We didn’t really know what this was, except it was pretty much why most people stopped in Vang Vieng when touring Laos, so we felt we had to give it a go. A steady stream of travellers coming the other way to us had been sporting T-shirts promoting the activity and were all only too keen to tell us to do it! We had had a little taster of what to expect from our Kayaking trip the day before, but we were totally unprepared for the fantastic day we were about to have.
We strolled to a warehouse in the town, and each signed out a tube. This was literally just an over inflated tractor tyre inner tube with a splash of white paint around it. Every tube came with the intriguing combination of an optional lifejacket, and a disclaimer to protect the tube hire operation if we hurt ourselves! Our tubes were promptly loaded onto the top of a Tuk Tuk and we were crammed in there too with Arthur, Yehel, Tony and along with several other tubers, we were among the first of the day to be driven to the start point.
We arrived and were greeted by pounding music coming from a ramshackle wooden waterfront shack which turned out to be a bar, promising us a free shot of the local whiskey with every drink purchased – it was only 11am at this point! Due to a few too many beerlaos the night before we grabbed a soft drink, but with the free spirits flowing the drinks didn’t stay soft for long! The bar’s main attraction was a huge rope swing, which was about 5m up and pointing out into the murky brown river. You climbed up a big tree, grabbed the swing from the platform, swung down and out and let go as late as you dared above the river. Gravity then took over and seconds later you found yourself very wet and being swept rapidly down the river to the next bar unless you swam to the bank or grabbed the lifeline the barman would throw at you. There was a sign at the bar saying the river had been dug out for our safety – I wasn’t too sure about safety as it looked rather high, but watched Rob and Yehel both throw themselves off it- much to their delight and the others on the deck watching. Then to our absolute surprise Arthur said he wanted a go. We had no doubt at this point that he was as hard as nails but we were still rather impressed that a man in his sixties was going to give it a go, especially considering he had a dodgy shoulder and had difficulty lifting his arm some days! But up he went and to the largest cheer of the day he swung out and made a perfect landing into the water! Next thing we knew he had climbed out of the water and was shinning up the tree to go again, but unfortunately this time he span in the air and hit the water hard, side first. When he climbed out of the water he was bruised up his leg and his whole entire side and chest. We quickly got him some ice and he decided that his swinging was over for the day, but he still wanted to continue down the river with us. Just after that who was to arrive but Jamie and Shawn ….. then Roald and Chris! We were all back together again! We looked at our watches and realised that we had spent over an hour at the bar and we hadn’t even done any tubing!
It was time to tube, so we went down to the riverbank, scrambled into our tubes and began floating down the river, holding onto each other and trying to steer in and out of the currents, it was harder than it looked to go where you wanted to! However we can’t have been in the water much longer than a couple of minutes when we happened across the next bar. More of the same, a simple wooden shack on legs sticking out over the river, blasting out the tunes, this one with a huge zip line instead of a swing but still plenty of free shots. Helpfully the bar staff threw out some ropes to haul us into the rocky bank. We greeted by a guy carrying a shot each for us, after that we got onto the platform of the bar. It was to my horror that I realised we’d seen the bar from kayaking the day before and this had the zip line that I had promised I was going to go on. One more shot later and Rob’s gentle persuasion I found myself at the top of the platform. I will be frank….. I was scared! I grabbed hold of Rob who then prised my fingers off him and moved them to the handle of the zip line. I stared down, then shut my eyes and held my breath and jumped…….
Thankfully I landed well and apparently made a good job of it. It was actually much more fun than I thought it would be and found myself jumping off once more. But then that was enough! We had a few drinks at the bar and then headed onto the next one. The next bar had a smaller version of the swing from the first bar and then next thing I know I had Rob in my ear again going - go on have a go – it’ll be fun…. Shaun was also being pestered my Jamie to go and he was just as nervous as me. After a while he was persuaded and went, and said he enjoyed it – so I didn’t really have much of a choice, and again I found myself at the top of the platform wishing I wasn’t there and I shut my eyes and went. This one was definitely scarier than the zip line, but again I came out the water and found myself buzzing. This one I did just the once though.
I’m sure you get the idea of what the rest of our day consisted of, floating a few minutes down the river to be hauled in by someone to have a few drinks and whatever other intoxicants were on offer, to watch Rob, Chris, Roald and Yehel throw themselves off what turned out to be increasingly larger and larger swings.
