same same but different

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I feel a little out of my element writing today because it's morning here and we usually go to the internet cafes at night. Last time I wrote we had just made it into Vang Vieng. We spent our first official day in Vang Vieng doing what all the good tourists do...tubing down the Na Som river! Tubing is Vang Vieng's most popular sport, it involves being dropped off at the first bar at the top of the river and floating down the river in a tube while stopping at the myriad of bars along the way. One particular river stop of mention was a "mud bar" where there was a massive mud pit/bath, tug of war ropes, etc. I have never been so dirty or injured in my entire life. Having never had the full tubing experience, Adam and I naively thought we would able to leave Vang Vieng the day after tubing. I now understand how people get sucked into staying in Vang Vieng for over a week (there was actually a guy at one of the bars who was doing is 186th consecutive tubing day). It's a vicious cycle. If you tube one day, you need to spend the next day nursing your wounds and your aching head. Plus, all the accommodations are relatively inexpensive and very comfortable. We had a nice little cabin by the river that looked like it was right out of the movie Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. Needless to say, as soon as my tail bone had recovered enough to do the 3 hour trip down to Vientiane, we got the heck out of there.

We are now in Vientiane, the capital city of Laos. I'm not sure if it was because I had built up Vientiane in my head, but Adam and I are both rather disappointed with city. There aren't a whole lot of touristy things to do, and compared to the beautiful scenery in the north, this city just doesn't compare. It's also only a city of about 200,000 people (even smaller than Oakville), so it doesn't have the hustle and bustle that some of the other big cities have. The best part about not having an itinerary set in stone is that if you don't like somewhere, you leave. Vientiane served it's purpose, we got our Cambodian Visas. We are taking a night bus tonight to Pakse, which is the town that will serve as a base for us to do some day trips down in the south. From Pakse we'll head to the 4000 islands where I think we are going to do a day kayak trip and hopefully see rare Idwardy dolphin. There are only 12 of them or something ridiculous like that, so I'm not sure how good our chances are of actually seeing them. But it's worth a try.

Anyways, more from Pakse.

Love, Nicole/Poke/Coco
xo

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