Monday 11th June

We had to wake up early, Stu was feeling hungover, I enjoyed this lots! We checked out and ordered breakfast. We had to wait for our pick up at 11 am, for our bus, thinking this is Laos it will be late and had a leisurely time. Our pick up came at 10:30!!! Luckily we were already up and ready, we packed our breakfast into a box and jumped on the tuk-tuk. The bus actually left on time, shocking I know!

The road to Luang Prabang was possibly the most interesting white knuckle ride I have been on, yet! Over taking on blind bends, cruising round corners in the middle of the road. At one point the bus driver had to break hard, skidding off the road slightly (luckily at this point we had a verge rather than a cliff edge) while five massive lorries came round the corner. I nearly pooed myself!! I have never feared for my life quite so much at this point in time! Despite the crazy driving, the scenery was fantastic, climbing up the mountains and climbing back down. It was beautiful. This distracted me for the immediate danger in front!

I was thankful when we arrived at the bus stop and considered kissing the ground for a moment! We jumped onto another tuk-tuk to take us to town, supposedly! We were dropped off with no real clue where to go; we found a guest house which seemed ok, with a brilliant view of the Mekong river from the balcony. We dumped our bags and headed out with the intention of booking our trips for the next few days and enquire about a bus to Huay Xia.

We booked ourselves onto a kayaking trip for tomorrow, elephant mahout the day after and waterfall trip after that along with our overnight bus ride to Huay Xia (pronounced Why Say!) Our next mission was food; we stumbled across the night market alleyway by mistake and took up the offer of buffet for 10,000 kip! We piled our plates high and enjoyed dinner!

We then had a wonder through the night market selling all sorts of beautiful handicrafts, where we bumped into Adam and Sarah, a couple from Koh Rong! We decided to get a (non alcoholic) drink and catch up with travel stories!

We left and headed home as we had to be up early, and still in dire need of sleep to catch up on. I found out I had been carrying a horde of ants in BOTH of my backpacks, not impressed. While attending to my bags I happened to turn around to see the quickest spider in my life charging towards me, which led me to scream like a banshee and give Stu a heart attack, at 11 pm!

Sleep did not come well after this incident and I lay rolling and tossing dreaming spiders were attacking me. Not impressed at all!

Tuesday 12th June

We woke up early and got ready for a day of kayaking! We went to the office and waited for our pick up. We were on the road for a good hour picking up more staff members, total of five for two of us, and picking up our equipment. We reached the river where were casted off and started paddling. We decided to share a kayak, big mistake. Stu likes to sit at the back and do nothing, which resulted in a lot of moaning from me!

We paddled down the calm-ish river by passing the beautiful mountains and going through some (tiny) rapids! It wasn't too warm, luckily, so the paddling didn't seem too strenuous! We stopped off at some caves that had been decorated by Buddha images, there used to be more but the Chinese ransacked the caves taking away the more valuable images. We stopped for our picnic lunch which was served on banana leaf and contained sticky rice and a selection of Asian treats! It was yummy! We shared our lunch with the local insects, furry caterpillars, giant crickets and massive spindly spiders!

We jumped back into our kayak and continued paddling down the Mekong river for another hour, I noticed the water line against the rocks, at the moment the river is two meters deep, wet season its 12 meters! We stopped off at the whisky village and tried some. We got hijacked by some local boys who climbed on board our kayak, making it so much harder to move the damn thing! Once aboard dry land, we tried some of the whisky. My god it was strong! Not my cup of tea! We wondered round the village learning about everyday life, the girls don't go to school they stay at home and learn to weave from their mothers to sell the handicrafts at the night markets. The boys go to school and then help their fathers on the farms.

We jumped back into the kayak one last time to paddle to our ride home. The river was really strong and in the end we bailed and dragged the kayak to shore! We got dropped off back at the office and made the short walk back to shower and clean up!

We were pretty hungry now and went in search for the night market once again; I stuffed my face with another buffet!

We came back home and slept it all off ready for our fun filled day with elephants tomorrow!!!