The largest swing however was the last swing, by this point we were if I’m honest – rather drunk…… There was no way I was going to throw myself off anything, but I looked up and there was Chris at the top of the platform throwing himself off! The platform was at least 6m high over the river. As soon as he came out of the water he was straight to Rob telling him that he had to go! (They had become swing buddies throughout the day) After some ummming and arrring Rob decided he had to go, and him and Chris ran up to the platform and I watched – nervous for them both. As I watched Rob grabbed the Zip line and Chris the swing and they both jumped together. It was at that point I realised that Rob was far braver (or stupid?) than I would ever be, as their combined efforts broke the swing and sent Chris crashing into the water with a nasty whiplash across his forearm!!!!
After one more bar with an impossibly even higher swing that must have nearly killed Chris and definitely put an end to Rob’s swinging activites for the day, we jumped in our tubes as apparently it was a bit of a float before we got to the finish point. We had no idea just how far it was going to be….. It was very relaxing just bobbing down the river, then we noticed it was starting to get dark….. and then it got darker and darker until it as pitch black! It was also beginning to get cold at this point, despite the beercoats we were wearing, so we were now eagerly awaiting the end. After floating for a mile or two longer we finally found the end point and climbed to safety on the gravely shore while fending off the small children trying to grab our tubes so they could return them to us for a small fee!
Thoroughly soaked we then staggered back through town to the tube depot where the owners were waiting for us. It turned out we were the last guys back and the second guys out that morning. We were suitably impressed with our tubing efforts and returned home for a long hot shower and even longer sleep…..
Wednesday, 30 September 2009
Tuesday, 15 September 2009
Kayaking in the Vang Vieng
After spending a few lovely days in Luang Prabang we decided to move on. Vang Vieng was to be our next stop, which was a half day journey by mini van. It was such a beautiful drive around jungle covered emerald mountains. However, that wasn’t the only thing that was many shades of green, poor old Rob didn’t get on with the very windy roads (one thing that can be said about coming from Mid Wales, you do get used to windy roads!!!) and changed all different colours throughout our trip.
Once we got there (at this point we had lost the rest of our group – all of us had booked different methods of getting to our destination) we booked into the most lovely of all our accommodation in SE Asia. It was a brand new wooden bungalow on stilts with fantastic bathroom and a lovely balcony with a large tree trunk wooden table, and a brand new mosquito net to boot!
About 10 mins after checking in who should we see but Roald and the rest of the group scoping out the same apartments! I soon discovered this as we travelled – you really do just keep bumping into the same people again and again and again. No need to plan meeting up – it will just happen. Unfortunately there were no rooms left in our complex so Roald and crew headed down the road.
We then met up with Athur and Yehel (by accident again!) and had a drink with them and Kat, Mags and Angelique (more boat people we met in Luang Prabang) and we decided to go on a day trip Kayaking down a part of the Mekong the next day.
We got to the start point of our day and were given our 2 man canoes and told we had to paddle straight across the river as we were going to look at a cave and a temple first. Me and Rob jumped into our canoe and paddled off and much to our pleasure got across very successfully while watching others being carried off down the river with the instructor yelling ‘KEEP PADDLING!!!’ Once we were all safely on dry land again, we walked for about 20 mins until we got to a cave. The entrance to the cave was mostly under water, and we were all issued with tractor tyre inner tubes. We were also given a head torch which resembled a primary school basic circuitry lesson (literary just a bulb on elastic attached to a little car battery type thing with the battery having a piece of string tied to it so you could hang it round your neck and to turn the torch on and off you simply screwed or unscrewed the bulb!) After putting the head gear on, we had to put the inner tube into the water, jump into the middle of the tube and then grab a rope which was tied from the bank and led into the darkness of the cave…..
So in a line with the rest of the group, instructor either side of us we pulled ourselves into the cave. (I was a little nervous as my last caving experience did not go too well and ended up with me getting lost and loosing the group – I figured it would be extremely bad luck for this to happen twice!!) Once in it was fantastic. The temperature dropped and the walls remained tight in, but you could see and touch all the droplets on the ceiling and the water was a wonderful green colour. The further we pulled ourselves in, ducking for the occasional ceiling obstacle the darker and darker it got, we eventually hit land again and following the guide we crawled through slippery warm mud, stones and a stream to find a large cave which had lots of the stalactites and mites. The highlight of the caves had to be the bats. It started with just one, a blur in corner of the eye and a thought of “did I see that?” Then there were too many not be sure. They flew really close – hurtling around and between us then back into the darkness with faint flaps and squeaks. That was when the realisation hit us though; it was not mud we were crawling through after all, just a rather large mound of bat shit! Back in our tubes we floated back to the river and our start point at the bank. We washed our thoroughly exfoliated hands and knees in the river and sat at the dinner table, wet and happy!
