Good day all, Sam here. Sorry it’s been a while since our last blog. We are currently in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, but first we must update you with the on goings of the beautiful Laos... After an uncomfortable few days in Vientiane, which need no further describing, we headed off north to the town of Vang Vieng. The journey was but a few hours long, and we arrived at around midday. Upon departing the bus I encountered a friend from Uni, which was somewhat of a surprise considering our location, or was it... The town happened to contain the [View Full Entry]

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Vang Vienne is considered a stop over on the way to Luang Provang. Personally, I think it is a destination - especially for the budget minded traveler. Nowhere can you rent motorcycles, stay in a decent hotel, eat great food, get a massage and go on an all day tour all for less than $50 US / day. There is the popular inner tube scene which entails floating down a river in an inter tube and going bar hopping at the same time. Personally I missed that because I was too busy exploring other areas via motorcycles and kayaks. [View Full Entry]

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We've jumped the border! Vang Vieng, Laos-I just wanted to let everyone know that we've made it to Laos after a few more days in Northern Vietnam. We don't have time to go into too many details, but here's a very abbreviated rundown of our pitstops from the last update. After Sapa, we took a 2 day, overnight boat trip to Halong Bay on the coast of Vietnam. After returning to Hanoi, we took thrilling 33 hour bus ride to Vientiene (the capital of Laos), then on to Vang Vieng where we have hanged our hats up to now. That's the [View Full Entry]

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Day 10 - Vang Vieng I started the day with some bacon and eggs while watching Family Guy. I am not joking but Family Guy and Friends are seriously the only two shows playing everywhere in town. We did a half day caving tour today starting with Elephant cave. I have not been caving for many years so it was very interesting for me. It was a 25 min walk to Elephant cave from the drop off point with our tour guide Seng. It was a really hot day so I had to keep up the sun cream so I did [View Full Entry]

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Day 9 - Vang Vieng Today we caught what felt like the worlds longest bus ride to Vang Vieng. We got the wrong bus, it was not the express like we thought so we had to make a few stops on the way......... It ended up taking around 5 hours. It was jam packed and had no air conditioning. I was sweating like I had just run a marathon. We were both fortunate that our stomachs had recovered enough to make it through the bus trip. We made it to Vang Vieng and checked into a guesthouse for about $8 a [View Full Entry]

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This is my first entry, so Im gonna just write up my diary entries from now on, some of them are a bit rambling, so bear with me please. I will also try to backtrack all the previous entries when I get the time. Anyway, entry number 1: Day 19-Nong Khai to Vang Vieng Got an early-ish start today and headed to the Thai-Lao friendship bridge after my bacon and omelette farang( tourist ) special breakfast with the french couple. Leaving Thailand was an absolute doddle, passing customs, and taking a 20bht bus across the bridge. Immigration to Laos presented more [View Full Entry]

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Hello everyone!! Just to update you on what we've been up to. Since we last wrote, we set off for the jungle just north of Chaing Mai. We were in a group with 5 others to begin with and our two tour guides (Jay-Jay and King Kong!). Set off from base and took an amazing drive north through fantastic jungle scenery. Set off trekking with our bamboo sticks in hand which were very much needed due to it being rainy season and the jungle being somewhat slippery!! Jay-Jay took the lead with machete in hand and carved a path up through [View Full Entry]

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After putting the final full stop on the last blog entry it was full steam ahead to Northern Thailand and a town called Pai (pronounced pie). Only a few hours on a mini-bus from Chiang Mai on a particularly winding road through the mountains. As it was roasting hot when we arrived we decide to go in search of a swimming pool nearby. This turned out to be a quite a mooch, we walked about 5 miles in the midday sun up snake pass (as i nicknamed it after seeing 2 dead snakes along the way - not good!) before realising [View Full Entry]

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Vang Viang is definitely a natural paradise. Yes, of course there are the people that spend a month tubing the Nam Song and watching Friends and Family Guy everyday, but there is much more to see around. The four of us dique 'VIP'Mini bus to Vang Viang and were there by early evening. May Lyn Guesthouse, which is running by an Irish character is just across a suspension bridge. We found out upon arrival to the bridge that there was a 4000 kip fee per person to cross. Jan was tired and we had come this far, so we paid and [View Full Entry]

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Well, here we are back in paradise after spending three and a half months in Tassie doing some work and the kids doing a term of school. We had planned to catch up with lots of people but time went so fast that many of our hello’s were also goodbyes. We have returned to Vang Vieng, Laos which was our initial plan, to sit by the river and decide what we would do with the next couple of months before we settle down again. But, you know what they say about plans…instead of a couple of days sightseeing in Vientiene before [View Full Entry]

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