Hey everyone!........ella, sal and and gina here, emailing from our lovely guesthouse in Hanoi in Vietnam!!! So since last time in Chiang Mai...heres whats happened! WE got a bus from Chiang Mai to Chiang khong on the border of thailand and laos, on it we met a girl from crouch end who knew some of sallys aquaintances from La Swap ..wot a small world! Anyway we stayed in a hut which was attached to a lovely bar and guest house where we watched some english football west ham get thrashed by chelsea. that wozella....west ham r amazing! woo! Anyway we enjoyed the football as well as lovely views of laos across the river! which we later found out had dead buffalo in it! Anyway sally and gina were awake most of the night as they heard screams from somewhere near by and where holding hands to try and protect themselves....i dont no wot they thought this wud do! Whereas ella had had enough beer to sleep soundly through the night! So we left early the next day on a longtail boat which let us cross the river into laos to catch a slooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww boat! now wen we say slow we mean slowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. maximum speed 15 miles per hour.. you do the maths!so we were sitting on wooden benches on a boat so full it should have sunk with ginas bag disappearing onto another boat! we met some people...enuf sed! 7 hours later..we arrived at out destination for the nite..the most amazing place ever..PAK BENG!! as we got off the boat we were bombarded by drug dealers trying to sell us every drug you have ever heard off! we politely declined...enuf sed! we found the way to a guesthouse half way along pakbengs only road..on the way we saw a 10 year old boy staggering down the road only to be told later that the majority of the town were off their heads on crystal meth! u learn something new everyday! so therest fo the nite involved very energetic and crazy people a bedroom with a bathroom which had a stagnent well of water filled wiv dead bugs and sea weed and who knows wot else as we didnt stick around to look! it was a disturbing nites sleep and very scary...so many bugs and all electricty cut off at 10 so we were in warm sticky bug infested darkness..torches can only do so much! the next morning we woke up things seem better probably due to the fact we were leaving and had been offered pancakes for breakfast the nite before! however things went slowly downhill wen in unison we took a bite and nearly threw up as the pancakes had some sort of heavy salt content...gives us shivers thinking about it now! we politely asked to take them wiv us on the boat and threw them at the nearest tractor! we boarded the boat for yet another long and trecherous day..but we survived 8 hours and arrived in luang prabang...heaven compared to PAK BENG! we stayed in jimmys guesthouse after searching sweaty and hevy bagged for a guest house for an hour as they were all full due to the songkran water festival buddhist new year! we were wet for the next two days continuously but was very fun after we realised we had to leave our important documantation in the room and just go out wiv our money which was all spent on BEER LAO and waterguns. we met some lays from the local travel agency and they mangaed to get us all suitably lethered. it was lay hospitality to giv guest a glas of beer to down before they were allowed to drink any..lets just say there were alot of them and only three of us! we left luang prabang sad to go as we loved it but excited about vientiane. we caught abbus along the deadly route 13 where wwe saw lots of people wiv guns on their backs at the side of the road but luckily no one shot us!..enuf sed! we arrived in vientiane to find a lack of pavements and alto of water and bogs! we find a nice guesthouse to stay the nite in and ventured ou the next day only to get soaked again but luckily we got rescued by some random people who invited us into their car..sorry mums but we didnt wanna get our hair wet! anyway they drove us to the river where they wined and dined us with spicyspicy spciy food and lots of beer lao. the stomachs still havent recovered! but was very fun and the day was topped off wiv a drunk lay doctor diagnosing ellas foot and writing her a prescription for antibiotics on second thoughts probably best she couldnt take them! and then we went into the woods for a lovely massage altho some may say a little painful! sally seems to have scratches all over her body! bizarre! we left vientiane the next day on a very small and scary plane which sally found hard to fit on..there were just 5 steps leading up 2 it and we were all a litlle frightened! luckily we arrived in hanoi safely..so now were in vietnam and bloody starving so see ya later! Let us know ho your all doing! Lovely when we here from you!! Love you and miss you all loads! Ella, Gina and Sally. x x x