After a very tasty lunch of BBQ skewers and rice we walked to a temple. This temple was where many of the locals went to pray, and also had a goddess of fertility and a god of wealth. The thing that was special about this temple though was it was built inside of the cave, and on the left side of the cave there was a natural feature which looked (if you looked very hard…I’ll let you look at the photographs – might depend on how much acid you have taken….) like an elephant. Strikingly, the temple bell was made from one of the many bomb shells left from the Vietnam war.
After the temple it was back to the canoes. The scenery was lovely down the river and there were a few gentle rapids to give us a little rest and a good splash along the way. We headed down the river with me and Rob increasingly discovering that we had not yet mastered the technique. We probably canoed twice the distance of many of the others, and a few sharp words were exchanged at times!!! But it was fun nevertheless, and just before our end point we stopped at a riverside bar that was set up for the river tubing (will explain more in the next entry) It had a bar, but also a rope swing way out into the water and a tug of war mud pit. I watched as Rob and Yehel and a new found friend from the trip called Tony threw themselves from the 5m high platform down into the water. I watched and then promised on the tubing the next day I would do it – hoping everyone would forget – how wrong I was…….
It was a great taste of the next day’s activities. It was then time to do the last half hour of canoeing. We had been going for a couple of hours before our stop so my arms were quite tired by the time we finished, but to our delight our stop point was less than a 5 minute walk from our bungalow, so we took ourselves off for a well earned warm shower
Once we got there (at this point we had lost the rest of our group – all of us had booked different methods of getting to our destination) we booked into the most lovely of all our accommodation in SE Asia. It was a brand new wooden bungalow on stilts with fantastic bathroom and a lovely balcony with a large tree trunk wooden table, and a brand new mosquito net to boot!
About 10 mins after checking in who should we see but Roald and the rest of the group scoping out the same apartments! I soon discovered this as we travelled – you really do just keep bumping into the same people again and again and again. No need to plan meeting up – it will just happen. Unfortunately there were no rooms left in our complex so Roald and crew headed down the road.
We then met up with Athur and Yehel (by accident again!) and had a drink with them and Kat, Mags and Angelique (more boat people we met in Luang Prabang) and we decided to go on a day trip Kayaking down a part of the Mekong the next day.
We got to the start point of our day and were given our 2 man canoes and told we had to paddle straight across the river as we were going to look at a cave and a temple first. Me and Rob jumped into our canoe and paddled off and much to our pleasure got across very successfully while watching others being carried off down the river with the instructor yelling ‘KEEP PADDLING!!!’ Once we were all safely on dry land again, we walked for about 20 mins until we got to a cave. The entrance to the cave was mostly under water, and we were all issued with tractor tyre inner tubes. We were also given a head torch which resembled a primary school basic circuitry lesson (literary just a bulb on elastic attached to a little car battery type thing with the battery having a piece of string tied to it so you could hang it round your neck and to turn the torch on and off you simply screwed or unscrewed the bulb!) After putting the head gear on, we had to put the inner tube into the water, jump into the middle of the tube and then grab a rope which was tied from the bank and led into the darkness of the cave…..
So in a line with the rest of the group, instructor either side of us we pulled ourselves into the cave. (I was a little nervous as my last caving experience did not go too well and ended up with me getting lost and loosing the group – I figured it would be extremely bad luck for this to happen twice!!) Once in it was fantastic. The temperature dropped and the walls remained tight in, but you could see and touch all the droplets on the ceiling and the water was a wonderful green colour. The further we pulled ourselves in, ducking for the occasional ceiling obstacle the darker and darker it got, we eventually hit land again and following the guide we crawled through slippery warm mud, stones and a stream to find a large cave which had lots of the stalactites and mites. The highlight of the caves had to be the bats. It started with just one, a blur in corner of the eye and a thought of “did I see that?” Then there were too many not be sure. They flew really close – hurtling around and between us then back into the darkness with faint flaps and squeaks. That was when the realisation hit us though; it was not mud we were crawling through after all, just a rather large mound of bat shit! Back in our tubes we floated back to the river and our start point at the bank. We washed our thoroughly exfoliated hands and knees in the river and sat at the dinner table, wet and happy!
