When in Vientienne get the bus out!

Vientienne

Well, I knew it wasn't a great place cuz Steve and Sarah emailed me to let me know, but hey always give people and places the benefit of the doubt.....they were right. It was a hole. The best part about it was the Beerlaos factory where they brew Beerlaos. The company started making beer in 1973, and before that Laos imported all it's beer. They are going for ISO 9001 this year, and sell about 60,000 cases of beer a day....12 beer in a case, I'll let you do the math.

Vientienne is just buildings, restaurants, and bars....no real character as such. It was also very bland, all the buildings appeared washed out and colourless. We did find a great wee Indian restaurant that did awesome samosa's 2 for 5000 kip. Thats about 50 cents, or 25 p. Good food!

The Bus
So I booked a bus to get me out of Vientienne to Hanoi, it cost 200,000 or 20 us dollars, and was a 24 hour bus ride. Not cheap, and it was a complete fiasco. They said they'd be there at 6pm, but showed up early. They then procedeed to squeeze 8 people into a 7 person people carrier. Then they pulled us out, and put us on another mini bus, then took some of us out and put us back in the original mini bus. Then when we got to the bus station to catch the big bus, they told me to put "Gigantor" (the affectionate name given to my backpack by Jake) on the bus with me. It's huge and didn't make any sense to me, but whatever. Then they proceeded to pile up all our rucksacks in a section at the back of the bus where there used to be a few seats.

Then they started passing our luggage out one of the windows, including gigantor, and emptied the space where the seats used to be....much to our amusement and puzzlement. Next they stared bringing seats on the bus and hammering them into place. I was very confused....eventually around 8:00pm we left....phew. I pulled out my book and started to read, and the reading lights went out. So I got out my trusty flashlight (Thanks Brian and Theresa) and the lights went on...so I put my flashlight away, then they went out, so I took the flashlight out, and guess what they went on again....this was the story for an hour or so before I got fed up and tried to get some sleep.

I dozed for an hour or so and then tried reading again, eventually nodding off. I woke up as I was jolted out of my seat. We were going over a really bumpy road, and it was pitch black outside, it was almost midnight. The bus came to a stop and we appeared to be in the driveway of some farm. Everyone got out to get food, or use the toilet, except there wasn't any. It really was just someone's farmhouse. Except there were about 12 Vietnemese guys boarding our bus....and one of them had the pleasure of sitting beside me. We reversed out of the driveway and got back on the main road, and my friend started to doze. After a few minutes I detected a lovely odour, it was a combination of stale cigarette smoke, and sweat, and it was coming off of my friend. He was wearing a T shirt that was stained with food from various dinners over the last month is my guess. Probably a contributor to the lovely aroma he effused.

So this was bad, and I turned away from him towards the window to try and get away from his pungent aroma....when he decided to get cozy and turned in the same direction practically spooning me. Dude, I don't even know you're name and we're spooning on the first date? I normally don't even kiss on the first date!! So I tried to make as much space as possible and reduce body contact. Not in a happy place was I. He eventually shifted and managed to lodge his elbow in my spine. That was enough I took his arm and put it on his stomach, and after 2 minutes he happily replaced it back in between the vertibrae of my spine.

2 painful hours later we pulled up at a small restaurant around 2 in the morning. Most of were pretty hungry, and thirsty and need of the toilet. We walked in and saw a football match on, Champion's League and many spirits were lifted. Then we saw what was in the jars, and many spirits sunk. There were Gorrilla feet, A cobra, and a baby pigs head in jars on the counter of the kitchen. Hmmm. When she came around to ask if we wanted soup and noodles, only the brave ventured forth with a timid...yes. I wanted a can of 7 up, as it doesn't have caffeine, but they only had cola which would keep me up for the rest of the trip so I had a beer. Turns out it didn't really matter cuz we were staying here for 4 hours. Great.

So a couple of English girls we'd met in Chiang Mai were on the bus, Jess and Alice, so we played a couple of games of cards with some French Canadian boys we'd met and passed the hours munching on snacks, playing cards, and listening to tunes on my beloved little speakers....all very civil. Then we got on the bus around 6am and drove to the Vietnemese border where we had to get off and walk up to immigration, only to be herded like cattle and pushed prodded, bumped and bruised in the process of being processed as visitors. After all that we got out around 7:00 to get back on the bus. Nope they were taking all our luggage off the roof as we had to have it x rayed...so back again we went, then lugged our stuff back to get hefted onto the roof again.

The Puppies
We then had to walk 10 mins up the road for some reason before the bus could pick us up....and this is where I saw one of the worst things on this trip so far. A truck passed me, and I did a double take. It was full of cages, which in turn were full of puppies. They were crying, yelping, snarling barking, essentially making every dog noise possible, while some were just quietly sitting and looking up with the saddest eyes in the world. Some of the dogs were piled on top of each other, and just looked so miserable. Although I don't know for sure, I'm pretty sure they were on their way to be butchered for meat. I felt so awful. There was nothing in the world I could have done. Even if I bought them all with all the money I had for the rest of my trip what would I do with them? What about the next truck load. Man that was rough.

