Blogs from Vang Vieng, West, Laos, Asia

Party Town! I floated through a limestone cave on a tube and kayaked down the river with a group. The river is surrounded by huge jagged, black karsts and beautiful mountains and forests. The second day we floated down the river on tubes. Bars line the 3km strip on the river, all with loud pumping western music, huge slides, rope swings and flying foxes (all of which I had a go at). They all had westerners working at them chatting, dancing, raving and throwing out waterbottles to pull you in. There was over 120 different guesthouses all with hundreds of rooms in town as well as heaps of restaurants to choose from. But the real choice came in what episode of family guy, friends and southpark was playing at each one. Once this important decision was ... read more

Jaja mijn blog is bijna weer up to date! Van Vientiane zijn we naar Vang Vieng gegaan. Wie Vang Vieng zegt, zegt ook tubing! Ook is het een echte party place. Ondanks dat ik niks had verwacht van Vang Vieng was de natuur hier weer super, dus het is meer dan alleen een party place! Omdat de brommers erg goed bevielen hebben we hier weer een "loop" gereden. Eerst stop was de blue lagoon! Yesss lekker springen uit een boom en lekker zwemmen! Bij de blue lagoon is ook een mooie grot dus die ook weer bekeken. Pittige grot om door heen te lopen dus Victoria is drie keer gevallen en die dag had ze ook al haar been verbrand tegen de uitlaat. Dus daarna ging zij weer richting het guesthouse en ik heb de loop ... read more

So the last time i wrote i was in Hoi an and it was the night before Bruisers Birthday! We all went out for a nice meal and his parent paid as a brithday treat which was nice :) we ended up getting wasted!! bruiser was sick all over the floor in the bar below, however did manage to get a birthday motorboat from sammy and elle. The next day it was bruisers actual birthday, sam and ellie left to go onto kuala lumpa and austraila. We went to the bar at about midday for breakfast and started drinking. Here we lasted until 6ish - the beer was less than 9p and therefore the whole day drinking for all of us i think came to about £15!! We then went in the pool, me and adam ... read more

After returning from the Gibbon Experience in Huay Xai we took a nightbus from there to Luang Prabang. We got there early morning after an okayish journey and found a nice guesthouse. Our room was big and we had a lovely balcony. Luang Prabang is a really pretty town with loads of nice restaurants and cafes. It's on the Mekong and you can walk down to the shore (no sunbathing!). We wondered around town, got splashed with water (run up to the New Year's celebrations) and found a lovely little cafe which does home made ice cream. They also have nice wine and delicious looking salads. We decided to go there for dinner, as especially I have been craving salads after 3.5 months in Asia. This little cafe was quite a walk away from our guesthouse. ... read more

Long before getting to Vang Vieng, I was hearing stories about Vang Vieng. I had heard stories about other places too, but the Vang Vieng stories were unique as they revolved around the (in)famous tubing pub crawl. I was excited to experience it, although I never planned to go all out as I'm a firm believer that drunkennes and water are a recipe for disaster, especially if you are as accident prone as I am. So when I arrived in Vang Vieng and learned that there was so much more to do that tubing I was pleasantly surprised. While the tubing was fun, and I will never forget it, I think that the other experiences that I had while in Vang Vieng are what made the town so memorable. Everything in Vang Vieng is about the ... read more

After all its hype, after all the stories it was time for me to take on the infamous party destination of Vang Vieng, Laos. A place where not only rules do not exist, but either do morals, care or even acknowledgment of safety, and seemingly for some; limits. This place has drawn more media attention through recent years than almost any other party hub in the world. At the epicentre of this pandemonium is a notorious pastime called tubing. Before Vang Vieng I spent a week on one of the glorious 4000 Islands of Si Phan Don called Don Det. It was the epitome of a relaxing hideaway. My brand new bungalow hung from a steep but brief cliff over the river and looked apon endless clusters of flourishing atolls. Days flowed from one to the ... read more

23rd December We were up early for, yep you guessed it another long bus journey!! Off to Laos’ capital City Vientiane! We made sure we got to the bus station nice and early, no idea why we did this we really should know by now that buses in Laos don’t leave on time! We managed not to get conned into buying a ticket for a “V.I.P” bus. A V.I.P bus means nothing – same kind of bus as non-VIP but it’s more expensive. Anyway we spent the first hour rolling and stopping to let more people on, rolling and stopping to put food on, rolling and stopping to put animals on…you get the picture (don’t worry V.I.P bus was doing the same thing right behind us!) In Vientiane we hadn’t booked again so we needed to ... read more

I set off from Luang Prabang on a minivan with the Danish girls for the 6 hour journey down to the party capital of Laos, Vang Vieng. Everyone on the minivan was soon introduced and I got some gambling going by getting everyone to chuck in some cash for a pot to guess the correct arrival time. The journey was a slow one as we wound through the dramatic mountain roads of Northern and Central Laos. Steep drops off to the side down the hill sides kept me awake, as did the seemingly endless number of overtakes performed by our driver on blind corners with nothing between us and a long drop off the side. I can only think that the driver was trying to get us in the right frame of mind to arrive in ... read more