2nd March- Woke up relatively early today, the fact we were in a Dorm meant that when some people start waking up inevitably everyone else wakes up. Laos used to be a French colony, it seems that the "Frenchness" of the country is more apparent in the Capital than anywhere else we've visited so far- French restaurants and more french language. We had a really nice breakfast this morning, (Observant Jonny pointed out in classic style that it "Had a bit of a French Feel to it", he must have spotted the French pastries and noticed the fact that the name [View Full Entry]

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We left Vang Vieng bright and early this morning, we got a truck for about 1.5 hours and then went Kayaking down the Mekong River for around 4 hours. Kayaking was well good,. I managed to capsize while going through some rapids!- was actually quiter refreshing though. We had lunch on some rocks by the rapids, our guide made us shish kebabs on a barbecue which were really nice. After a bit more kayaking we came to a stop by the riverside and were asked if we wanted to do a jump off some high rocks (About 15metres) into the water. [View Full Entry]

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26th February-We managed to get up at 620am and caught a bus at 8am from Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng. I was well impressed that we managed to get up at such a ridiculous hour (In Luang Prabang there were signs everywhere asking tourists to respect the local culture and be quiet after midnight, consequently life started for the locals at about 6am everyday, by the sounds of things life started at about 4am for the flaming roosters!). We arrived in Vang Vieng after 6.5 hour bus journey from Luang Prabang- there were some killer views along the way, and I [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Luang Prabang yesterday after a (very!)slowboat ride taking around 7 hours from Pak Beng. After getting a hostel sorted we headed to a LaosIndian restaurant for some food by the river. Probably the best food i've had on the trip so far- i just got Chicken Tikka Massala but it was in a different sauce to back home and was just what the doctor ordered after the long bus ride. We ended up in a bar that was showing the Chelsea Barcelona game, all be it a day late and we already knew the score. Found out Liverpool [View Full Entry]

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Hey y'all, we left Chiang Mai on 21st: Felt quite sad to be leaving cos it is such a great place, so many happy memories, the people who ran the hostel were brilliant. We headed to the Thai border with Laos in the morning and a couple of busrides and a quick boat trip over the Mekong River later and we were in Laos, at a place called Huay Xai. We got our visas sorted in quick time, found a hostel and headed out for some food by the river. Huay Xai is a pretty small place and people only tend [View Full Entry]

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Hey you guys, Got back from Trekking in the Jungle yesterday, it was absolutely awesome. We booked it through our hostel and set off on the morning of 17th February and stayed the night in the Jungle on 17th and 18th, before coming back to the hostel at 5pm on the 19th. There were 10 of us on the trek, aswell as our guide and another guy that helped navigate us. Our group was a mixed bunch of various nationalities: Me, Will and Jonny (England), Matt and Sheridan (Australia), Astrid and Evelyn (Holland), Alexandra (Germany), Jonathan and Sandra (Sweden). We were [View Full Entry]

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Just a quick note today folks. Today was pretty uneventful. Got up at 2pm, a record low even by our standards. We're going trekking tommorow for three days and two nights with a group of 10 alltogether- Our hostel arranged it for us, our guide speaks really good English and used to live in one of the villagesdwe will be visiting. It sounds amazing, visiting different hill tribes and riding elephants- all for around thirty quid including food and drink. hope it will live up to the hype. I may be wrong but the last time i checked hilltribe villages didn't [View Full Entry]

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... Well i say "full", if you can call any day that begins at 1.30pm a full day! Jonny went solo this morning as he didn't stay out as late as me and Will the night before. Me and Wills task for the day was basically to see the main attractions, there are temples everywhere throughout the city, population is around 1.6 million so its quite big. however there were three temples that were meant to be must sees. We got talking to a few locals on the street who were very helful in telling us in how to find the [View Full Entry]

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Decided to catch the train at 230pm to Chiang Mai in the North of Thailand. The morning in Philsanulok consisted of me buying some sunglasses for 70pence and passing throught the local market. Definitely the weirdest market i've ever seen. They had live fish in the stalls ready to be bought, whole fish that were just heated up and ready to eat!?!? Also sold whole Pig Heads and chicken feet- Needless to say i thought i'd give them a miss! The 6 hour train journey to Chiang Mai was ok, some great scenery along the way. We managed to find a [View Full Entry]

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Early start today to catch the train for Phitsanulok, which is a 6 hour journey. Thankfully the train was quite spacious and not too uncomfortable. I've realised that a cure for my insomnia is to drink loads the night before, we had some good banter with this Canadian and Dutch fella in this bar in our last night in Ayuthya and had a few too many Singha beers, just the four bottles for me, thats all, but the stuff can be quite lethal. Arrived at Phitsanalok at 2.30pm, found a hostel straght away, only 100baht per night. We were pretty shattered [View Full Entry]

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