After a very tasty lunch of BBQ skewers and rice we walked to a temple. This temple was where many of the locals went to pray, and also had a goddess of fertility and a god of wealth. The thing that was special about this temple though was it was built inside of the cave, and on the left side of the cave there was a natural feature which looked (if you looked very hard…I’ll let you look at the photographs – might depend on how much acid you have taken….) like an elephant. Strikingly, the temple bell was made from one of the many bomb shells left from the Vietnam war.
After the temple it was back to the canoes. The scenery was lovely down the river and there were a few gentle rapids to give us a little rest and a good splash along the way. We headed down the river with me and Rob increasingly discovering that we had not yet mastered the technique. We probably canoed twice the distance of many of the others, and a few sharp words were exchanged at times!!! But it was fun nevertheless, and just before our end point we stopped at a riverside bar that was set up for the river tubing (will explain more in the next entry) It had a bar, but also a rope swing way out into the water and a tug of war mud pit. I watched as Rob and Yehel and a new found friend from the trip called Tony threw themselves from the 5m high platform down into the water. I watched and then promised on the tubing the next day I would do it – hoping everyone would forget – how wrong I was…….
It was a great taste of the next day’s activities. It was then time to do the last half hour of canoeing. We had been going for a couple of hours before our stop so my arms were quite tired by the time we finished, but to our delight our stop point was less than a 5 minute walk from our bungalow, so we took ourselves off for a well earned warm shower
Wednesday, 9 September 2009
Wonderful Waterfalls
We had decided at the bowling that we would meet the following morning and take a trip to check out the waterfalls that were close to Luang Prabang, but except for a little write up in the Lonely Planet and the hoards of tuk tuk drivers constantly asking us if we would like a lift there we knew very little about it.
So, anything but bright and early we met the next morning and there was a few new boat people to add to our group. Two dutch girls and Sean and Jamie from Miami who we’d met at the bowling. Plus a mysterious short, tanned and bald man; seemingly no-one knew who he was, where he came from or how he had heard about our meeting. He just sat outside our hotel waiting for our uncoordinated, hungover group to assemble while moaning all the time in a German accent about how slow we were to get ready and go. It turned out that his name was Martin and he was a troubled man. Waterfalls were his crack and he was in deep withdrawal. Seeing as he professed to know an awful lot about our daytrip destination, we let him sort out the tuk tuk driver and before we knew it we were on the 30km journey to the waterfalls. When we arrived we had to pay an entrance fee of 20000 kip each (about £2) this seemed a little expensive but we were told it was well worth it – so paid up and strolled into the park. A short walk later, much to our surprise we found there was a bear sanctuary, it was a great set up for the bears with a large amount of space and lots of things for them to climb, hang from and lie on (there was a bear hammock which one bear looked incredibly comfortable in). It was a conservation and rescue project as many of these black bears had been rescued from places where their habit was being destroyed or where they were being farmed for their bile (it apparently has many uses in Chinese medicine and is sold on the black market). The eventual aim was to try and put as many of the bears back in the wild but unfortunately this was not always possible with the farmed ones. After some bear spotting and seeing a few rather large and scary looking spiders hanging on the fence we continued further into the park.
The first part which was quite short just felt like walking through woodland. We then came to a clearing where we saw the most beautiful natural limestone pools. They were light yellow limestone and the water within them was a most wonderful turquoise blue. The first pool we saw had a rope swing tied to the tree which dangled over the water, and there was a 4m ish waterfall cascading down into it. It was so perfect looking it was hard to believe what we were looking at was completely natural. We all wanted to jump straight into this pool, but were told that was just the start, and our mysterious guide led us up a flight of wooden stairs to the side of the pool. We passed a few more pools that according to the signs were ‘don’t swimming areas’ and then we were back into wood land but could hear the running water. We climbed for a while which was hard work in the heat and then about half way up the flight of stairs we were led off, it didn’t look like a track at all, but we followed. The next challenge was climbing a load of rocks. Some of it had a small amount of water flowing over it other bit were completely dry, they were however all steep and like most of the other rock in the part were these smooth limestone formations. We all battled and pushed and pulled each other up the slimy stone and eventually got to the top where we were then led through a small amount of standing water surrounded by trees with very slippery rocks underneath. I had begun to hope all this effort was going to be worth it. I wasn’t disappointed, and nor was any of the rest of the group, when we finally got to the clearing we saw one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. We were at a pool which was one tier down from the top of what must have been a 8 or 9 tiered waterfall. This first tier was stunning, about 5m in diameter with a waterfall based in the middle and then many points horseshoed around the pool from which you could jump or dive off into the pool. The other fantastic thing about it was once in the pool you could swim to the very edge of the tier and look down and see all the other equally beautiful but not as large tiers stepped below. The water in the pool was very still just filling up and then cascading down, so you could sit on the edge very easily and take in the view. It felt like we were in a theme park, it was just so perfectly designed for swimming and jumping into and the colours were so vivid it just didn’t feel real. And no safety barriers either, to look down the main waterfall drop from the edge of the swimming pool was quite exhilarating! It was such a wonderful natural feature. I did a few very small jumps of 1 or 2m while Rob and some of the other members of the group did some 6 or 7m ones. Once we had swam for a little bit, and relaxed we actually began to get a little cold as the water was surprisingly not very warm, we decided to head back down towards the bottom and check out the pool with the rope swing. As we descended down the other side (we were back in woodland now) it became increasingly steep and soon the group was split up. As we knew very little about where we were going I had worn my flip flops. It was definitely not the right footwear for the occasion and soon I had taken them off and Rob was helping me slowly navigate the way down the slope. Once at the bottom we soon realised that the others had stopped on one of the middle tiers! There was no way we were going to climb back up there and meet them so we stayed at the bottom and waited for them to make their way down.
