Feb 13:
Today, instead of the tubing we wanted to go and see another cave which is apparently the most famous. We figured we should stay another night so we can do the tubing tomorrow without worrying about getting back early for a mini bus. After breakfast at the same spot, we played cards again which i suppose woke us up a little too, ready for the day ahead.
We didn't know the exact direction to the cave, or the name but we read instructions of how to get there so we began following the route. We had to continue walking down the road parallel to the river until we came to a bridge. In order to cross the bridge, we had to pay 4,000kip each, not surprising, they would charge us for oxygen if they could. There was a nice view over the bridge of the river drifting under us, a local fisherman and a group of young girls swimming. We stopped and took some photos.
When we reached the other side of the bridge there were two signs pointing in different directions to two different caves, neither of them being the one that we were heading for. While deliberating a course of action at the cross roads, a herd of cows slowly filtered out of their pen and all walked off together. The baby cows got the better of me and off i was taking photos.
We decided to not take either of the roads on the left and right but to walk straight ahead. The road led us through a local village. We got onto a main cobbled dirty road near the mountains and we figured we must be pretty close, although we still hadn't passed any signs directing us to the correct cave. After couples on motorbikes and bicycles whizzed passed us, we realised we must have been heading to the cave thats 7km away. As we were both on foot we decided to turn back and head into town for a fruit shake and maybe a game of cards. We passed an empty field with the view of the mountains in the background to which we took some nice photos so i guess our journey wasn't THAT wasted.
After grabbing a shake at a cafe and heading back to our guesthouse we rolled up and had a smoke sitting on the wide windowsill of our room. We then headed for somewhere to eat. As ever, it gave me a headache deciding where to eat until we ended up in a restaurant that had those cushioned booths. I ordered chicken noodle soup as well as a honey chicken with french "fried" and baguette. Dan got the same as me although he seemed to enjoy my noodles (that he would usually turn his nose up at) so much that we practically shared it. After dinner, we went for another roti. They're so damn good we can never resist. And SO cheap. I got my usual and we found a spot to sit down on steps near our guesthouse and devoured the things. We then proceeded to go to the room for a windowsill bedtime smoke and read our books. I'm enjoying my book "Rules of Civility".