Leaving Koh Tao, Ian, Kelly, and I made a short stop again in Bangkok and Pattaya again before heading north to the Laos/Thai border at Nong Khai. Being pressed for time to make it to my microcredit convention in Hanoi, we only spent a couple days in this town searching out some of the famous Buddha parks and strolling through their extensive knick-knack market before crossing the border to Vientiane and looking for the next bus out to Hanoi. I was able to find a bus that left the same evening but was unaware of the adventure that lay ahead of me.

After having to leave Ian and Kelly in Vientiane, I boarded the bus and was shown to my seat in the very back next to a Scottish guy, and we both had the pleasure of sitting on top of straw mats, carpets, an old CB radio, and also had an iguana under our feet. Not to mention there were also full sacks of rice, people sitting in "special seats" in the aisles, and chickens and pigs on the bus as well with motorbikes on the roof.

With the exception of the minor discomforts and Laos people sleeping on top of us, the trip started out fairly well. We drove all through the night until we reached the Vietnamese border where we had to wait for another four hours before it opened. When the border finally opened, we were all extremely tired and a bit delirious, and I learned that I need to have acquired my visa to Vietnam prior to arriving at the border, which was completely different from what I was told in Thailand. Anyway, begging and bribing would not get me any closer to crossing, so I ditched my desire to go to the convention and began searching out Ian and Kelly.

Luckily, I was not the only one that had been told the wrong information, and a couple other Americans and Isrealies and I began walking back planning to hitch a ride Vientiane. Eventually a bus came along that we were able to flag down and made it back to Vientiane several hours later.

I remembered that Ian and Kelly wanted to do an excursion called the Gibbon Experience in northern Laos, so after I found out that they had checked out of their hotel I went to the internet to tell them that I would meet them there and immediately set out to find the quickest route to get there in time since I had already missed the bus to Huay Xai (the town where they were going).

So, I was able to catch an overnight bus to Luang Prabang, which is north of Vientiane, and from there I would have to figure out if there was another bus or boat up to Huay Xai. Even though I had two days to make it to Huay Xai before their Gibbons Experience was to start, I really needed to be there the night before in order to stand a chance at getting a spot on the excursion, so I really only had that night and the next day to make it. Unfortunately, we got delayed twice though. Once the lug nuts fell off the the front right wheel and we came to a screeching hault as the bus teetered to one side, and the second time the same tire blew and we had to stop and wait for a new one.

Even with the delays we arrived about seven in the morning in Luang Prabang, and I found that there was another overnight bus to Huay Xai, but that was not going to help me. So I decided to head into town to see what my other options were: possibly taking a motorbike, hitching a ride with a truck, or taking a boat since both Luang Prabang and Huay Xai are both located along the Mekong River.

The first boat I found out about was called "the slow boat," but I told them that I really needed to make it to Huay Xai that day so they told me about another boat appropriately called "the fast boat" that left at 9:00, which was in 15 minutes and on the other side of town. I made it, but little did I know at the time but quickly figured out and was informed later that this was one of the most dangerous ways to travel anywhere, and they prohibited foreigners from traveling this way for several years because of the amount of deaths and injuries they have each year.

When I got on the boat, I did not think much about it until they gave me a helmet and a life-jacket to wear. Then we set off in our 20 foot long and 3 foot wide bullet canoe for one of the most exhilarating six hour rides of my life dodging whole trees, small stumps, over rapids, and plummeting through whirlpools. Fortunately, I was so tired from two nights without a bed and three days without a shower that I almost felt drugged and was able to enjoy the ride.

Finally, I arrived in Huay Xai without injury and had spent somewhere around 40 hours on public transportation not counting the time in-between stops, and I actually arrived in Huay Xai before Ian and Kelly and was able to make it on the Gibbons Experience, which is also sure to be an adventure. Till next time, cheers.