We stopped for lunch a few hours later and piled off the bus. When we were done lunch we went to go back on the bus, and they told us no....that bus. A public bus that was even more crowded and funkier smelling than the big bus. Not good. We hoped it was just a transitional bus to get us to our next one. Nope. We spent 6 hours of the most uncomfortable busride in the world hoping that we'd crash to put us out of our misery. Then I realised I'd left my travel towel, my beanie, my book and about 10,000 dong on the other bus. The trip just got even better....grrrr. At least smelly boy stayed on the original bus, (and probably is the proud new owner of my belongings) and we didn't have to stand, but we did have to watch our bus driver do his Michael Schumacher impression, passing everything in front of him with ridiculous blasts of his buses foghorn. We finally arrived in Hanoi, and watched in amazement as they pulled off 5 mopeds that had been strapped to the roof beside our luggage. 5 mopeds! I hated every minute of that bus ride. Hated it.

Vientienne and bus photo's

The Beerlaos factory...the best part of Vientienne

Billy Chris and Me with our free beer!

Our 2 AM bus stop. Gorilla feet, a cobra, and pigs head....uh, yeah. No menu thanks.

A dog-gone tradgedy so it is.

Van Viang Pho-toes

Sarah Steve and Scott begin their tubing adventureSteve Tarzan style off the first bar's amusement...a rope swing

The calm before the crazy drunk Laos guy wanted to Thai box our asses

Me preparing for a back flip off a higher rope swing (I jumped off the top platform too!)

Billy Boy at our lunch stop

No more tubing for today...booo!

How's that for a sunset, only 5 mins after I took my photo above! Billy, Steve and Sarah

The Elephant Buddha in the Elephant Buddha Cave

The Elephanat Buddha cave Elephant....can you see it?

The result of playing vehicle pinball, fortunately no-one was seriously hurt

All Van Viang'd up

Arrival
As mentioned when we arrived the road we were on was the main one and it was a dirt road with open sewers on both sides. It must have been at least 35 degrees, and we were baking just waiting for our bags to come off the roof of the bus. I went to an internet cafe to see where Jake and Deke were holed up....to no avail. No email, so I found myself a guesthouse, and splurged a little...I paid 35,000 ($3.50)kip for a double bed with a bathroom inside all to myself!! Except there was a slight problem. When I grabbed my money and passport to go pay for the room....I realised I couldn't find my passport. I'd done laundry in Liangprabang and given my passport over, and forgotten to get it back. The bus ride was 4 hours and 50,000 kp x 2. FECK!!! That's if that was indeed where I left it.

We had all agreed to meet up for dinner later that night, so after booking in and giving a fake passport number, I went to the internet cafe next door to email Bryan back in Liangprabang to see if he could try and get my passport before he left the next morning.

There was bugger all I could do except keep checking my email until Bryan either did get my email and get back to me, or didn't get my email and it was too late. Then the internet went down in every cafe in Vanviang. I was seriously stressed. I had to catch Bryan before he left!Vanviang had a whole load of cool bars. Some played Simpsons non stop, some played Friends non stop, others movies non stop...and all had these really cool seats. Raised kinda like a stage with low tables, and loads of cushions to sit on instead of chairs...really comfy. So I hung out in the bars, and kept checking all afternoon for the net to get up and running and when it finally did? No respsonse from Bryan, and it was time to meet for dinner.

We went to an English place that served fish and chips, steak pies etc, and it was pretty good. I left early to check the internet and see if Bryan had got back to me. I went across the road to check the net....it was down. Aaaarghhh. At 8:30 that night I got an email from Bryan......he had my passport!!! Whoooo hoooo result! I'd also gotten an email from Dereck. He and Jake were leaving in the morning to Canoe downriver to Vientien. Missed em. Ah well.

I went back had a few more beer, and went to bed feeling a whole lot more relieved!!

Vanviang Day 2
So we got up and rented tubes to float down the river on. What a great idea, see cuz when you pass a bar (which is basically a bamboo hut with either beer on ice literally, or in a fridge) they just hold out a bamboo pole and reel you in. Each of the bars have an "amusement" in some cases it's a rope swing, in others it's a high bamboo platform you jump off of, on others it's a zip glide thing that you hang onto a bar with, and zoom across the water. One place even had a kind of trapeze. The whole point of these amusements is to get drunk, and throw yourself off 20+ foot platforms into the water. Whadya mean Health and Safety risk? Like all dangerous things it was silly fun.

It wasn't long before I figured out with enough momentum you can flip off all these things, so I suffered a few times trying to get the hang of it, but got there in the end. All I can say is that falling 20 feet onto the side of your head, back, stomach and arse hurts. Believe you me, an enema from 20 feet up is painful. However as mentioned I nailed it in the end, it was a riot of a day.

