After leaving the worst hostel we had yet stayed in so far in Hanoi, it was time to head to pastures new. A short flight into Laos and a super efficient visa on arrival system brought us swiftly to Luang Prabang. We had trouble finding accommodation as it turns out it was the Laos New Year (Pi Mai Lao) and finally settled on a cheap one with mixed reviews. The taxi dropped us at the new worst hostel we have yet stayed in and, worse still, the young man on reception spoke zero English. Despite us stood there, out of a taxi with all our worldly belongings on our backs, he couldn't seem to comprehend what we wanted.

The room had a piece of wood disguised as a mattress and a couple of what seemed to be sandbags as pillows. It was less habitable than we imagine most prison cells are. However it was nice to be out of Vietnam as, we had not realised until we arrived in Laos, our doctor email accounts had been blocked whilst we had been there...perhaps they were somehow threatening to the regime. We therefore had a flurry of emails to reply to, some of which were from our new jobs starting this summer with points such as "you must reply to this within 48hrs" or "you have until this date or you will be allocated randomly"...uh-oh.

The following day we were soon to realise what was involved in Pi Mai Lao. There was lots of loitering children with water pistols in the morning which we had thought was a little suspicious so we returned to our guesthouse to quickly change into water wear. There was a parade at 1pm with lots of monks and local women and children dresses up in traditional costume. The monks especially were getting soaked by the on lookers, this is to wash away sins of the previous year. After the procession, the whole centre of the town erupted into one huge water fight, we ran into a nearby shop and acquired a water pistol and beer each to join in the mayhem. We bumped into one of the girls from the Cambodia tour during the celebrations which added to the elation. We sprayed water in monks faces, soaked small children and danced with a transsexual on the back of a ute. A truly unique experience. The water hours are strictly 1-6pm, after which we headed to a bar, but made sure we were in bed before the 11pm curfew.

On day two we both felt a little worse for wear, our enthusiasm for repeating the prior day's events was low. It turns out Pi Mai Lao lasts for 4 days. We enjoyed the parade, got soaked right through a couple of times and dyed green before sneaking off for an afternoon nap. After this we headed for a Lao massage. This was very similar to the Cambodian one, we were dressed in pyjamas and it mainly involved putting lots of pressure on certain areas, with the addition of lots of big pinches, making Claire very aware of the amount of thigh cellulite she is currently carrying around.

We had a quiet evening away from the new year crowds and enjoyed a traditional Lao BBQ before strolling through the night market which seemed altogether sedate given the antics on the same streets just a few hours earlier. The night market was definitely classier than those we'd seen previously with far more crafty bits and pieces as well as wearable clothing. We topped the night off watching a dancing ceremony at a local temple after stumbling across it on our way home.