Off The Grid

Well the capital city of Laos, Vientaine was good for what most capital cities are, picking up some essentials, doing a bit of shopping and some monument sight seeing. This was to be Charya's last stop on the moto trip as she decided she would rather fly back to Phnom Penh. The city itself is a beautiful city, but other than some temples, museums, and monuments there is really no activities there. One of the cool things about Vientiane is that it is probably the first smoke free city I have ever been to in SEA. There are signs everywhere and you are not allowed to smoke in just about any buildling. That can be refreshing as they tend to smoke a lot in SEA especially Vietnam. My bike was having a bad time there and ... read more

Luang Prabang is certainly that. The main area of the town is where two large rivers combine, the Mekong and the Nam Khan. As the rivers get closer to each other, the town gets slimmer and slimmer until it ends in a small peninsula. Our welcome was unfriendly as we were pulled over at the very edge of town, about 12km outside the city. We were asked for our titles to the bikes, which we happily complied with. Then they gestured to our handlebars and then back at theirs to show we had no mirrors on our bikes. They were giving us a ticket. Basically they just saw some $$$$ signs where our heads were as we drove by and they were intent on getting some money. There is not even spot for a mirror on ... read more

So it wasn't quite one day. Nobody had expected what the roads would be like. We should have known better really. I mean the steep and winding road from the border to Xam Nuea made for an interesting ride, but this. This was something different altogether. It was a beautiful day for riding. Sunny, with a bit of cloud cover. We started relatively early and it was already warm enough that you didn't need a jacket. It has been quite cold at night and in the mornings the last few days as we are high up in the mountains. I would love to tell the exact elevation, but we have not even been able to get a map of Laos yet. We probably should have bought on in Vietnam, but we didn't really think about it. ... read more

Well we did it. We finally got moving and it is great. We seem to have fixed Chuck's bike. We have been doing better now that we are doing most of the work ourselves. The mechanics in Vietnam are like the ones back home. They fix one thing and then the next day something else breaks. We left Hanoi for the last time four days ago. We had one bad break down along the way that we could not fix and it turned out to be a really lucky place to break down. I towed Chuck's bike about 400 meters to the first bit of cover we could find as it was raining. It turned out the guy had a minsk out back and he let us strip his bike of any parts that we needed. ... read more

So I wound up heading back to Siam Reap. Why not right? It is just a 5 hour bus ride for $5. I had a much better time there this time than last actually. I did some things that I guess maybe are not as popular versus going for just Angkor Wat. I went along with three Cambodian girls and one Loation girl. They are the same ones that gave me a ride from Sihanoukville after my bike got stolen. It is interesting because they are like half local. One of the Loation and two of the Cambdian girls live in the states now, but they both have family here and one has a twin sister that lives here as well. So it like traveling with locals who speak English. Well some of them do, her ... read more