Hello my lovelies!

So lets start with the 24 hr bus journey! We arrived at the bus station in Hanoi and we were directed towards three buses that were lined up, two VIP buses and a death trap. Guess which one we ended up on?! Ha! This bus had about 30 people's lugguage piled on its roof, as well random furniture and massive boxes. The inside was also packed with what looked like plastic car parts and more boxes, aswel as us passengers of course! ha! The fella working on board was keen to shove the tourists to the back of the bus, where the seats are in two rows of five, and if you get lumbered right at the back you have to climb over all the people in the row in front to get out, all very snug and cosy! Jon managed to get on the bus early and bagsyed some better seats, despite this fella grabbing Jon's arm and telling him, "you go to back"! We found some of the Vietnamese quite pushy at times!

So we were on our way, and managed to get some sleep, we were quite comfy in the end. We did however manage to nearly hit a policeman, resulting in us being pulled over! We also made random stops picking up some random parcels and delievering them along the way! These stops were also our loo breaks, as the death trap did not have a toilet!

It was an interesting ride, but before we knew it we were in Laos! Vientiane the capital of Laos. We stayed in a lovely guesthouse and ate BBQ fish and sticky rice from a street restaurant in town. Jon found out the footie was on, he can sniff out football miles away! We enquired at the guesthouse about how we could get tickets, when the owner of the guesthouse, Yo, popped up and invited us along to the game with him! The game was a bit disappointing, Laos lost 6-1 to China. But we enjoyed joining in with the fans, drinking beer out of a bag and munchin on green mango dipped in chilli and salt! Yo then took us to a local restaurant for some typical Lao grub and even more beer! Jon and i are officially the biggest lightweights and were soon up dancing like doughnuts to the live band! A good night, good food and lovely company.

Next we went up to Vang Vieng, with the intention to try tubing along the river that flows through town. It didn't stop raining from the moment we got off the bus, so we didn't tube and we didn't really like the town. Its a real piss up place, passed out teenagers on the pavement and got offered a "special" drugs menu in a bar! The best bit about Vang Veing was the bus ride outta there! The journey was very windey but really pretty. Laos is really green and the view from the top of the mountains was beautiful.

Luang Prabang was our next destination. We have really enjoyed our time in this pretty little town. The buildings are very French, and the town is linked with small alleys and quiet roads. The massive muddy brown Mekong river runs infront of our hotel, and every evening the night market is in full swing, selling clothes, jewellery and crafts. This morning we woke up at 5.45am to watch the monks, robed in orange, walk in single file, bare foot, through the streets collecting food from the locals, the 'Giving of Alms'. Local people are concerned that the toursits are ruining this tradition by behaving like wally's and taking photo's right in the monks faces and not being respectful, so we made sure that we sat down quietly on the pavement to watch them pass before getting a picture.

We also spent a good hour chatting to a local lad in a cafe place, he spent two years a a novice monk when he was 13-15 and was happy to teach us a little about Buddhism, aswel as chatting about Norwich city and Arsenal!

The waterfalls were also very cool. We took a tuk tuk ride through the coutnryside and a couple of small villages until we reached the falls, where we could swim and jump in if we fancied it! (Not brave enough, lots of big rocks in there)! ha! Luang Prabang has been a lovely place to stay for a while, we have enjoyed the food, eating at the stalls serving BBQ fish and buffet noodles and rice, followed by nutella pancakes with banana! (hoping to burn this off once we start our work at the elephant nature park next week!) We have also loved cycling around town, visiting the temples and taking it easy! One thing we didn't enjoy, was our first rubbish massage in Asia so far! It was so bad, Kate asked her massuse to stop half way through, which sounds very ungrateful, but it was very bad! ha!

We have really loved Laos, the people have been lovely, and despite all the rain we have really enjoyed our short time here!

Anyway, how are you lot?! Hope your all well.

Missing you lots.

Tomorrow we take another mega bus journey, to Chaing Mai, ready to start our week working with the Elephants starting on Monday!

Lots of love

Kate and Jonxxxxxxxxxxx