When we were reunited again as a group we headed towards the first pool we had seen that day with the rope swing. I spent some time watching several people including Rob fling themselves into the water using the rope swing and one thai girl (from another group of tourists) who once she had swung into the middle of the pool lost the bottle to let go and rather painfully crash back into the tree with a chorus of oooooo owwwww and general “that must have hurt!” murmurings from the crowd of people watching.
Then Rob swum up to me and suggested we jumped from the waterfall feeding the pool. It was about 3 or 4m tall and certainly the highest thing I had ever thrown myself from and although nervous I agreed to Rob’s suggestion and moments later I found myself at the top of the waterfall cutting the circulation from Rob’s hand wishing I had never agreed. He counted to three and I shut my eyes and took a massive jump. Moments later I hit the water, I surfaced with the adrenaline pumping slightly shocked at the fact I had just done it and a beaming smile from Rob. It was frightening but great fun – and a cool way of concluding the day at the waterfall.
We jumped back into the tuk tuk and just outside of town our Germanic guide jumped off and vanished into the distance, to sit and wait for his next group of tourists and waterfall fix. Just as mysteriously as he had arrived he left us – but he showed us some great things we would never had found without him.
We got dropped off at the hotel and I popped into the bathroom for a shower when stuck to wall before me was one of the large black and spiky spiders we saw hanging from the fence at the bear sanctuary. I adopted girly mode and let out a scream and ran to Rob to take his manly duty and sort it out, a quick flip flop movement later and the spider was a squashed ball on the floor, I asked Rob if he was sure if it was dead, and he showed me the 4 or so legs that had been left on the wall which helped convince me! I suppose going just over 4 weeks with out a creepy crawly encounter like this was not bad going?
So, anything but bright and early we met the next morning and there was a few new boat people to add to our group. Two dutch girls and Sean and Jamie from Miami who we’d met at the bowling. Plus a mysterious short, tanned and bald man; seemingly no-one knew who he was, where he came from or how he had heard about our meeting. He just sat outside our hotel waiting for our uncoordinated, hungover group to assemble while moaning all the time in a German accent about how slow we were to get ready and go. It turned out that his name was Martin and he was a troubled man. Waterfalls were his crack and he was in deep withdrawal. Seeing as he professed to know an awful lot about our daytrip destination, we let him sort out the tuk tuk driver and before we knew it we were on the 30km journey to the waterfalls. When we arrived we had to pay an entrance fee of 20000 kip each (about £2) this seemed a little expensive but we were told it was well worth it – so paid up and strolled into the park. A short walk later, much to our surprise we found there was a bear sanctuary, it was a great set up for the bears with a large amount of space and lots of things for them to climb, hang from and lie on (there was a bear hammock which one bear looked incredibly comfortable in). It was a conservation and rescue project as many of these black bears had been rescued from places where their habit was being destroyed or where they were being farmed for their bile (it apparently has many uses in Chinese medicine and is sold on the black market). The eventual aim was to try and put as many of the bears back in the wild but unfortunately this was not always possible with the farmed ones. After some bear spotting and seeing a few rather large and scary looking spiders hanging on the fence we continued further into the park.