There was one particularly interesting moment, we had stopped at this one bar which was about 12 feet by 12 feet of bamboo floor to sit on, but they brought out a guitar. There was some Laos dude puking over the side, so apparantly he had heat stroke....okay, you're probably right...he was probably just pished. So we were all sitting chilling, having Laos Bud, and life was good. We got up to go and they started saying that we hadn't paid for one beer. So then Pukeboy gets up and starts wobbling and shouting that "Yuuu musssss pay". We weren't sure if he meant with money or our lives, then Billy the Irish boy (who has a shaved head, and is the nicest most easygoing guy ever" was pulling his tube out to drift away when Pukeboy points and him and says "you, you Thaibox" and assumes a Thai kickboxing stance.

Billy's response will be with me till the day I die. In a very alarmed voice that rose 3 octaves with stress he responded in a typical Irish voice as he stumbled back in both surprise and fear "What?" "Me? Me? Jesus fuck no, fuck no" and wildly looked around at us to see if he'd heard right. Pardon the profanity, but he thought he was going to have his lovely Irish head punted the length of a rugby pitch. If the Laos boy hadn't been so set on kicking someone's ass I probaby would have laughed. However I was getting pissed off at pukeboy trying to intimidate us, so I said to him loudly, clearly and aggressively...."we paid for 4 beer, we drank 4 beer, we're going now" puke boy turned to me and said "No, you no go, you must pay" and took a step towards me.

I'm both stupid and stubborn enough that my last word's would have been a gurgled "shit" as he held my head underwater and drowned the life out of me, but damnit I was not paying another penny. Then some old geezer stepped in, waved us on, and we drifted away in serenity. Yup, he was hammered....I reckon I could've taken him. cough cough, erm. So we drifted on to the next bar had a sandwhich and a beer, then wrapped up the tubing. When we got to the shore the sun was setting, and wow, what a sunset. Then we changed, met up, ate a cracking meal (pizza....hmmmm) and booked up for an adventure tour the next day!

Vanviang Day 3
Today was much more mellow and relaxed. Although my body felt all banged up, (like it was lucky to have walked away from a car crash .. an omen?). It was sore all over, and the whiplash...ohhh mammy was I sore. However we had an adventure tour to complete. We started by tubing into a cave which was pitch black, and at some points we had to get out and walk amongst stalagtites, and stalagmites, and were in the caves for a total of about half an hour before getting back out. Pretty cool, but not if your afraid of the dark, or claustrophobic. Then we visited the Elephant Buddha cave, which is a shrine to Buddha and so called because there is a natural rock formation that vaguely resembles an elephant. We then walked a few metres away to a bunch of huts where they served us a lunch of rice and bar b q'd veg kebabs, or meat kebabs and a baguette! Pretty good lunch!!

After lunch we canoed down the river, two people per canoe and the canoe's were these crazy plastic things. I was with an older German lady, and I wanted to get the canoe sideways through the rapids, but she wouldn't for some reason. So we had a slightly more mellow trip than I would've liked....until it started to rain. More on that in a second. We stopped at one of the jumping platforms and Pete the English fellow we'd met the day before was determined to make a better go of rope swing than the day before. So he went on a few times. For our last jump I asked the guy if I could just jump off the platform into the water...this is probably about 25 feet or so, so slightly higher than the swing....but felt like a hundred feet higher. So I said to Peter, you doing it....he said no outright. I did it, and what a great feeling that was...although it still freaks you out looking over the edge and forcing yourself to jump off! I hit the water and came up, and saw Pete looking over, I yelled at him to "Have it" .... and to my suprise he did!! He said it scared the crap out of him, and he couldn't believe he did it....I said he had definetely stepped up his game!!

So we to back into the boats, and as mentioned it had started to rain. It felt like someone was throwing small rocks at our heads it was so heavy. Then, the thunder...and lightening started. That spiced things up nicely....until we noticed the boat was getting harder and harder to paddle. My arms were getting tired, I figured cuz I'd been doing most of paddling....apparantly not. Upon looking at the sides of our canoe, the water was about 2 inches from the top ofthe sides. previously it had been a good 6 inches. Turns out there is a big hole in the back which is supposed to have a cover...ours didn't have a cover so as it had been pelting down rain it had been filling up...and sinking our boat. We were only 20 minutes from the finish so I'd been hoping we could make it. A few paddle strokes and I noticed we where tilting way out of control, one last paddle stroke and the water started filling in the side of the boat....on the left side...and so it was that we got dumped into the water.

In between laughing, and trying to swim with the tipped boat to the shore we both nearly drowned. However we got there, and trying to lift the boat to tip it when it was full of water was not easy...especially as we were both shivering with cold as the clouds had come out. We emptied it eventually and got back in, man what a difference....we headed for the finish full steam ahead with visions of warm dry clothes and food dancing in our heads. We got there, and dropped off the canoe and went right back into the water to warm up. The water was roasting compared to outside!! As we were sitting there we saw this crazy bus come flying along the road, and plunge right into the river in front of us. It was only a foot or two deep, but not exactly what you expected to see....then all these young boys jump out and start washing it....a Laos bus wash....cool! We got fed up waiting for them to strap the canoes on to the trucks and drive us back, so Billy, Pete and I opted to walk back...man was that cold.

