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Published: January 3rd 2006
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It must be more than a week since I've updated, oic!
Luang Prabang:
We arrived a couple of days before Christmas (via a propeller plane; Stuart was pretty excited by this), and stayed nearly a week. There's not actually that much to report from there re: activities, because we kind of took it easy. It was that kind of town. Mostly, we wandered about and sat along the Mekong at the little restaurants there and read our books etc. Yes, Stuart is reading! I even have a photo.
We weren't all that energetic because the people staying in the room next to us were two of the biggest @#@#($)()%*)*@^)*@%^)*6's ever. I truly, truly hated them for keeping us up every night. You get that way when sleep is hard to come by anyway, and then some !@$%$&^&%^&&*&* steals any opportunity you have.
Sorry 'bout that outburst.
Even so, it was a good stay, quite different to Thailand, but very similar as well. Same Same But Different is what they say here.
They had a really good night market, and we got a few sweet purchases, mostly fabric stuff. The ladies make really beautiful scarves, and
blankets etc. I really wanted to get a bedspread, but where the flip was I going to put it?
Not much to say about Christmas, they had decorations up, and there were little Lao kids running around the night before in Santa hats, with blonde pigtails attached (??!!), but otherwise it just seemed like any other day.
We took a trip up the Mekong in a little boat, to see some caves (they love their caves over here), which we both really enjoyed.
But yeah, mostly just wandering the town and having naps in the day.
Then, a couple of days before New Year, we got the bus down to Vang Vieng. I'd been told the scenery along this route was pretty amazing, but that anyone who gets motion sickenss (**puts hand up**) would hate it, and that it was the route that most banditry happens on.
The banditry I wasn't too concerned about, apparently the last attack was over a year ago, but the turns mans, the tuuuuurrrnnsss!
I think all those years of Dad having to mop up my sick were humiliating enough to help me develop an iron stomach, because I'm
telling you back in the day, there would have been breakfast alll oooovvvver that bus. But somehow I held it together...barely.
They were right about the scenery though, bloody fantastic. Best we've seen so far perhaps.
There were a few hairy moments when the driver almost took out various wandering beasts, and at least one roaming village toddler. Everyone went a bit quiet after that one. The driving over here is pretty incredible.
Anyway we got there.
I was looking forward to all the things you could do in Vang Vieng, but I'd heard a lot from people who said they hated the place because it was really touristy and because most restaurants play Friends constantly...loudly. I wasn't really looking forward to this part of it, which was why I thought it was better to stay a bit longer in Luang Prabang.
Fortunately it was a lot nicer than we'd been led to believe. We got a good guesthouse (Vang Vieng Orchid) for half the price we'd paid in LPB; again we didn't sleep, but hey, it was New Years.
The town itself was actually really relaxed; there weren't that many people around and
although there were a few places that played episodes of Friends all the time, it wasn't all of them, and it was a lot easier to avoid than we thought it would be.
There were some places down on the river where you could sit in a little bamboo hut of your own and eat or drink, whatever. Very relaxing, and I had a top bit of Larb down there. Larb, larp, lapp, is my Lao standby; the food here isn't really as exciting as in Thailand unfortunately, but hey, no complaints, it's edible and cheap. Although we went to one bar and I had to eat a cheeseburger because they had no veggies, that was a bit weird.
So anyway, the first full day we spent tubing down the Nam Song river. How was the serenity!! We did it pretty early, before other people got up, so it was fantastic, just us and the locals on the river. We helped some people to catch the fish that got stunned in the rapids, and just floated down between crossing cattle etc. Soooo nice.
Poor old Jim's legs got pretty sunburned though; that'll learn him to put cream
on when I tell him.
The next day he was a bit off from the Malaria tablets, so we took it easy in the morning and then in the afternoon took a walk out of town to a cave.
It was such a nice place to walk around; reminded me of home a bit, all dusty and hot.
Our last day was spent kayaking, trekking, and caving, which was great fun, although Stuart and I spent most of the day arguing about who knew what they were doing in the kayak. Turns out we're both control freaks, but then I think we already knew that.
I'm getting so much bettter with the heights; it seems every little outing over here involves scrambling up or down a bloody mountain, and I haven't had to be carried yet!
We're both pretty sore at the moment from the kayaking. Only I'm admitting to it, but I can see Stuart flinching.
So now we're in Vientiane. For a capital city, it's well laid back, but I kind of like it. I'm happy spending a couple of days here anyway. We decided to spend a bit of money on
a proper grown ups hotel, just so we could get some sleep. Most buildings here are designed with the weather, rather than soundproofing in mind.
At night they set up little makeshift restaurants down by the river, just serving basic stuff. We went down last night and had a good feed. Actually we've been eating well here so far. For lunch today we went to some local noodle joint and had a good nosh up for about a quid each.
I like the local places because anywhere that's used to foreigners assumes you don't like spicy food so they don't put out the little Nam Prik sets (little dishes of chillies arranged in various ways) which is a bummer, because we LOVE the chilli man. Every time someone's asked us if we want something Thai style or European style we say Thai style and they get really worried. You can usually see them looking out the corner of their eyes to check if we implode while we're eating. But we LOVE the chilli!!
Okay, that's us pretty well up to date.
Oh yeah HAPPY NEW YEAR I almost forgot; time gets away from you.
We're here until Thursday, when we fly to Hanoi. I'll update soon.
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