The first part which was quite short just felt like walking through woodland. We then came to a clearing where we saw the most beautiful natural limestone pools. They were light yellow limestone and the water within them was a most wonderful turquoise blue. The first pool we saw had a rope swing tied to the tree which dangled over the water, and there was a 4m ish waterfall cascading down into it. It was so perfect looking it was hard to believe what we were looking at was completely natural. We all wanted to jump straight into this pool, but were told that was just the start, and our mysterious guide led us up a flight of wooden stairs to the side of the pool. We passed a few more pools that according to the signs were ‘don’t swimming areas’ and then we were back into wood land but could hear the running water. We climbed for a while which was hard work in the heat and then about half way up the flight of stairs we were led off, it didn’t look like a track at all, but we followed. The next challenge was climbing a load of rocks. Some of it had a small amount of water flowing over it other bit were completely dry, they were however all steep and like most of the other rock in the part were these smooth limestone formations. We all battled and pushed and pulled each other up the slimy stone and eventually got to the top where we were then led through a small amount of standing water surrounded by trees with very slippery rocks underneath. I had begun to hope all this effort was going to be worth it. I wasn’t disappointed, and nor was any of the rest of the group, when we finally got to the clearing we saw one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. We were at a pool which was one tier down from the top of what must have been a 8 or 9 tiered waterfall. This first tier was stunning, about 5m in diameter with a waterfall based in the middle and then many points horseshoed around the pool from which you could jump or dive off into the pool. The other fantastic thing about it was once in the pool you could swim to the very edge of the tier and look down and see all the other equally beautiful but not as large tiers stepped below. The water in the pool was very still just filling up and then cascading down, so you could sit on the edge very easily and take in the view. It felt like we were in a theme park, it was just so perfectly designed for swimming and jumping into and the colours were so vivid it just didn’t feel real. And no safety barriers either, to look down the main waterfall drop from the edge of the swimming pool was quite exhilarating! It was such a wonderful natural feature. I did a few very small jumps of 1 or 2m while Rob and some of the other members of the group did some 6 or 7m ones. Once we had swam for a little bit, and relaxed we actually began to get a little cold as the water was surprisingly not very warm, we decided to head back down towards the bottom and check out the pool with the rope swing. As we descended down the other side (we were back in woodland now) it became increasingly steep and soon the group was split up. As we knew very little about where we were going I had worn my flip flops. It was definitely not the right footwear for the occasion and soon I had taken them off and Rob was helping me slowly navigate the way down the slope. Once at the bottom we soon realised that the others had stopped on one of the middle tiers! There was no way we were going to climb back up there and meet them so we stayed at the bottom and waited for them to make their way down.
When we were reunited again as a group we headed towards the first pool we had seen that day with the rope swing. I spent some time watching several people including Rob fling themselves into the water using the rope swing and one thai girl (from another group of tourists) who once she had swung into the middle of the pool lost the bottle to let go and rather painfully crash back into the tree with a chorus of oooooo owwwww and general “that must have hurt!” murmurings from the crowd of people watching.
Then Rob swum up to me and suggested we jumped from the waterfall feeding the pool. It was about 3 or 4m tall and certainly the highest thing I had ever thrown myself from and although nervous I agreed to Rob’s suggestion and moments later I found myself at the top of the waterfall cutting the circulation from Rob’s hand wishing I had never agreed. He counted to three and I shut my eyes and took a massive jump. Moments later I hit the water, I surfaced with the adrenaline pumping slightly shocked at the fact I had just done it and a beaming smile from Rob. It was frightening but great fun – and a cool way of concluding the day at the waterfall.
We jumped back into the tuk tuk and just outside of town our Germanic guide jumped off and vanished into the distance, to sit and wait for his next group of tourists and waterfall fix. Just as mysteriously as he had arrived he left us – but he showed us some great things we would never had found without him.
We got dropped off at the hotel and I popped into the bathroom for a shower when stuck to wall before me was one of the large black and spiky spiders we saw hanging from the fence at the bear sanctuary. I adopted girly mode and let out a scream and ran to Rob to take his manly duty and sort it out, a quick flip flop movement later and the spider was a squashed ball on the floor, I asked Rob if he was sure if it was dead, and he showed me the 4 or so legs that had been left on the wall which helped convince me! I suppose going just over 4 weeks with out a creepy crawly encounter like this was not bad going?
Luang Prabang – Cycling - and of all things - ten pin bowling!!