Then we got changed, and Billy and I met up with Nic and Chris, and a few other folk...namely Bryan...and my passport!!!!!! As well as an american girl I'd met canoeing named...Nicki. There's a lot of Nicks, Nics, and Nickis going about over here. We all hit a club, then wandered to some bonfire, except Bryan wanted food so we lost them, then trecked over a bridge, through some grass, hopped a fence, and found them....but no bonfire. So Billy stayed, and Bryan and I sod off for our beds. Busy, hectic, but fun day.

Vanviang Day 4
Nothing to tell here, except that we left for Vientien. I was on the way to Vientien today from Vang Vieng (here in Laos) when we had a slight problem. We had a 6 hour bus ride to Vientien.

After an hour of mostly normal driving on the bus, our bus driver got a little crazy and tried to pass on a corner heading over a small bridge.....with a truck coming towards us. We smashed into the first truck on the left side of the bus, and then careened over to this massive transport truck on the right that was carrying jeeps and slammed into it ripping open the right front side of the bus (where the door is) and buckling the front of the bus.

The first truck was run off the road, and we got wedged between the bridge and the transport lorry. I was asleep when the first hit took place, safe to say it woke me up. The second hit I was watching out the front screen of the bus when I saw glass shatter and cascade into the front of the bus as we ground to a halt. The glass came from the entrance doors, and they were so buckled we had to climb through where the glass previously was as the doors physically couldn't open.

Fortunately no-one was seriously hurt, and just a lot of hearts going a hundred miles an hour. I think the folk in the front had the biggest scare. It took an hour or so for the police to show up, and clear the bridge, there was traffic queued up as far as the eye could see in both directions. Freaky, but I'm ok.

The crasht certainly wasn't the highlight of Laos, nor was Vientienne. I don't think many people were too impressed with it, it was just a small city with restaurants and bars. We did a tour of the BeerLaos factory which was cool...they're going for ISO9001, how very cool!! However I wanted out as soon as possible and booked a 24 hour bus ride too Hanoi Vietnam where Dereck and Jake are...so that is where we shall pick up next!

Liang Prabang up to Speed!

Arriving in Liang Prabang
So after getting off the slowboat Bryan and I manged to eventually find a guesthouse where we each got our own room, with fan, and a double bed for 25,000 kip, or 2.50 each! So we checked in, dropped our stuff off and went out for a bite to eat. We bumped into Sarah and Steve on the way into the main street, then a few minutes lataer, low and behold Skeebie and Jake!! They were with an Ozzie fellow and a couple of gals. So they had already eaten and were going for a walk, and had already booked their bus to leave the next morning. They did recomend going to the waterfall, and seeing the tiger and bears....so instead of trying to book a bus, I opted to go see the waterfall, and catch them up somewhere else! I needed money though so Steve, Sarah and Bryan were recommended to an Indian, so off they went and I changed my 100 US travellers cheque into....."One million dollars" said with a Dr Evil accent of course. It was actually one million kip, but for the first time in my life I was a millionaire...I liked it. I couldn't find the Indian place, but I found another Indian, and met a lovely lady named Bek, who is from Brisbane and has a band called Excavator....they're album is coming out, so keep your ears open...she described them as a jazzy ensemble with a bit of Evanescence about them. Bek was kind enough to put up with me over dinner, and we had a good chat about our travels before we parted ways and I went to find folk. I bumped into so many people from other parts of our trip it was highly amusing. I eventually found Bryan in an internet Cafe and so we went for a beer and met Seattle Dan!! We all had a few beer, decided to meet at 10:00 to head to the waterfall and headed home.

On the way home we bumped into a Swedish girl and Dutch guy who weren't ready for bed yet, and convinced us to join them and a few friends down at the river for a few more drinks and a chat. So we went back to there place where there were a couple of Dutch girls.....and Canadian Dan who I met in Chaing Mai!! I also met another Canadian bloke named Matt and we all headed down to the river where we had a great ole chat about everything worldly. The constelations down here are totally different which is both cool and disappointing at the same time.

Day 2 in Liangprabang
So we all met up at the intersection as discussed to get a Tuktuk to the waterfall, except we didn't all show up. Brian was having a lazy day and Seattle Dan was a no show. So the Tuktuk driver wanted one more person to take Sarah, Steve and myself. So I volunteered to rustle up an extra body. Low and behold who did I find? Bek! So she was up for the waterfall and off on our merry way we were. The falls were awesome. If you've ever imagined a tropical waterfall, here it is. Check out the photo's. We were only there for a couple of hours, but could have easily spent all day there with a book, some music and a bit of grub n beer.

