Sabaai dii (hello) everyone! I am in Luang Prabang, Laos today. The journey here has been a wonderful adventure. It was sad to say goodbye to Bangkok, but Chiang Mai was even better. It would seem that my first day there would have been miserable because we had to take a 13 hour bus ride over night to get to Chiang Mai. You can only imagine how horrible I looked and felt after 13 hours cramped up on bus. Add in the fact that I hadn't showered in two days, it was about 95 degrees outside, I had to use a horrible Asian toliet on the bus, and had about 3 hours of sleep. Despite all that, I somehow managed to have the most fantastic day! After breakfast we all split ways. Five of us got a ride up into the jungle to ride on elephants. Katelyn and I rode together. Wow! It was so much fun. We switched off riding up on the elephant's neck. Their hair is really rough on your skin and their skin feels like sandpaper. Not only was the ride fun, but the views along the way were fantastic. Afterwards, the same group of us went on bamboo rafts down a river. We had so much fun jumping from raft to raft and splashing each other. After all that we wandered through a local market to have some cheap food. We were all smelling pretty bad by this point so first thing I did when we returned to the guesthouse was have a long shower. A nice Thai massage after and then met up with the boys in the lobby for some beers. The rest of the group spent the afternoon getting massages from prison inmates. Crazy, huh? They all agreed that the massages were great though. Then they went to see a temple and got blessed by monks. We all met up for a night out in the markets. There were fireworks going on for the King's celebration. We watched it going on in Bangkok on the television and it was quite a sight. There were about a million people in the streets. We had a great seafood dinner in the market. Hey mom and dad, remember the great dinner we had in Sydney at the Chinese place? Well, David and I split a meal that was just as big and about the same type of stuff for only $5 US each! The next day we did some more riding up to Chiang Khong. The van ride was an adventure in itself. I felt like were were on a crazy ride in a theme park. The driver was passing everything he came up behind at record speeds. I think at one point we were within inches behind another car going about 100 km/hr. We did survive though and ended up having another great market meal in Chiang Rai. We also wandered through a temple that looked like it belonged in Iceland or something. You will see what I mean when you look at the photos. We walked through the hill tribe museum in town. I learned some interesting things about the Asian hill tribes. Did you know that the Karen tribe in Thailand (the ones with the long necks and they have rings around their necks) are not real. They actually come from Burma and the ones in Thailand are people that are just for show. It was sad to hear that they were brought over here just for the tourists and are sortof like a human zoo. Anyway, we finally made our way up to Chiang Khong, which was our departur city for going into Laos the next day. The lodge that we stayed at was amazing! It looked like a huge treehouse. The decks overlooked the Mekong river and the entire place was built for relaxing. This night was our first experience with rain. We were so fortunate to have sunny weather each day and only one night of rain. Anyway, we had a huge feast at the lodge. Afterwards, the boys and I went out to watch the first night of the World Cup. We were sitting at this bar outside watching the games on this huge screen and have a beautiful view of the Mekong river just next to us. It doesn't get much better than that. Early morning the next day in order for us to cross over the border. We left Thailand and took a short boat ride over and checked into customs in Laos. At the waterfront we met our crazy tour guide, Sing. He was going to be with us for the next few days to give us plenty of information about Laos. Everything changed when we entered into Laos. We went from driving on the left to driving on the right. We came into communist state. We came into a even poorer country. We now had to deal with a different currency and a different language. We also had to deal with different customs such as taking shoes off before entering almost any building (or boat), tucking our feet under while sitting, and much more. We were about to embark on a two day boat ride down the Mekong river to Luang Prabang. You will see the picture of the boat that we rode in and just imagine how comfortable it was for 12 hours. The family that lived on the boat were so kind to us. The first day was about 5 hours down to a tiny village called Pak Beng. We played many card games, took naps, read books, and listened to our ipods in order to pass the time. Sing told us all about the Mekong river and the areas that we passed. We fit our huge boat in between a bunch of others in Pak Beng and then carried our packs up an enormous amount of stairs. Ugg! It was really hot outside too. Sing took us on a tour of the small village. I felt like a superstar in the market because everyone was starring at us while Sing explained how they made Laos food. We also walked up to a temple which had an incredible view of the Mekong river. We finished the day off with a dinner at a place that overlooked the river. Our guesthouse wasn't the image of luxury this time. It only got power for three hours in the day and no hot water. Oh, well that is about what I expected for the entire trip. The next day was a much longer trip down the Mekong and it began early. We stopped at the sacred Pak Ou caves and a small village that made rice whiskey. Luang Prabang was a beautiful sight. The city lies between two rivers. We took a jumbo tuk tuk to our guesthouse. I felt like I was arriving in a tropical paradise. The bungalows were amazing! Tracy told us that even the Intrepid guides stay there when they go away on private holidays. We had a free afternoon before going into town to walk the markets. I thought that Thailand was cheap, but Laos was even better. We ate a plateful of Laos food in the market for only 50 US cents. It was so good! Shopping in the markets was great. Man, if I had it I could blow a lot of money on market shopping. We spent another night out watching the World Cup. The following morning we got to take a long trip up the hills to the Kwang Si Falls. The were beautiful! We gladly all jumped into the swimming pools. One of the customs here is that women stay mostly covered, so being in a bathing suit is badly looked upon. So, we had to wear clothes over our swimsuits. After a nice cool down we walked down to visit with Phet the tiger. She was amazing. We all got to take turns feeding her buffalo meat. Then we fed the sun bears some bannanas. All of the animals in the conservation were saved from poachers who caught them to sell on the black market. We had another free afternoon in town and I got a much needed cat nap. Then our group split up for guy's night out and girl's night out. The boys were invited to Sing's house for a homecooked Laos meal. Tracy said that they were the first ever in all of her groups to be invited to his house. We (the ladies) went out to eat in the market, do some shopping, and get massages. I had the best body massage ever. Wow! I felt like I was floating after it was over. Sing called us and sent a tuk tuk to pick us up and go to his house. So we arrived there and to no surprise found Sing and the boys completely drunk. They had been singing karoke, drinking Lao Lao (rice whiskey), and eating some pretty crazy stuff. We got to meet his brothers, wife, and two children. His wife was a beautiful lady, but so are almost every women that i have seen so far in Laos. All the children are beautiful too. Anyways, we all ventured off to a Laos nightclub. It was hillarious watching us dance with the local people. Sing had the waiters treat us very well and taught us some Laos line dances. Pretty soon the entire group was going crazy. The funniest bit was every time the music stopped, everyone just left the dance floor. Then a minute later when the music started, the same people get right back up. Since everything closes at midnight we had to leave. Sing's brother was a tuk tuk driver so a few of us went with him and the others went in another one. All of a sudden we were having singing competitions and racing tuk tuks through the street. It was so much fun. We planned on having a late night party back at the guesthouse and when Doug came out of his bungalow wrapped up in a sheet we came up with the crazy idea to make it a toga party. So, that we did. It was quite a sight. All of us westerners sitting around in togas down at the pavillion by the river. The owners of the place got a good laugh at us the next morning especially when they woke up and saw Doug laying in the garden in his toga singing karoke songs. Good times.! So, needles to say I have been having a fantastic time. These countries have been absolutely wonderful. I am really happy that I came on this trip.