After disembarking the slowboat and ignoring the onslaught of touts (we were becoming more and more accustomed to this – and beginning to get good at ignoring it without feeling rude) we headed for a hostel that had been recommended by one of the girls on the boat, unfortunately it was full so we headed back down the street in search of another place. We met a tout who was cruising on his bike looking for travellers fresh off the boat. Soon after we jumped on a tuk tuk heading for his hotel, and lucky for us it turned out to be a nice cheap room – I think we ended up paying a whole £4 a night! Sharing our hotel were Roald, Chris and Arthur, and an Israeli girl called Yahel (who Roald and Chris had met on the boat). Once settled in we decided to go for a curry (Indian rather than Laos!) and just after we arrived more and more travellers began to join us, by the end of the evening there were more than 20 ‘boat people’ at our table! The curry was ok but as we were discovering, unlike their neighbours in Thailand, Lao chefs were not very good at making food spicy in any cuisine or context even if you specifically asked for it.
After the meal we decided to go and explore the town by night. We quickly came across the night market, and to Rob’s horror I dived into the many rows of stalls containing many ‘shiny things’ of handmade jewellery, scarves, clothes, cloths and other handicrafts. It was defiantly a market for the tourists but I loved it, and soon (well not so soon – poor old Rob looked bored to tears!!!) came out with earrings, scarves and a pair of trousers
Next day after some breakfast at café down the road – which had a balcony which over looked the Mekong, an over friendly cat who finished our breakfast for us, and a kitten who looked like it belonged on a black and white Athena poster. We decided to explore the town by bicycle. Luang Prabang actually is quite a small town with a population of just under 26,000 but it a Manchester size city by Laos standards! It is incredibly picturesque with a mainly traditional French architecture with a handful of beautiful Buddhist Wats thrown in for good measure. To top all of this is the fact that the whole town is surrounded by large imposing mountains covered in many hues of unspoilt green jungle.
So we jumped on our bikes, joining us was Chris, Arthur, Yehel and an American called Brian who our friends had met on the slow boat the day before. After getting our bearings by getting lost and finding a rather if I’m honest rubbish temple (maybe I’m getting fussy now!) we eventually found Wat Xieng Thong which is Luang’s most magnificent (quoting the Book of Lies – aka the Lonely Planet) temple. This actually turned out to be true and it was indeed beautiful and while it wasn’t as large or as imposing as some of the Thai temples it had all the charm and the same feeling of religious importance. The temple was surrounded by several other buildings which was then enclosed by a large wall with several carved gate entrances. Two of the most impressive things were the Tree of Life mosaic on the back of one of the temples and a 12m high funeral chariot which was housed in one of the smaller temples on the complex, the chariot was surrounded by tens of Buddhist statues of all different shapes and sizes.
Once we had explored the complex we jumped back on our bikes and decided to go for another explore – a bit off the beaten track of the Lonely Planet. After getting to the outskirts of town and heading over a small bridge and finally down a dirt track for half an hour (which was an interesting ride as by this stage Yehel was loosing her chain everytime she hit a bump and I had no brakes - I went back to the old school bmx foot braking method) we found a small settlement which had a local shop, a few houses and a bar / pool house. The bar was an open fronted open plan room with just enough room for 2 pool tables and a tall fridge of beer inside. It was a very simple wooden building but the local men seemed to love it! I guess it did have everything they needed…………….
Although it was mid week, mid afternoon the bar was full of local men crowded round the pool tables watching, giving tips and playing. (In Lao culture the women do all the work, run the home, and also work in all the offices and shops while the men are seen to be the ones in charge – but it was fairly obvious that women ran the show too!) They looked slightly bemused to see us but made us feel welcome by clearing one of the tables for us so we could play. So we grabbed a cold Beer Lao and had a few games of pool. It was fantastic find as Luang although beautiful is quite touristy so it was lovely to find a local spot. After soaking up the atmosphere and in my case playing pool badly we jumped back on our bikes and headed back into town.
We met up later in a bar and had a couple drinks, when it came time at the bar Roald said he had heard of a place everyone goes when the pubs shut that was just out of town. It was a ten pin bowling place, so we thought we’d head there. We jumped in a tuk tuk and 10 minutes later we were there. It was a bowling alley consisting of about 10 lanes and the place was packed of people bowling and drinking – it was indeed the place to be after hours! The crowd was a very mixed one of locals and tourists so the atmosphere was fantastic. Very relaxed but frenetic. We booked a couple of lanes and soon enough we were playing. There were no bowling shoes so you had to do it barefoot, we soon discovered why most places give you shoes – pretty much all of us ending up falling over as we were bowling at some point!