The big falls were spectacular and cascaded for almost a hundred feet, then there were mini falls which cascaded in turn downstream from the b ig falls, and then there were emerald green swimming pools which were fed off the mini falls. Just awesome. Nature really is incredible.

We got back and bumped into Seattle Dan who had slept in, a hangover apparantly! We had a bite to eat, all wandered off to do our own thing, I caught up on my journal in this really cool wee garden with benches, and shrubs that looked like dogs!! Then we met up for dinner which was out of this street vendor. There was a buffet all vegetarian, one bowl as much as you could fit into it of rice, noodles and veg...all for 5,000 kip that was about .50 cents. What a deal. Nobody got sick either!! Good grub. We then went to a bar where we had a few beer, we'd met Chris and Nic as well so Chris pulled out his Ipod, I pulled out my speakers and we listened to someone totally take the piss out of George Bush all night. It was a good night!!

Leaving Liangprabang
The next morning we jumped on a bus (we being Steve, Sarah and myself) and met an Irish boy named Billy who shared the bus with us to Vanviang. Pretty uneventful trip, although it was bloody hot!! We arrived in a very dusty, run down Vanviang. Pictures to arrive as soon as Danny boy has time!!

Slowboat, really means Slow!!

Okay, so we took a minibus from Chaing Mai to some remote place near the Thai - Laos border. We then spent the night in this way out of nowhere town, where they packed our lunches for the next day. Next day we went in a small water taxi across the river to....Laos! Yup, it was about 2 minutes across this tiny river and bang....we're in Laos. So we all got ferried to another point by Tuktuk...which in this case was a pickup truck with a canopy and metal frame roof. We then boarded...the slowboat. The slowboat is a really long, slow boat..as opposed to the fast boat which is....a really short, fast boat. Basically a speedboat. They are much more expensive and legend has it a few tip on occasion. So we opted for the slowboat, and I still think it was a good choice.

Day 1 Slowboat
We figured about 40 or 50 people would fit on them? Wrong, try 70 or 80 and every stop it seemed we picked up more!! They're basically like a train service, except along the river. We just stopped at what seemed like random bits of rock and people just jumped on or off!! I met a good bunch of folk, Bryan from the US but living in BC. Sarah and Steve from England, and Chris and Nic from England. So we spent most of the first 6 hours just chatting to each other.

Of course, even though there was good conversation I felt the ante needed to be upped!! So I managed to climb out the side of the boat onto the roof, where I lay back in the sun and vegged for all of about 5 mins before this pished English girl comes running up on the top screaming and hollering and whooping her arse off...the boatmen (sounds ominous!) saw her, then me and make me climb back in. Boooo. I also managed to lose the back of my MP3 player, and the cap that covers the USB in the scramble ontop of the boat. Booooo again.

At one point we had to get off and walk for 15 mins cuz the boat got stuck.....there were two boys from Manchester who had apparantly met the opium boys and took them up on there offer. Coming off the boat they were all over the plank, then off it, then on the beach, then in the water, I've seen gay guys straighter than those two could walk. The hike was roasting, we were all dripping in sweat, and my t-shirt had to be wrung out when we I was back at the boat.
So we eventually go to the pickup point...and all got on the boat, pulled away and somebody said....where are those Manchester plonkers....so we had to go back and wait for them. They eventually showed up and half walked half tumbled down the sandbank into the boat.

We arrived in the overnight village and where hit for opium about 5 times!! We found a room for what amounted to 3 bucks each (for Bryan and I). It was...adequate. It had Mosquito nets, which where more holey than the Pope, I tell ya, what's the point!! However, so goes life. We had a lovely meal, of spicy rice, and then hit the sack.

Day 2 Slowboat
Instead of half of us sitting on the floor like we did the first day, this slowboat had seats for almost everyone. We were on the boat for 8:30, but didn't leave till 10:00, we think because some girl met some guy, and they opted to stay in bed the next morning, and the boat was waiting for them...bugger. We eventually got on the way, and the scenery was better than the first day, more extreme...the rocks were really sharp and rose quite high, and there was fishermen all over the rocks casting nets, and using lines. The mountains rose up and away and created a dramatic colourful background to the dark brown cliffs along the waters edge.

Bryan and Steve decided to sneak up onto the roof and had a good run about until they got busted too....but it was all good cuz we had just pulled up into Liangprabang...or something like that. After wandering around, we finally found a guesthouse that met our requirements...our own room, with fan, and double bed, outside shower for 25,000 kip...or 2.50 american. Good deal. We settled in, saddled up and went out to explore the city!!

