And I'm back..... After another short bout of illness – if only that meant I was turning into a stick insect! – we spent an excellent day of spectacular waterfall spotting on the Bolaven Plateau. Breathtaking is not the word (photos will follow eventually I promise). The following day, Somchit driver (that really was his name!) took us in relative luxury down to the islands of Si Phan Don. Don Det was everything I’d been hoping for with a...

This week has seen a glorious mixture of comedy journeys, new experiences and a little bit of pain...  We've moved down into the south of Laos and it's taken one overnight bus, two day buses, several breakdowns (transport and mental!) and a consecutively smaller set of tuk-tuks to get us here. The beginning of the week saw a return to Vientiane for a bit of capital city time.  The bus to get us there broke down twice with an alarm...

Well, I wasn't wrong about the adventure in store for us on the public bus from Huay Xai to Luang Nam Tha....  The story starts at 8.40am when the angry owner of the guest house knocks on the door shouting that he'd told us to be ready to leave at 8.30am because the bus leaves at 9.30.  News to me but heh...  Hastily packed The Beast, as my rucsac is now being affectionately termed, and bundled out to the waiting tuk-tuk.  By 9.05 we s...

Managed to meet up with Tim in Vientiane, Laos last weekend. Good to meet up with a friendly face especially as he cheered me up immediately by confessing to successfully bartering an increase in cost with the tuk-tuk driver to collect me from the airport. Needless to say we've had a few AST style lessons. Differentiation very important.....Since then we've sampled many of the delights of my favorite country in the world. Beerlaos heading the list... ...

Finally reached the end of my Vietnamese adventure...  Since my last entry I've dodged a typhoon (in a single bound!), eaten enough bacteria to give me food poisoning and wrestled with a shark.  Ok one of those isn’t true but you can use your imagination to work out which one is the lie.  It’s just like a game of I have never….From the amazing old town of Hoi An I took a mammoth train journey to Nha Trang.  Comedy journe...