It was great fun though and to Rob’s excitement the lane had a speed monitor on it so very soon a game of speed bowling was instigated, where it didn’t matter how may pins you hit just how fast the ball was travelling! Much more beer and laugher later we left. It seemed to be a very bizarre thing to be doing in what is pretty rural and poor part of SE Asia but a fun night nevertheless and a good way to escape the curfew that winds up the bars in town too early!
After the meal we decided to go and explore the town by night. We quickly came across the night market, and to Rob’s horror I dived into the many rows of stalls containing many ‘shiny things’ of handmade jewellery, scarves, clothes, cloths and other handicrafts. It was defiantly a market for the tourists but I loved it, and soon (well not so soon – poor old Rob looked bored to tears!!!) came out with earrings, scarves and a pair of trousers
Next day after some breakfast at café down the road – which had a balcony which over looked the Mekong, an over friendly cat who finished our breakfast for us, and a kitten who looked like it belonged on a black and white Athena poster. We decided to explore the town by bicycle. Luang Prabang actually is quite a small town with a population of just under 26,000 but it a Manchester size city by Laos standards! It is incredibly picturesque with a mainly traditional French architecture with a handful of beautiful Buddhist Wats thrown in for good measure. To top all of this is the fact that the whole town is surrounded by large imposing mountains covered in many hues of unspoilt green jungle.
So we jumped on our bikes, joining us was Chris, Arthur, Yehel and an American called Brian who our friends had met on the slow boat the day before. After getting our bearings by getting lost and finding a rather if I’m honest rubbish temple (maybe I’m getting fussy now!) we eventually found Wat Xieng Thong which is Luang’s most magnificent (quoting the Book of Lies – aka the Lonely Planet) temple. This actually turned out to be true and it was indeed beautiful and while it wasn’t as large or as imposing as some of the Thai temples it had all the charm and the same feeling of religious importance. The temple was surrounded by several other buildings which was then enclosed by a large wall with several carved gate entrances. Two of the most impressive things were the Tree of Life mosaic on the back of one of the temples and a 12m high funeral chariot which was housed in one of the smaller temples on the complex, the chariot was surrounded by tens of Buddhist statues of all different shapes and sizes.
Once we had explored the complex we jumped back on our bikes and decided to go for another explore – a bit off the beaten track of the Lonely Planet. After getting to the outskirts of town and heading over a small bridge and finally down a dirt track for half an hour (which was an interesting ride as by this stage Yehel was loosing her chain everytime she hit a bump and I had no brakes - I went back to the old school bmx foot braking method) we found a small settlement which had a local shop, a few houses and a bar / pool house. The bar was an open fronted open plan room with just enough room for 2 pool tables and a tall fridge of beer inside. It was a very simple wooden building but the local men seemed to love it! I guess it did have everything they needed…………….
Although it was mid week, mid afternoon the bar was full of local men crowded round the pool tables watching, giving tips and playing. (In Lao culture the women do all the work, run the home, and also work in all the offices and shops while the men are seen to be the ones in charge – but it was fairly obvious that women ran the show too!) They looked slightly bemused to see us but made us feel welcome by clearing one of the tables for us so we could play. So we grabbed a cold Beer Lao and had a few games of pool. It was fantastic find as Luang although beautiful is quite touristy so it was lovely to find a local spot. After soaking up the atmosphere and in my case playing pool badly we jumped back on our bikes and headed back into town.
We met up later in a bar and had a couple drinks, when it came time at the bar Roald said he had heard of a place everyone goes when the pubs shut that was just out of town. It was a ten pin bowling place, so we thought we’d head there. We jumped in a tuk tuk and 10 minutes later we were there. It was a bowling alley consisting of about 10 lanes and the place was packed of people bowling and drinking – it was indeed the place to be after hours! The crowd was a very mixed one of locals and tourists so the atmosphere was fantastic. Very relaxed but frenetic. We booked a couple of lanes and soon enough we were playing. There were no bowling shoes so you had to do it barefoot, we soon discovered why most places give you shoes – pretty much all of us ending up falling over as we were bowling at some point!
It was great fun though and to Rob’s excitement the lane had a speed monitor on it so very soon a game of speed bowling was instigated, where it didn’t matter how may pins you hit just how fast the ball was travelling! Much more beer and laugher later we left. It seemed to be a very bizarre thing to be doing in what is pretty rural and poor part of SE Asia but a fun night nevertheless and a good way to escape the curfew that winds up the bars in town too early!
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