Laos'd in the Translation

Chiang Pai

Pai

Okay, okay, you're right, I should have taken a photo of our lovely quaint little bungalow in Pai. I didn't. I'm a bad blogger. It was a 4 bed bungalow, with a tended garden out front, with a wee veranda to sit out on and drink beer before going to the clubs, not that I do that often, in fact I didn't really do it, but Skeebie and Jake did. From there we explored a few bars/clubs, and waterfalls and hot springs. One day I rented a mountain bike and cycled about 30-40 km's to a hot spring (it was about 30+ degrees) which was interesting, and bloody hot!! Then I just chilled, or heated I suppose in the hot springs, and met some local fellow who gave me a 20 min Thai massage cuz I was Canadian....which was cool. Dereck and Jake rented mopeds and hit the hot springs but didn't go in, then went to a waterfall where Jake slid on his arse from top to bottom of the falls.....as you do. They then decided that later in the evening after we'd all had a few beer that it would be good to go back to the falls....I missed out on that as I passed out in bed, and the boys went back and had a wee bonfire by the waterfall, by all accounts it was a good night!!

Chiang Mai

There are no photo's to substantiate this story. Sokran (spelling is likely off) is the Thai new year, and it is celebrated with a lot, I mean a lot of water. Basically everyone grabs a bucket, a water gun, or anything that disperses water and throws, shoots or disperses water over anyone and everyone. So the streets and pubs are lined with big bins filled with ice cold water or equally as bad, moat water which looks and smells like shite. Pardon my french. At least the moat water is warm. So once you find a spot after walking around and being hit by moat or ice water, you then return the favour by hitting anyone on foot, moped, bike, car, truck or taxi with your moat or ice water. This goes on for 4 days. You'll understand why there's no photos!!

We basically spent the 4 days drinking, swimming (yes Dereck and I ended up in the moat at one point...fortunately we didn't get sick), and dancing....not that I danced a whole lot. We met a great bunch of folk in the American Peace Corp and had a few laughs and drinks with them, and I opted to stay behind for an extra day or two, and catch up with Jake and Deke in Laos....stay tuned!!!

Have your Pai and Changmai Too!

It's growing exponentially Sarge!

Old Temple Wisdom unleashed from the Peace Corp
Chaing Mai Waterworks
New Temple
View from Pai on a mountain bike

Hot springs in Pai...they were...roasting

Thai Chi

Yes, Elephant boobies
The kids, and Scott just in the water....the poles are similar to the raft we rode on
Mechanical man builds a boat for the village kids
Scotty rides the Ellyphunt, Kiwi Dan on the left
Look me in the eyes, and tell me you love me
Dereck asks the Elephant....who's yer Daddy?
A tree with a plant in it, yup that's it
Who you calling Dumbo?

Another Thai Plant
Look carefully there is a lizard there, I caught him too!!
I dare you climb that tree Deke says....shah, right.
The village kids delighted with their Kalaidascope
Very tall bamboo trees
Deke, protector of the group
The jungle village we stayed at first night
Wild Banana trees
The view from our dinner table
Lohso our guide, and his trusty assistant....neither to be messed with!
The three Coconuts, Scott, Deke and Jake
The waterfall in it's entirety
Taking a break from all that hard jungle hiking!

Most of the crew munchin and lunchin

Welcome to the Jungle

We had fun and games....well we had 3 days in the jungle, it was fun and mad, and here's how it went!!

Day One

The first day we went to a beautiful waterfall in the back of a pickup with a roof and two benches that ran along the sides. 10 of us sat on the benches, and another 3 hung out on the back of the truck...literally. Eventually we got off the truck or "Ute" as they say in Oz. We had a 30 min hike to the falls which were beautiful, and then just mucked about there for a while then we hiked back down and had an awesome lunch of soup and fried rice in a wee bamboo hut. We then travelled for another hour or so to the start of the real trek. We all geared up, sprayed ourselves, sun blocked ourselves and prepared to enter the Jungle. The Cicada's (sic) were everywhere. They are crazy little bugs loud as, well loud. If you don't know what they sound like, it's kinda hard to explain, but at points they were so loud it was almost deafening. There was thick brush and tree cover, but it was more like forest than Jungle as I'd imagined it. However we hiked for about an hour or so and had a pretty good pace going, even though it was mostly uphill!! Towards the end of the hike we came across some bamboo trees that were about 80 feet high. Pretty impressive. We also found some small venus flytrap like plants growing in the grass. Just growing there as wild live things do. We got to the first hut and had another really good meal, chatted, drank some sam sung (whiskey) and eventually hit the sack.

Day Two

Whoooo whee. This was some hike. We had to hike for a couple of hours....up hill, in the heat (30+) and everything was brown and dead. Our water was evaporating faster than I can manage to hurt myself on my mountain bike, and the sweat and sunburns were out in full force. It was tough! Monroe tough but half the height, and more effort! However being me I just got the nose down and hammered through it, even though it nearly killed me. We got to a small village where I gave some of the kids a Kaleidascope that my parents had given me to give to some kids. I did and they were totally amazed by it, then they tried to give it back and I had to explain that is was for them! When we looked again all the kids were passing it from one to the other throughout the village. It was pretty cool Mom/Dad.

