GOOD MORNING VIETNAM!!! Arrived here last night from Vientiane laos we were going to fly and had booked seats on the plane with will and verity but realise we would save 100 quid by getting the nightmare bus, we were promised that it would only take 18 hours so we went for it, had our finally day in Vientianne, tried to go to the Buddha park but the tuk tuk man decided we should go to the temple he wanted intead (no change there then!!) We prepared ourselves for the journey head with new books, batteries for the MP3 and got rid of all our kip as its worthless out of Laos. We were picked up at 5.30, said our goodbyes to Will and Verity, who were flying lucky b******s!! And set off on the journey, we wont write too many details as we would rather try to forget the experience (would not repeat it again in a hurry!!) as soon as we arrived at the bus station we were plucked from the minivan onto one of the many s***ty buses heading to Hanoi, we then proceeded to wait til 8pm for the bus to finally leave, it was packed to the rafters with various goods, the whole roof top was full, so they then packed the pack seats and every available space on the bus with sacks of garlic. We couldnt leave until every seat was taken, there was even a cat on board, yelping!!! We were handed some wierd lookning monkey nuts which turned out to be like dates inside so everyone chucked the shells all over the floor, there were people smoking what looked like opium pipes the whole time, lots of singing and shouting to each other. the first part was sweltering hot!! we were the only 2 westerners on the bus but they were all friendly we did feel rather watched at times, and a target, we made sure everything was locked up and hidden. the bus had to stop so many times along the way, when various things fell off the top, (luckly our bags were inside and we could see them stuffed in the back with the garlic and dried fish). Managed to sleep abit and woke up at 5 am at the boarder it was so cold and wet, eventually the boarder was opened at 8 am and we were instructed to get our departure cards stamped (lots of pushing and shoving the Vietnamese have rather different manners and queuing skills to those we have experienced in Laos and Thailand. Finally the bus went over to the boarder into Vietnam and we were checked though with our visas, they picked at our passports and studied them for an eternity (toby does look very different now from his passport picture, finally checked us through and then the bus was turned upside down by the customs officials and guards with guns looking for drugs and illegal immigrants, it took forever. we were finally allowed back on the bus and it left, only to be stopped again 5 times at various intervals to check and recheck everyones passports. the police have alot of power here.  To cut a very very long story short, we finally arrived in Hanoi at about 7.30 it had taken over 24 hours, we had made it very cold and hungry, slightly smelly!!! only to be met by some very persistant motorbike cyclo taxi drivers who followed us up the road for ages, they don't take no for an answer, (didnt fancy holding on to my backpacks and toppling over on a bike to finish the journey. Hanoi is a huge city we are staying in the old quarter, just waiting for Verity and Will to arrive later tonight so we can explore the city, hopefully check out the water puppet show, and then continue to Halong Bay and down South, where hopefully it will be a bit warmer!!!

Rach and Nick - Gutted we didnt managed to get tickets for glastonbury we had my Mum and Uncle on the case both trying but when they got through they had all gone, they are going to try again on the 22 April when more are released, so fingerscrossed!!! Sorry to hear the jobs front still abit dry, not looking forward to that at all. We will be living in Kent when we get back, its not that far from you so will come up an visit, when get back, we get back on the 10th May so planning to go up to Midlands to visit everyone, will you be able to come too?? we are going to find your friend when we get to Cambodia, how many people can he take as there are 4 of us travelling together can you remember how much it cost for 3 days?

Hey  Morey, good to hear from you mate, will be back in IOW soon cant wait to catch up with you and all the boys, hope the new job is going well, take care.  

hey guys long time no speak, hows it goin? sounds like ure avin fun. sorry been so long but u know how it is,  workin at new inn shafleet now, dunno how long 4, hate bar work now doin my nut in, gotta new motor the ova day nice tatty old 3series bmw, v much like jason's lol. glad ure enjoyin yourselfs and ill cu soon, take care love morey

Hi T & V

Just been looking at your recent pictures, looks like ur avin a great time still, those tubing pics brought back memories although we don't have any pics of our shinanigans cos no posh water proof camera!!

Hope ur both well u look it, we are settling in ok going downhill though as still can't find a job, we have to be patient though. Did u2 manage to get Glastonbury tickets, we managed to just in the nik of time think they were nearley all out cos it was getting late, but woohoo we got them can't wait, hope u2 managed to get them too.

Lookin forward to seeing you both when you get back were are u guys gonna be living, is it back to good old derbs??

take care of each other and enjoy Vietnam!

Love Rach & Nick xx

p.s when are u actually back, not that you want to think about that.

