, massive, winding caves, that you whizz through on narrow, shallow, wooden motorboats, along a river that runs the entire way through. One of those natural phenomena that remains largely unknown outside the region, solely because it's in a country like Laos, that doesn't, or can't, really shout about it. If the Kong Lo caves were in America or Europe, the world would know about them (and they'd cost more than about ten pounds per person to see them!). The caves are jaw-dropping, and almost as impressive were the boat handlers. There were two tourists on each boat, in the middle, with a torch holder and shallow water boat hauler at the front, and a captain steering, holding his own torch, and in our case, scooping water out of the boat, an amazing multi-tasking performance, at the back. The guys at the back myst have known the routes like the proverbial backs of their hands. We motored through, repeatedly coming to within inches of the cave walls, yet the entire time with nothing less than the smoothness of the Fonz. We might have been gliding on air currents. Impressive in daylight, but this was in mere torch-lit darkness!

Little wonder that it was such a content bunch of tourists that made their way back to Ban Khoum Khan later in the afternoon, and the setting of the caves, in a picturesque region of karst rocks rising from green tobacco fields, that we cut through to get there and back, just completed the picture.

But, alas, as a brilliant day was drawing to a close, disaster struck. Paula's diary wasn't to be found; six months worth of handwritten entries through Eastern Europe, Russia, Mongolia, China, Vietnam and Cambodia. It definitely wasn't with us, four or five thorough comb-throughs confirmed. It was, as I said, a disaster, and one to which no words of actions could make amends. Not a happy girlfriend.

It was also an unfortunately timed discovery, as the village was having a party that night, to celebrate a new born baby, and, along with the rest of the village, we were invited. Paula and Sara, roomies that night, stayed in the guesthouse, opting for tabloid TV and snacks therapy, Paula unsurprisingly not in a party mood, and Sara happy to stay in with her. So Matt and I made a belated appearance without the girls. I won't dwell on it, as the event obviously paled in comparison with the diary situation, but an invite to a Laotian village party isn't an everyday occurrence whilst travelling, so naturally we wanted to check it out. And it absolutely typified the Laotian sense of community. Despite our evident relative wealth, purely by virtue of being foreigners who had travelled to Laos, we weren't allowed to pay a thing for food or drink. We simply had to dance for our beer, was the rule set out by some local ladies! An art at which Matt and I were of course trained, following our Attapeu experience a couple of days earlier. Or so we thought, until the ladies laughed off our wrist twisting and started gyrating around a pole! It was a fantastic event to witness. The party as a whole, that is, not the gyrating. Everyone had chipped in, everyone came along, from small kids up to grandparents, everyone was smiling, and it's a crying shame that the days of this sort of community spirit has long since departed from most parts of our so-called "developed" neck of the woods. We were last up, along with Irish / South African couple Brian and Caroline, and Canadian brothers Jeff and Jay, but returned to the guesthouse not too late, albeit a little tipsy, with myself and Matt both on the back of the motorbike of a girl at the party, who zigzagged in second gear the kilometre or so distance, the direction of which she was fortunately heading in anyway.

Our next stop, and last for Sara, was the capital, Vientiane, from where she had booked a flight to Malaysia, for a couple of days of relaxation in the sun, pre-return to England, and where Matt was also to depart from us.