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2nd January saw us fall for another minor travel scam as we booked the 'special air-conditioned tourist' coach across the border from Hue in Vietnam to Savannakhet in Laos. Transpires it was a series of journeys on local buses for which the locals pay a lot less than we mugs did! And we thought we were becoming travelwise! In any event we consoled ourselves with the notion that we were supporting local enterprise and the views across the border into Laos are wonderful.

Laos, (apparently misnamed by the French, as it should be 'Lao'), is a warm, sleepy backwater in SE Asia. Which belies the fact that it was the most bombed country in history! More bombs were dropped on Laos by the Americans than the whole of Europe received in the second world war. The Americans were spending over 2 million dollars every day to bomb the place! All this was kept very quiet at the time as the U.S. had made an agreement not to bomb over the border from Vietnam, either in Laos or Cambodia. The communists in North Vietnam were using the Ho Chi Minh Trail through the jungles and mountains, just over the border in Laos, to ferry arms, supplies and soldiers to the war effort in South Vietnam, and it was this the Americans were targetting. Following the communist victory in Vietnam, and following a war with the royalists in Laos the communists took power in Laos. And so it has remained.

We arrived in Savannakhet and only stayed one night as our guesthouse was not clean and the town wasn't offering much. The next day we took a local bus (a conscious decision) to Pakse. We arrived as the sun was setting over the mountains. Pakse is quite a big place in a lovely location, surrounded by rivers, mountains and plateaux. We stayed at Pakse Hotel run by a very helpful and friendly Frenchman who volunteers to speak English. We settle, as it's clean and has a good restaurant with Rothschild's wine! For a couple of quid you can buy a delicious peppered steak with french fries and salad!

When travelling one becomes a bit obsessed with the cleanliness of each sleeping establishment. Although we have noticed our criteria for choosing somewhere to stay has become evermore extensive and sophisticated! For Denise it must be spotless with no nasty smells (drains can be a problem out here); the room must be large with windows and plenty of light and preferably with twin beds (we need space from each other!); there must be no restaurant/bar/club underneath creating late night noise; for Gerry it must have satellite TV with as many channels as possible and an attached French restaurant doesn't go amiss! In general it must always have air-conditioning and attached bathroom with shower (and for Denise ideally a bath to soak in). Oh, and it has to be cheap!

So to the title 'Irrawaddy dolphins'. On the border with Cambodia in the Mekong River there are a group of very rare freshwater Irrawaddy dolphins (the name comes from the Irrawaddy River in Burma where they can also be found). So we hired a pick-up truck and driver for the day and went in search of the elusive beasties. It was about 150 miles to the border and the river. We arrived somewhat stupidly in the middle of the day so we had to wait around until late afternoon when they start to appear. We sat down in a hut, masquerading as a cafe, and bought a drink hoping to spin out a few hours in the shade. Not long after that a French couple and an Italian woman (who spoke very good French and English but kept getting them muddled up) came in, then a mature German lady. The French couple and the Italian woman became distressed when they discovered that they could not get back into Cambodia (from whence they had came)from this border crossing as their visas had expired when they had exited and they had not bought new ones. A long drawn-out drama ensued with bribes being offered, frantic phone calls, umpteen suggestions from us and all and sundry, and the German lady very helpfully translating from French to English and vice versa (these Germans are frightfully clever!). The United Nations has never worked so well! In the end the Cambodians refused all bribes (who said the Cambodians are corrupt?), and the poor things had to return to Pakse (150 miles) and pick up a overnight bus to the capital, Vientiane (400miles) to try and get a visa the next day!

After such a cafuffle the time had quickly passed and we hopped on a wee boat, at some considerable expense, to explore the inner reaches of the Mekong. After 5 minutes we were dropped on a titchy island occupied solely by a dozen other intrepid white explorers, a policeman (who had a sideline in selling cold beers) who dutifully noted in a jotter that two more visitors had arrived, a tied-up monkey, and several locals who lay in hammocks and teased the monkey. This was the look-out post for the dolphins. Sure enough after a little while one or two dolphins surfaced briefly. The other tourists eventually left and we waited until sunset, spotting maybe about 6 dolphins who surfaced fairly regularly. Although we couldn't see the whole dolphin clearly it was exciting nonetheless, especially in such a beautiful location. The local fishermen think of these dolphins as sacred and if one dies it will be cremated with a religious ceremony to boot. In one village the dolphins are known to aid the fishermen by driving fish towards their nets.

On the way back we stopped off at the largest (by volume) waterfall in SE Asia, Khon Phapheng, quite dramatic.

I (Gerry) spent a night with my friend I met at a conference in Thailand. His village is a curious mix of 6 ethnic minorities and not a few pigs and chickens. I slept in his one room shack with attached latrine with the family of 6 and a friendly family of mice. I awoke at 4am with the shack full of smoke as the wife prepared a cooked breakfast over a charcoal stove in the same room! We had a jolly evening as I bought a pig and three chickens to be slaughtered for dinner, and half the village turned up!

We flew from Pakse to Vientiane, the capital, where we spent a few days before flying to Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam.




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