Vientiane

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After a long time searching the google cache for my blogs, I have managed to recover all but 7 entries, which is a relief. I'll be putting them back up at some point probably, maybe when I get home in a month or so. For now, I'll continue where I left off, which is Vientiane.

Leaving Vang Vieng early doors, we piled into a tuk-tuk/van with the kayaks on the roof and drove about an hour to the river that we would be kayaking down. The kayaking was in pairs, and I went with Force, whilst Larry and Dan paired up. Before we got in the water, we were given helmets for the white water parts of the river, which were absolutely comedy, and I couldn't stop laughing at the other 3, with bright yellow helmets that didn't fit at all, and pink life jackets that were 3 sizes too small.

We kayaked for about a couple of hours and then stopped for lunch which was really good, cooked on the rocks on the bank of the river by the guides. Kebabs and fried rice. The guides had also bought a fish from the market earlier in the day that they ate, and this American guy saw it, and thought that they had caught it from the river there and then and started taking photos of them with it. Ha, what a muppet!

After lunch it was time for some more cliff jumping, off a 10 metre cliff that didn't seem that high looking down at the river, but the fall seemed to last ages.

About another hours kayaking took us to the tuk-tuk that was going to take us the rest of the way to Vientiane, about an hour and a half. On the way, the tuk-tuk driver kept stopping at the side of the road and picking up more and more Thais, that were hitching a lift to the city. By the end of the trip, we had no less that 20 people crammed in and on to the tuk-tuk that you could probably fit about 8 people in comfortably.

Arriving in Vientiane with a numb arse, we struggled to find somewhere to stay, eventually finding a nice hotel in the centre. It was strange that everywhere was full, because Vientiane was like a ghost town! I prefer to call it Noneventiane (ha ha ha). We went out on a Saturday night to a club on the roof of a massive hotel on the Mekong but it was rubs. There were more staff there than customers.

We visited the highlight of the city, apparently, That Luang, which is a huge gold temple that could do with a lick of paint, but still impressive.

I think that one day would have done in Vientiane, which would have given us another day on the tubes, but you live and learn. We were glad to be heading back to Bangkok, and then on to Ko Phangan, where the full moon party awaited.

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