Vang Vieng/Vientiane and Kies Birthday!!!!!!!!

Hello Everyone!!

We spent our last few days in Vang Vieng with new friends that we'd met and friends from the slow boat. On Friday we went for our second day of TUBING, this time with Dez, Laura and Sandie - some Aussies we'd met on the slow boat!! We started the day as we meant to go on with some beer pong and buckets all round! We had a really good day playing volleyball, drinking and chilling on the river. We even managed to find people we had friends in common with back home - small world! One guy we met had been on one of the rope swings and the Laos worker had forgotten to pull in the retrieval rope (the cord they use to pull the swing back in when people jump off) and it had wrapped round his neck while he was swinging - he managed to hold onto the rope swing one handed while he untangled himself with the other hand, his poor neck was a state. Next, we were leaving a bar and a guy was trying to keep his mate afloat, at first we thought they were messing around until we saw the panic on his face. So we paddled ourselves over and helped keep him above water with our tubes before getting him back to land where we found out he couldn't swim and was actually drowning. Kie's favourite line of the day was then, "Just busy saving lives, you know" !! During all of the lifesaving activity, Sophie managed to hold onto Kie's can of Beer Laos, spilling none - proving women really can do two things at once!! All in all a very exciting, if not a little dramatic, day!

On Saturday we made our way to the Blue Lagoon on our mountain bikes over the bumpiest roads imaginable! (Much to Sophie's disgust with her blistered hands and bruised bum!) It was a 14km round trip but a day spent in the sun and in the lagoon made it worthwhile. We saw lots of baby animals along the way, dodged cattle roaming freely and came face to face with wild buffalo.

On Sunday it was someone's birthday! Not that anyone would have known ... ! As we needed to get to Vientiane, we decided the best option was to go under our own steam! We booked a day trip kayaking down the Nam Song river. We were in a group of 7 with 3 guides, all of which were great fun. We spent the first hour travelling South by tuk tuk where we were dropped off, given a demonstration and sent on our merry way! After about half an hour we had to tackle some fairly ferocious rapids, we made it through the main section but towards the end we were hit by a wave which threw us both off balance and we ended up upside down in the water, floating downstream being eaten alive by the current. Of course Kie loved this, while Sophie coughed, spluttered and panicked. We jumped back in the saddle and an hour later stopped for a BBQ, swim and Kie took part in the 11m high rock jump with the rest of the boys. The BBQ was made from scratch using branches, rocks and leaves. We expected a baguette for our "all inclusive meal" but what we got was amazing; 3 big chicken kebabs, a pile of banana leaf cooked rice and a baguette each. It was delicious, but noone could finish it! After refuelling, we headed towards the finish point where we got changed and jumped on a minibus for the rest of the journey.

On arriving in Vientiane, we checked into the 'Orchid Guesthouse', which was really nice and offered a roof terrace view of the city and river where you can also see the sun rise and set. We dumped our bags, showered and changed then headed out for a special birthday meal. WOW. We found a nice little Steak House called 'Inner City' which boasted it was "the best steak house in town". They weren't wrong. We both had beef steak and chips, which was served on a hot grill plate and was still sizzling! We then spent the rest of the evening with Jo, Phil and Dip in a pub drinking, watching the football and people watching (there was one English bloke showing us English up as he was a complete a*sehole!) All in all a great birthday with a difference for Kie.

Tonight we're heading to Savannakhet by overnight bus which should take approximately 7 hours (but in Laos time this could mean between 10 and 12!!) Another long blog over with, we will be updating again soon!

Hope everyone's ok, lots of love Sophie and Kie xx