Vang Vieng- TUBING!!!!!!!!!!

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TUBING. what can I say? It works. We arrived in Vang Vieng and checked into a guest house. It was pretty nice, chill out area, tV, pool table and bar. The downside was a weird, druggy manager from England. Turned out to be a muppet but left us alone so no harm done. Our first impression of the town was along the lines of Magaluf, lads on tour type gig, but at the end of the day we were there for tubing and to see Mickey and Rory ( mates from uni). Myself, Chesty and Joanna settled into our room, very brave of Jo! We then set off to explore the very limited town. Strolling around to find somewhere to eat, to our surprise we only go and bump into Mickey and Rory. These two liabilities had given us very little to go on regarding where they would be and when they would be there so we were pleasantly surprised. We settled down into a very English restaurant showing back to back episodes of Friends. This became a recurring theme in Vang Vieng, a toss up between Friends or Family Guy. Tough choice. Food was followed by a stroll to the island on the river where the majority of bars were. Buckets of whiskey flowed like the Mekong River and after an early exit by Jo (a responsible, mature girl who doesn't really booze) the four 'lads' headed on. The wake up in the morning hit us all hard, Jo was ill with some stomach disease and myself and Chesty were hit hard by a combination of a hangover and dodgy tummies. Time to man up, we had a day of tubing ahead of us and I for one was keener than mustard.

Jo remained in the guest house while the four 'lads' met up for some food. This didn't go down well but we eventually pulled ourselves together and hired four large tubes (inner tubes) and were taken in a tuk tuk further up stream. Our arrival surprised me. A river consisting of several bamboo bars hanging over the banks each with some sort of zip line, trapeze or swing type entertainment/death trap. I was not keen for these especially with a broken toe I didn't think hitting water from a height was advisable. First stop, a bar. Free whiskey on arrival sorted me out a treat. so tubing is basically a concept thought up by a very drunk individual where by you sit in a tube and float down a small stretch of river and get pulled into bars along the way. Very simple but very effective. We floeatd down the river stopping at each bar where a little laos man would throw a rope out to us and pull us in for whiskey and beer. Near to the end of the bars we each stocked up with a few bottles of Beer Lao before we embarked on our final mission for the day, to see how far down river we could float before it got dark. It was lovely to relax in our tubes against a beautiful backdrop of lime mountains sipping on cold beers. Mickey got a little serious with a Norwegian girl and they held hands whilst floating. This is a big NO in the world of tubing so we sacked them off an dfloated down on our own. It eventually got dark and being hit by massive rocks was getting painful and quite dangerous so we pulled into the bank to find a tuk tuk waiting for us. I think he spotted us upstream and knew we wouldnt get far so followed us. Back in town we went and checked on Jo who luckily was feeling heaps better. She stayed in while we got food and watched more friends. Mickey eventually caught up with us.

The next day Jo joined us for tubing and the day followed very much the same as before. Perfect.

After two days of tubing we all caught the bus down to Vientienne. 4 hours on a local bus wasnt too bad, windows down so nice breeze but no leg room was a struggle. Our arrival in the capital of Laos was supposed to see Mickey and Rory head off towards Chaing Mai. However Mickey soon realised he had left his passport back in the guest house in Vang Vieng. IDIOT! whilst the sensible and responsible four headed into the city to find accommodation Mickey got a bus back to Vang Vieng in search of his passport. We woke up with a day of admin ahead of us. Chesty had not been well the previous day and was not feeling good today either, delicate insides. We headed to the Vietnam embassy to get a visa and it turned out they did it there and then for us. Two good looking English chaps obviously went down well. We then booked our coach ticket for that afternoon as Vientienne doesn't seem to offer too much and we can't be bothered to stay. So this is where we stand at the moment, Jo is heading to Bangkok this afternoon to meet up with her two friends from Auckland; Mickey and Rory are heading to Chaing Mai shortly, but that all depends on whether Mickey remembers his passport this time (he did get it back ok); and myself and Chesty are going to get a 20 hour coach to Hanoi this afternoon. Something to look forward to.

Laos has been great, it was really cool meeting up with Rory and Mickey. Just being able to have proper conversations and talk about interesting things rather than the repetitive where, why, who, whens etc regarding traveling. Next stop VIETNAM. Bring it on! Back to just the two of us.

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