tues day 102

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This being my first full day in Luang prabang I decided to spend the day exploring the city with Katya, Jenna and annalene. Heading out towards the centre we stopped off for some breakfast and spent the next few hours walking around the small city trying to get our bearings. After popping into a couple of tour agencies and working out prices etc and stopping off for a well needed fruit shake Katya and I decided to explore the village on the other side of the Mekong. Its highly recommended as a place to visit in my rough guide book, so catching the small ferry for only 5,000 kip 40p we headed across. With the village making Luang prabang seem like a major tourist attraction ( its not ) this felt like the real laos. With not a tourist in sight - well only us, dirt track roads, chickens, dogs and children everywhere it felt like a different world. Following the obvious path we walked along towards some temples keeping the Mekong on our right. Paying 10,000 kip per temple we stopped off to visit a couple and as we got to the last one there was a chance of visiting a cave as well. Following a young boy towards the cave he led us up some steps to a locked gate - wanted a further 10,000 kip each from Katya and I, which we payed and in we went. Walking round for a few minutes exploring with a torch as we came out the lad wanted money for the torch! We politely declined and sent him on his way as we headed back to the boat pier. On the way back we passed a group of people having a party and a group of school children playing there version of toss the welly with toss the flip flop! What else!? Catching the boat back and finding somewhere nice to go for dinner, we had a nice evening with Jenna and annalene and then headed back for the night.

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