Whats up guys?? We havejust arrived in the Cameron Highlands and checked in to that place you recommended!! seems pretty cool!!! the bus journey up here is a bit of a nightmare though eh? gonna spend a few days here then to pulau pangkor for a few, penang and then we will be in Thailand, What sort of time are you guys expecting to be there?? We will be just slowly cruisng up the coast and doing the island circuit i guess!!!

Will be wicked good to catch up!!! cant  believe you are looking for jobs already - you geeks!!!! bet your chuffed with the footy eh toby?? i caught the 1st half of the liverpool game - first bit of live footy in ages!!! i need you back here to give me some leverage to watch the champions league!!! so sar can have v for company!!!

catch you guys soon- we are ona malaysian sim at the mo- +60 166 759804

catch you soon 

x

Still in Vientiane waiting for our visas, its absolutely roasting, very wierd though in a capital city and everything is closed coz its the weekend, only find this internet shop open, feels like we were back in England 25 years ago. Finally decided we will fly to Hanoi on Tuesday we have spent far too long on coaches in the last few weeks and 24- 28 hours on an old school bus, with the locals and their various livestock was not that appealing however it is very cheap!!!! Last night the boys had a long night of footie, watching 3 games back to back, Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool and got pissed up, soon after realised that they are at one of the infamours Beer HOuses!!! Invited to go dancing with some of the local ladies (or so they thought they were!!) Meanwhile me and Verity enjoyed an hours pampering, with a full neck, shoulder,  leg, foot and arm massage for 40,000 kips thats 2 quid!!! it was lovely however the head massage though she was gonna kill me not so relaxing at the end. We left the boys who returned MUcH later!! they were locked out the guesthouse and had to wake up the owners to get back in pisseads!! today we are checking out the sights of Vientiane or looking for anything thats open, been looking on the internet for jobs!!! argh the reality of our return is looming!!! Must enjoy what is left speak to you all soon x x  x 

hi tarzan and jane ooops i mean toby and verina, lovely talking to  you today. you both look so fit and well. loved looking at all your pictures. cant wait to see you in the flesh. time is passing on very quickly now it seems so make the most of your time left being footloose and fancy free, you will probably find it quite hard to settle down to a hum drum life after all the exciting things you have been doing but i am sure you willsoon get back to normality. please be careful and look out for each other love from gran  grandad   and all the family x x x

Hey guys! Sounds like you're having wicked fun :)

I'm in Bangkok at the mo, but am heading north on monday...the plan is to slowly make my way up to Chiang Mai in time for Thai new year (13th-15th April).

Do you know if & when you'll be coming back to Thailand? Got to make a visa run from Bangkok to Malaysia around the 25th, but apart from that I'm easy. Can't wait to see you :)

Hey hey hey!

How you doing guys? Cheers for the email Toby/Tom. Great to hear you guys are still doing well. In Wellington at the moment, heading to the South Island tomorrow to continue the adventure trail. Will email you with more gossip and of course those pics from the Whitsundays.

Take care guys and you know you've gotta love Chili Tuesday!

James 

We went tubing, And this is the best sport
ive discovered so far! We started at around 1:00, we hired four Giant
inflatable tyres, got a tuk tuk up the river. Jumped out and went sraight to
the river. Splash were in! This is the most brilliant idea, the river was
quite fast and we had our sandles in our hands to use as oars. We heard the
music of the first bar so we tried to steer ourselves near the edge, when i
guy witha long bamboo stick and a bottle tied to the end shouted welcome. We
all got  pulled into the bar. We jumped out our tyres, And went to the bar
to order Beerlao. At every bar they have a slightly different version of
rope swings. This bar had a zip wire, going in to the river, when it hit the
end of the wire, you'd catapolt in to the air and hit the water hard. So we
did it! It was soo much fun, i am not too fond of hights and these were
high. I cant tell you how terrified i was throwing myself of one of these
things but it was the best.
              The beer was drunk so we headed to the next bar, which was not
that far at all. The same happened we drank some more and threw ourseves
into the river some more. Oh the fun we had, until we realsied it was 5:45
and the tyres had to be back by 6:00. Now we stiil had 3km to travel and the
current in the river had gone so we had our trusty oars, to row us home!! We
stumbled in to the tyres and set off. Eventually we caught up with some
english guys who were trying to make the same journey in a ridiculous time
span, we decided to sail together. It was hopeless it was getting dark
really quick and we hadnt seemed to of moved very far! So we thought we'd
get out and try to find a tuk tuk. Theres always 10 there when you dont want
one, so there haas to be one there now we actually want one. We climbed out
after what seemed like an age in the tyre, we had rashes where we'd been sat
for so long. We all got out including these english who had given up the
will to live by this point, and to my suprise found a guy shouting tuk tuk
at us. I have never seen anything so beautiful in my life!!! Than this
greasy tuk tuk driver! Once the four of us had finally come to the
conclusion we had no money between us, we'd left it with our friends, who
had bailed out before us and by now were probably in the comfortable warm
room, having a nice hot shower. Great! We had to walk. So there we were,
could hardly walk, wearing our swimming clothes still wet, no money,
starving hungry ( in all the excitment of the day we'd forgotton to eat)
walking through the streets with a giant type wrapped round our necks. Shame
was not even close!
          Made it back, and vowed that once we'd recovered we were definatly
going to do it all again! So tommorrow we might go for a little jaunt in the
river AGAIN!!!!