Dereck had gone ahead with the first group, and I was taking my time trying to get photo's for the first part, and the camera went away once it got gruelling. However on the way down we had a lot of singletrack, or thin walking/riding trails for you non cyclists. So we were hammering down as fast as we could (we being mostly Kiwi Dan and myself) and then we turned a corner and bang. There was elephants. Big. Yup, big animals. We sat and had lunch which was noodle soup, and then this big elephant starts walking towards us. This may just sound like another blog story, but see when this thing walks up to you and your eyes meet it's knees, and it's eyes are staring at you......and you don't know why......it's intimidating, and quite unnerving. Skeebie is 220 lbs, which they eat for breakfast in bamboo shoots. Ellyphunts are awesome creatures!!! So now that the elephant and I are aquainted it's time to get a bit closer. Let's ride that fellow! Riding an Elephant you understand how powerful, and elegant (rhymes with elephant) they are. We were on a trail that was about 1.5 feet wide. The elephants walked it like it was a motorway. By far one of the most incredible experiences I've ever had....especially going downhill!! We got to the next village by Elephant and the village was an experience unto itself!!

Day 2 TheVillage
We got to the village and there was a huge wooden suspension bridge that was hanging, and this is amazing....suspended!! over a river. We crossed over dumped our stuff into another bamboo hut and headed to the river. Some folk went swimming, but Dereck and I were afraid of dying from typhoid or something nasty. So we skipped out. Then we all went up on the bridge (20 feet?) and saw this massive school of fish just anchored to one spot that took up the whole of the width of the river (15 feet) and about 10 feet long. They apparantly were forbidden to fish, so they just exist. That ryhmes. The coolest part was watching the village children, just be children. They were running around jumping in the water off the stone bank, bollock naked and happy as Jay Birds. There was an 8 year old who was taking care of a 6 and 3 year old, and they were all playing about, until the 8 year started to shampoo the 3 year olds hair in the river. When they were done, the 8 yr old put the 3 yr old on the bank, and went in to play with the 6 year old...the water was about 2/3 feet deep and the 3 year old just threw herself in giggling cuz she knew the 8 year old would be there to get her....even though the 3 yr old couldn't swim!! She kept doing this and giggling like crazy. It was awesome to see. There were also about 15 kids on the other side of the bridge jumping off a big set of rocks....so eventually I figured bugger it, and did some cliff jumping too....I did front flips, back flips and dives and all the kids were amazed, then they climbed up the bridge and jumped off it into about 6 feet of water.....they had me beat, I wasn't doing that!!

That night we had another amazing meal, and all sat around afterwards as Ozzie Mick got hold of a guitar and we just sang every song you could imagine, and had a really awesome night in the jungle!

Day 3 - The River
This was soo much fun!! We basically got up, and made our way down to the river. We were split into two groups, one for each raft. The raft was basically a bunch of Bamboo held together with vines.....in the photo of the kids playing you'll see roughly what they looked like. They had a tripod type thing for all our bags to hang on at the front, and bamboo poles to push us and steer us. We all got on, and what fun was had!!

We were soaking the other raft, trying to steal their poles, jumping from one raft to the other, trying to push each other in the water, jumping off the raft, waiting in ambush to throw a massive rock in the water to soak the other raft, jumping off the raft onto little rock islands then back onto the raft.....ramming the other raft....it was all good fun. Okay so maybe I was a little more hyper active than some of the folk, but it was a good laugh, and everyone seemed to enjoy the day. There was one particular moment where Deke jumped and totally slipped falling into the water, and another where he managed to snap our bamboo pole....not good. We were on the river a total of 4 hours, so towards the end we were all a little mellow, and just sat and chilled floating downstream. Then we got to our destination Village where we had a great meal of noodles, and then jumped into the truck to take us back to civilisation.

What an all round awesome experience. Next up I need to tell you about the Thai New Year and Sokran, spelling is probably wrong, but I'm sure you'll forgive me!! Let's just say it could be called Soak/ran....speak to you soon!!

Thai a knot in it punk

The train from Bankok to Chaing Mai
Mountain Jungle, or Jungle Mountains? From train
Bangkok park - traditional Thai dance
Reach for the sky punk, train to Chiang Mai
Dereck discusses calmly how exactly they lost his passport
Israeli Guest House, Hooligans, and Siam Sato in Bangkok

Jungle Huts, if you can see them

Thai'd up - first week

Well here we are in Thailand. It's only been a week or a little over, but man, what a week!

The Flight

Well Dereck was a lucky boy. We had a pretty obviously gay Thai flight attendant who for some reason decided to give Dereck his own row. So he seperated us and Deke got to stretch out and relax. The fellow never said boo to me, but Deke was getting a lot of special attention. So when we landed I got off the plane ahead of Deke, and as I heard him shouting on me saw his face....not a happy one. He'd lost his plane ticket. Our tickets are for all our flights for the whole trip. Not good! Especially when we found a sign that said we need our tickets to get our Visa for Thailand......bad news folks, bad news. So we tried to speak to a few people but no-one really knew how to sort out our problem. So I showed the Thai Airlines woman my ticket to help her understand that Derecks was lost......that's when his fell out of mine. I guess when they checked us in they gave them both to me. Man. Talk about stress.

