Woke up at 4 again to bloody cockerals! Had my breakfast of omelette sandwich and ridicously strong, tar-like 'brack coffee'. We left Pakbeng at 8am so we could visit a few places along the way before we arrived in Luang Prabang. It was freezing on the boat but thankfully the sun came out at 10 and it was the normal tshirt and shorts affair. (We later found out that Laos is all like that, possibly because of the mountains. It would be freezing till about 10 or 11 then get freezing again at night). We stopped at a tiny village in [View Full Entry]

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Got up early again after being woken up by cockerals going off at 4am. We met Europeans to go get tickets for the 2-day slow boat journey down the Mekong to Luang Prabang. After meeting some Italians and more English (thank god) we managed to bargain with the captian and charter our own boat the whole way for not much more than the normal ticket. We managed to get one for 18 people instead of the usual cattle cart of 80 where you can barely move around! Left Houay Xai for Pakbeng, our overnight stopover. Floating along the Mekong was by [View Full Entry]

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Got up pretty early to catch our bus to Chaing Khong. Waited at the station for ages for the bus, about as punctual as England. We arrived 7 hours later in at the Laos border after very painful Thai music the whole way on the bus. We followed some Europeans who looked more like they knew what they were doing and where they were going. We crossed the Mekong on a ferry to Houay Xai, Laos and after about 20mins of visa paperwork, we were safely in the country. You can tell why so much opium was smuggled over the borders [View Full Entry]

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Had a bit of a lazy day today. Went on internet then organised a Songathaew to the bus station so we could book a bus to Chaing Khong, the Laos border. Also got the same driver to take us to the Tourist Information Office (T.A.T) and Tourist Police so we could find out what we could do about getting some money back for our suits. Eventually the driver found the TAT office after many examinations of the map. Getting to the Tourist Police however was a different story. He managed to get lost on a straight road and took the wrong [View Full Entry]

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Woke up at 7 not feeling great! Got in the minibus as we drove North to the Long Neck Tribe. Caught up on some sleep on the long journey. We arrived at the Long Neck Tribe where the women would put rings round their necks to stretch them. They have an extra ring put on every year up to about 27 rings. They are never allowed to take them off even at night. It looked quite painful but they seemed happy. It wasn't the authentic tribe I had hoped for. There were a lot of tourists and every tribeswoman had a [View Full Entry]

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We woke up quite late after catching up on sleep after the trekking. Decided to have a lazy day because we hadn't had a chance to relax with everything we've done. Went to internet cafe and tourist agency to try and sort out our bus to the Laos border and our trip to see the Golden Triangle and the Long-Neck Tribe. Went back to the hotel and went for some food with the German we had met on the trek. I had a nice meal from a stall of 'pork leg and rice' with some chillis and paid 50p. We made [View Full Entry]

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We all woke up with a huge hangover and not looking forward to our walk that day. We walked for a few hours through the jungle to the bamboo rafting place. This was great fun just floating down the river on a load of bamboo canes tied together with a bloke at the front steering it. The Thai version of the Venetian boats. It was really relaxing and serene just taking in all the scenery, apart from the few rapids we rattled down, trying to get fall in! After a while we got off and into the minibus to drive back [View Full Entry]

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After we all braved the 'hole in the ground' toilet, we left for more walking. We walked a little way up the road and saw a little village with a school and shop. I thought we were in the middle of nowhere but this was civilisation! We walked about 2 hours of so to a little village for our lunch. We all helped the woman preparing rice to make us seem useful. We played cards outside the church whilst Woody slept off his hangover! Apparently all the people in the mountains are either Christain or Catholic, very few are Buddhist. Again [View Full Entry]

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We left the hotel at 9.30 in the back of a converted hilux truck with our tour group which consisted of us, Woody our guide, the 2 kiwis we'd met, 2 norwegians, 2 french and 1 german. Our English pride was at stake! After stopping at the market to stock up on rum, we arrived at the elephant trek around 2 hours later. We got to trek on top of elephants and it was fantastic. It was truely amazing and I loved every second of it. They're so big up close but really friendly and seemed peaceful. Our one kept stopping [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Chaing Mai early at 5am. I didn't get much sleep on the bus, I was too worried about the driver's manic driving! Because we arrived early our cab wouldn't be there till gone 7am. So we bundled into a tuk tuk and went to the hotel. After changing our worst room yet because they gave us a double, we went to bed. got up at midday to go into town. Hopefully Chaing Mai would be better than Bangkok. Apart from the temples and palace, Bangkok was too dirty, too polluted, too busy and I got sick of people [View Full Entry]

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