Wednesday 13th June

Another early start and we were off to see the elephants! It was about an hour's drive out of the city to the elephant village, which is situated next to a small river in a beautiful setting. The village has nine female elephants rescued from terrible working conditions at the logging farms and here they are treated well.

We were told the basic commands to control the elephants, right, left, stop, go, backwards, leg up (to help you get on!). It was difficult to remember, by go was the easiest! The first thing we did was ride on the neck of an elephant round the village. It is a lot higher and scarier than riding a horse for sure! Elephant's skin is kind of soft and squishy and spikey from their long hairs! Their trunks are the weirdest thing though, they are so sensitive they can feel a blade of grass and strong to pull over a small tree! Impressive!

We had a really good time riding on the neck of our elephant, our next activity was our elephant walk, and we climbed up onto a platform and hopped into the seats and went off. It was an interesting experience, never having done this before. It was a good laugh when the elephants stopped to grab some nearby grub in form of grass and bushes! We had (we being the elephants) had a wade through the water where we both got the chance to ride on the elephant's neck once again. Our mahout had been with our elephant for nine years! He jumped off the elephant and took our camera and got snappy happy! We had a good hours walk by the time we reached back to the village. Our elephant was naughty and tried to eat someone's plants and our mahout hit her trunk to say no!!! Naughty Nelly! We arrived back at the village, where we both brought a bunch of bananas for 10,000 kip to feed our elephant. Their trunk reminds me of a wet dogs nose, by more gross! They were searching Stu for more bananas, it was a great way to finish before lunch!

We had lunch, which was delicious! We had some free time so we all went to the onsite pool; it was lovely with great views of the valley and river below! We even had time for a beer at the poolside bar! We got called to get out as it was time to have a bath! We jumped into a boat and headed down the river and waited for the elephants to come over before jumping on and heading back into the water. This was great fun splashing water and getting the scrubbing brush out and giving them an all over clean! Before long our time with the elephants was over, we said goodbye and hopped back into the boat to go home. It was honestly one of the best days ever! Getting so close to these amazing creatures was brilliant! Before we left I brought a key ring recycled from elephant poo (like the sheep poo paper from Wales!)

We got back, showered again before heading out for some food! We went to the night market, where maybe I went a bit mad a brought a lot of things! It was all too pretty ok? If I was going home soon I would have brought more! We brought two handicraft lamps with monks painted on one and elephants on the other! Luckily they fold flat (they know us travelling kind!) and easy to carry round!

Thursday 14th June

We had a lie in, well till 9 am anyway! We packed up and checked out, we had a quick breakfast before getting into a minivan to take us to the Kouang Si waterfall!

It was a short ride to the waterfall, we paid our entrance fee and in we went. We stopped first at the bear sanctuary where there are rescued bears from poachers and all sorts. The Chinese believe the bear bile is a natural remedy for something and use giant needles to harvest the bile. It is horrible.

We walked on and arrived at the picturesque falls; the water was a lovely light blue and had three drop pools. We went up to the top pool first and had a go at the swing rope. It was great fun and the water was beyond freezing!! Good job the swing rope was there otherwise I wouldn't have got in! We had a swim around before looking at the other pools! The pool had fish they took a liking to feet! When they did bite it did actually hurt! Reminded me of the fish spa in Siem Reap! It was a lovely relaxing way to end our time in Luang Prabang!

We got back in the minivan and headed back to the guesthouse to collect our belongings before getting a tuk-tuk to the bus station.

Our bus was by no standards 'VIP' as they claimed it was! The guy who booked our tickets said we had the best seats, if you call front row seats to watching hell best seats? Then yes it was! We had to spend 12 hours sitting up right at the front of the bus for the night. I was beyond impressed, but there wasn't much I could do. We spent the first couple of hours talking before trying to find a comfortable position for us both to sleep. We stopped at 10 pm and had some dinner before getting back on the bus. The road conditions worsened, no more tarmac, instead pot holed one way track roads. I couldn't sleep well as the bus driver kept honking his horn and the fear of another bus coming the other way! It was the least enjoyable journey so far!!