Bangkok

We arrived in Bangkok and found a guest house that had a reasonable room rate, and was close to Khaosan road...which is one big street filled with shops and stalls. We met up with an English fellow named Ben who's hair put Xanders fro to shame...it was total bush. Anyways, Ben crashed on our floor as he couldn't get in touch with his mate in Bangkok. The first night we just wandered the streets and got a bite to eat. The next day we went to a Market with Ben and this Market was huge! The stuff they had for sale was crazy, crabs for eating, crabs for pets, snakes, fish, lizards, featherless parrots, beautiful carved wood furniture, millions of clothes and shoes, and it went on for miles!! After the market we just went for a bite to eat and met up with Ben's mate who is in Bangkok working on music. He's signed to the same album as the Scots Rockers Mogwai and was an interesting fellow. Ben and his mate sod off, and Dereck and I just chilled and had an early night.

Jake flew into Bangkok the next day so we got a room, and booked our train to got to Chiang Mai, as well as our Vietnam Visa's. Everything would be ready the next day. We went for a bite to eat on the street and I found this crazy wine type drink called Siam Sato. We all had about 3 of them and ended up completely wrecked. We decided to go see one of the shows if you know what I mean. All I'm going to say is that the Ping Pong was impressive. It was a pretty interesting night purely because none of us could believe how drunk we got off 3 bottles of that wine. The next day we just hung about the streets, went to a park where we saw a traditional Thai dance which was neat, and went back to get our passports. Ooops. They only had 2 of them. Mine and Jakes. We were getting the train at 8:00pm and it was now 6pm. Dereck wasn't going to have a passport. Oh man, can you say stress? He wasn't a happy Bunny that is a fact. They had promised to have his passport delivered to him in Chiang Mai.....but he wasn't too impressed, but then again there was bugger all he could do. We couldn't get into Vietnam without his passport, so we'd just need to wait and see how it went.

Chiang Mai
The train ride was intense. It was roasting hot and we were in pretty small sleeper cabins. I just kept sweating all night long. Didn't sleep that well to be honest. We woke in the morning to an incredible view. Rolling hills, spotted with jungle, and small wooden huts dotted along the way. We arrived in Chaing Mai and had met Mick, an Ozzie fellow who was happy to tag along with us and try and get some cheap accomodation. Enter Mama Honey! She pounced on us once we got off the train and promised us good accomodation, and good prices. So we jumped into her van along with about 6 other folk. To say it was tight in that van is an understatement. However we got to Chiang Mai Guesthouse which is Mama Honey's place, and we agreed it would do the trick, ordered food and booked ourselves up for a jungle Trek! The trek was leaving the next morning at 8:30. I went for a swim at Mama Honey's other guest house, and man that was some pool! Met a Canadian bloke named Justin, and had a good chat and agreed to meet up later on at my guesthouse after we had our jungle trek briefing around 6. Our guides name was Loh So or something like that, and there were about a dozen of us all said and done that were going on the trek. After the brief we went to a night market ate food, and a few of us went to a bar for a couple of beer.

The bar was in front of a big square with a boxing ring. Which was cool cuz we watched some Thai Kickboxing, sparring. It was good. Then things got a little weird. We ended up at a table with Thai Lady Boys. Justin wanted to speak to one of them, and so it was. Thai lady boys, are all woman up top, but all man down below...freaky stuff. Everyone had buggered off except for Justin, Fin a Scottish fellow (Grew up in England so has an English accent!) and myself. Justin wanted to stay and chat and Fin and I were ready to call it a night. That's when a bunch of topless ladyboys wandered by. Man, it was just weird, Justin insisted that I get my photo taken with him.....so yeah....Fin hasn't sent me the photo, so you may never see it...probably better that way. We headed back to Mama Honey's and hit the sack!

China cups make tea taste gooood

The Boys, chillin outside the Chinese pizza place (Ozzie Jake)
The Chinese Pizza Guy (Near Leo's)

China Alley
Life in Beijing Rusty Decostruction
Hard at work You want how much?
Untitled
Three musketeers (Jake, Me and Skeebie)
Tianamen Square
Noodleriffic
The reality
Terra Cotta Soldiers
Kids these days
Please the understanding?
The vastness of the Terra Cotta Army
Deke and Scotty at the soldiers domain
Enter the Dragon (Datong)
Help!
Hmm, nutitional value?
The hanging temple (Datong)
The Hanging Deke (Datong)
Eat it!
Chinese Bird
Kung Fu kick
A teple in the Summer Palace
Scott in the summer palace
Eat the scorpion, it's not wriggling any more
Leo's contingent
The Construction Passage is Cateful to Meet?
Skeebie goes dancing
Eat it!
Ten Rapid on the wall!
Scotty enters the matrix (I am not falling!)
The great wall
More unintelligable english
It really is great Beautiful, ignore the rucksack
Coen and Yaron
A moment in time
Incredible really

You've been framed!