down the tubes

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fEB 14TH

Yesterday we tried the infamous tubing down the nam som river. It started off pretty okay. You pay about 12 bucks a person, half of which you get back when you return your tube. In return you get a big tire tube painted yellow and a tuk tuk ride to the starting point, a few kms up river.

The starting point is pretty much a bar with lots of girls handing out free shots and trying to get you to drink at their peticular riverside bar. (because nothing mixes like booze and watersports)

Anyhow, we sealed all our valuables up in a drybag and hopped on our tubes into the river. I immediately flipped over backwards into the water and inhaled about a litre of water.

Once you get going, along with the beatuful mountain scenerey surrounding you, there are also dozens of bars on either bank of the river. Each bar has something to offer you, be it a rope swing, water slide or more free shots. (one bar even had a sign offering psychedellic shrooms, another great idea) The people working at these bar are constantly throwing out ropes with soda bottle attached to them, trying to fish you in. We ignored them due to the abraisive electronic music eminating from every one we passed.

Once we travelled the first km or so, the bars thinned out and we were able to lay back and enjoy the scenery a bit. There were families of goats playing and it was generally a pretty good time... Then the water got shallow, fast and rocky.

Suddenly you're moving down the river at a pretty good clip, with rocks smashing you in the ass and getting you stuck. After each getting stuck a couple times, we successfully navigated our way through the first set of 'rapids'. back the the calm, peaceful river... for a little while...

Jenn pointed out that my tube was leaking just as we ended up completely stuck in the next set of shallow rocks. I got out of my tube and attempted to put my sandals on an fid free us. I slipped on the algae covered rock, 3 times. Smashing up my back and neck pretty good. I dropped one of my sandals, and my tube. Fortunately as I was helplessly watching my footwear and transportation float away, a couple of locals were crossing the river, and mercifully grabbed my stuff for me.

Well at this point Jenn no longer wanted to carry on and I really didnt want to risk my leaky tube sinking. So we donned our sanadals and trudged through some thick, insect and itchy thistle filled bushes, noting the abandoned tubes along the riverside, and climbed up a steep hill past some abandoned huts and onto a gravel road.

After about a km or 2 of miserable walking we came across a house. We were quite pleased to hear the familliar words "tuktuk?" coming from inside. "yes please" we said, and for 30 000 kip, the man drove us back to town.

Thus concluded our tubing adventure, I'm quite sure that in the low season, when the river is higher, I would have really enjoyed myself, but as is, I'm lying in bed right now, In a fair amount of pain thanks to all the rocks, so i'm not really sure I can say I had a great time, though i did enjoy alot of it, some parts, not so much...

They say at least 5 people a year die tubing on the river. An aussie we were talking to said that a girl died last year on a waterslide. Overall, it could be really dangerous.
Heck, had we been drunk or under the influence of any of the things they offer here, our shitty trip could easily have been deadly.

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Comments

[Darren]

Glad to hear you're both okay. I'm sure you'll heal up in no time! Take care and keep having a blast.