yesterday we tried tubing, this involved floating down the river in an inner tube and being pulled into various little bamboo hut bars to drink Beer Lao, it was lots of fun there were zip wires and swings to jump off into the river for the brave at heart. It is great  fun stopped for a few buckets on the way, the last bar had the biggest swing, and the best vibe, could play beach volley ball,etc or just enjoy the view over the river looking at the mountains and watching other crazy people doing trapeze artist tricks on the swing before splasshing into the river. It was getting late at 5 we decided to float further down the river to return the tubes thinking it would only be a little way down stream, 1 hours later we seeed no closer to town and it was getting dark, we decided to get a tuk tuk but realised that the others had the dry bag, opps no money so we had to do the walk of shame with our tubes, soaking wet in our bikinis back to the town,  we'd laugh at all the people doing this the night before and now it waqs our turn, never mind had a wicked day and topped it off with a lovley indian meal,  had had one to many buckets and headed to bed early whilst the others carried on to GUys night at another bar. a great thime had by al.

Hey guys - Laos is sounding like good fun!!! We are in Singapore at the mo. Went to the zoo the other day but Sar was sick yesterday so didnt do anything. tried to go into the city today but ended up wasting hours in the library - what geeks eh!!! it was nice though!!!!

off to melaka tmw then - who knows??!!! going to see what you did hehe!!! altho money is short at teh mo so we wil have to start proper roughing it!!!

Now, Thailand!! We leave on May 2nd, so if you will be around Bangkok area around then that will be cool!!! How does that fit into your plans?? oh and why are you not bothering with hong kong now???

 

all the best and we will catch up again soon!!!!

pete and Sar

Hey all, had an action packed day yesterday, it was great started it off with Milo and Banana milkshakes yummy!!! Then we got ourselves some bikes with Verity and Will and went off to explore the jungle to find some caves, had to manouvere over the Bamboo Bridge across the river a mean feat in itself. Then across some farm land a few kms till we came across the Phou kham mountains and cave, over 300 m high,  there were a few wooden ladders to start the climb which gave us a false sense of security, these only lastest a few metres then it was full on rock climbing, in UK you would have been harnessed up with ropes, hard hats and instructor guide the lot but we were in Laos so it was just our wits and nimble bodies. It took us a while to scale the beast with some risky moments but we made it to the top and felt like we had conquered Everest, the only problem was what goes up must come down, this consisted of some very hard climbing techniques called shuffling on our arse!! Made it down to the bottom and were greeted by two locals who requested the fee of 5,000 kip we had to pay for the privillege.

After this we had a short break drinks by the river and then it was on to the next cave, the roads we abit bumpier here and I ended up in the bush, after flying down the hill, very funny.  When we reached the cave we were greeted by an elderly man waiting for us with a car battery and some dodgy wiring and a light these were our head torches all 2 of them,  we got on our bellies and scrambled into the caves, they were roasting hot, we turned to wait for the guide but he just motioned us on we were on our own, the caves were great, pitch black, and very spooky, there were ladders inside and went on for ages, but we started to get abit spooked out too many horror movies if you've watched Descent you'l understand. We got out and the guide directed us to another cave, even harder to get into by the time we got out we were filthy covered in clay, but smiling, had been an amazing experience, lots of adrenaline rushing today. We then cycled back and rested our battered bones and bums relaxing with a Beer Lao at Oh La la's then went out for pizza and a game of golf (cards)  to finish the night!! Right we better go as we are off to try tubing!!!

Speak to you all soon x x

Hey Rach and Nick, thanks for that address and number we will contact him when we get to Cambodia. Hope you had a great birthday nick!! How did you get from Cambodia to Bangkok did you go on the road or fly??

Happy Birthday to Adil hope you have a good one mate.

And Happy Birthday to Uncle Andy, hope to see you soon x x

Mum, thanks for the number for Paul, don't think I will be able to go back there now as we left Luang Prabang 3 days ago its a 6 hour journey back, such a shame would have been good to see him. I will ring and send our love.

Also hope everything goes well today, thinking of you all, say hi to everyone for me especially Heather, love to all x x x