Week 1

Well we are coming to the end of the 1st week and already, the 9-5 office life seems so far away (and I'm not sure if I will ever be able to go back to it!).

Bangkok

I have to say we didnt see much of Bangkok, we were completely jet lagged and overwhelmed by the whole prospect of our trip, it was mainly spent sleeping at the most bizarre times (normally waking up at 5am to catch an episode of American Dad) and getting lost in the most gigantic supermarket. So we have decided to do more on the way back.

Vientiane

From Bangkok we flew to Vientiane the capital of Laos. We arrived at about 9pm not having arrange any accommodation. I would like to point out, not for the want of trying, it turns out Roben and I are incapable of using Thai pay phones, with a credit or telephone card!

The 1st 2 places we went didn't have accommodation and surprise surprise the one that did have accommodation, it was only the expensive room left! Could have put a bet on that, but it was now 10.30 and we were tired of carrying our backpacks, so took the room and went to have a Beer Lao at the wee bar on the corner.

As it turned out we only spent 1/2 a day in Vientiane and it felt like more than enough, by mid morning we had walked the length of the town booked our bus visited a temple and were sitting down to have breakfast. The temple we visited...Wat Si Saket which is where the head of the Lao Buddhist community lives.

Vang Vieng

From Vientiane we got the local bus to Vang Vieng which takes 4 hours, it was great fun being the only westerners on the bus, and everyone we met said the 'VIP' buses broke down on their journey, but we got there with no glitches. Got chucked out the bus with our backpacks, the bus hardly stopped, at the 'bus station' and old air strip. Of course the only time we have been here and it has started to rain is when we had our backpacks and booked a guest house outside of town......45mins later 2 drowned rats arrived at a bridge that we got charged for! and arrived at out little hut in the jungle.

Being a wee bit outside of town worked out well as Vang Vieng is more of a party town.....imagine Gran Canaria but with more Irish people! Most people, including us, go there to go tubing, where basically you sit in the innards of a truck tire and bob down the Meekong, great fun! To add to it there are bars all the way a section of the river where they throw out ropes for you to grab on to and pull you into the platforms at the side of the river, they all have rope swings, slides etc. It was a lot of fun and the scenery was great but we could have very easily been anywhere in the world.

Back to the hut in the jungle, we received a visitor one night in the shape of a jumping spider the size of a pancake! At first I though I could be big and brave and deal with it myself but it looked particularly evil and then the jumping started, the big b****** was far faster than me, so we decided to stop trying to be brave and get a local to help us out, he flicked it off the wall with a rubber band and squished it with his bare feet.....what a mess!

After 3 days of too many bucket cocktails (yes, a kids sand bucket filled to the brim with alcohol) and too long in the river we decided to continue north.

Luang Prabang

We have now been here for 3 days after getting the bus up from Vang Vieng, so far the bus journeys haven't been too painful. Although it is not the capital there is far more going on here than in Vientiane. As we are used to a backpacking budget and haven't come across that many high end guest houses we got a shock upon arriving here, as there are some very posh and expensive hotels, by Laos standards.

Yesterday we went out to the Kwang Si Waterfall 35km outside of Luang Prabang, it was gorgeous and the tuk tuk journey was equally as beautiful and enjoyable. Today we visited the Royal Palace and the temple within the confines (the temple is in the pic above).

We have discovered (I say discovered its in the guide book!) an amazing restaurant that you can bbq your own food Lao style, they put the coals in a hole in the middle of the table and come out with a pan that you cook your food in, the water buffalo is our favorite.

Well I think that is enough for now, tomorrow we are going to an Elephant sanctuary then Saturday we have the delights of a 20 hour bus journey to the south of Laos, where we are going to make our way into Cambodia. It looks like we are going to have to miss Vietnam, we have tried numerous ways to get there but there doesn't seem to be a way out of Luang Prabang till the middle of next week. And with all the flooding and the promise of thunderstorms for the next week it doesn't seem like the best place to be at the moment.

With love,

Lauren xoxox