I was having a good night's sleep in the guest house in Pak Beng until the Cockerel decided to start crowing about 4 am right through till when we left on the boat. Breakfast was a little strange but I braved the coffee, hearing that Lao coffee is some of the strongest I would find in SE Asia. Amy and I had breakfast early and the boys rocked up looking a little tired. I believe Connor got a little impatient with that Cockerel and said something along the lines of 'everyone is awake now so you can stop' however, this is the edited version...his actual sentence had a lot more swearing in it!

After watching some very interesting Lao soap opera (no watershed here by the way) we boarded the boat. Billy came and sat next to me and we just chatted about random things for a good few hours. The second day on the boat was supposed to be shorter however, since we were in the dry season and the Mekong is a little lower, the shorter day was another 9 hours on the boat! Sleep wasn't possible and we arrived at Luang Prabang about 6 pm to be greeted by the usual touts. After collecting a book worth of leaflets we went walking through the town scowering for cheap accommodation. It was here that I left Billy and the other couple walking with us because I wasn't going to pay 120,000 Kip per night for a room when I know you can get one for 30,000.

I eventually found a room for 40,000, no perks like free wifi or tea or coffee, but it had a double bed, fan and shower so I didn't care. Also I discovered it was on the road where most of the recommended restaurants and bars where. Later in the evening I went walking, determined to find an ATM. 40 minutes later I found one and on the way back I also discovered one right by my guest house...D'oh!

The night was young so I went into a bar called the Lao Lao Garden, very nice although their motto is Drink like a fish for the price of water...hmmm this could end very badly. I actually stayed till closing and had a couple games of pool with some of the locals. Everyone I met seemed to have a name beginning with 'J' thinking they were taking the mick I told them I'm just going to call everyone John as I won't remember all the different names! Apparently according to the 'John' from Australia I must be a Lesbian because I like bars with juke boxes and pool tables...never heard that one before. Although he was off his face so he was forgiven for his random assumption!

Tomorrow sees me exploring Luang Prabang and the surrounding area, may be here for about 4 days or so, we'll see.

The photo is a picture of the boat we were on for 2 days. The seats are old bus seats and are not fixed to the floor, to the amusement of some by leaning back too far and them tipping over!