Advertisement
Published: November 11th 2005
The Love Boat
Donkey found love on the Mekong!!!Hi all...here's our third installment on our travelblog and today my friends we'll be concentrating on our journey through Laos.....so get a coffee and a biscuit and sit back and enjoy the read!!!!!
Before we could enter Laos, we had to stay overnight in Chiang Kong in North Eastern Thailand.....There’s not much to do there to be honest so all our mini bus went for drinks and Man Utd were playing Spurs so we had a few drinks and watched that and also played a bit of jenga (a great drinking game by the way)....All was going good until someone changed the TV channel and Edo (a fellow backpacker from Israel) started asking "where’s the football" and gesturing to the TV..... Of course Leanne, being the nice person she is and despite the few drinks she had consumed, decided to help Edo out.............and went looking for......... "the fruit bowl"....We keep meeting Edo and his girlfriend and he keeps calling Leanne 'fruit bowl' so I reckon we have a new nickname there and a very apt one at that..........On the way home that night we got interrogated by our landlady who was a bit of a freak so we were happy
Should've been a chippy!!
Taking a break after building our stable!!! enough to get up the next morning and cross the river to Huay Xai, Laos!!!!
From Hay Xai, we started our two day slow boat journey to Luang Prabang, the main city in Northern Laos....Now this is an experience we will never forget....the boat was this low long narrow thing and we were wedged into it.....we were all just waiting for them to load up the chickens and pigs to cap it off!!!!! It was a bit like being on Noah’s Ark if you can picture that in your head (if you can’t picture what Noah’s Ark was like, don’t worry....just go with the bit where I said we were wedged into it!!!). We were stuffed onto the boat for about eight hours the first day as it meandered up the Mekong River through the beautiful countryside of Laos (with one hole in the ground to the rear of the boat for one to do their business!!!!)... It was actually a good experience in a funny way because it made people get on and by the end of the day everyone was having great craic and we'd our very own Swedish boy band playing a few tunes for us
Tour De Luang Prabang
Check out Leannes break pads!!! (they were sh1te to be honest, but they did their best)
As part of the two day slow boat trip to Luang Prabang, you have to overnight in a small town called "Pak Beng" that is half way on the journey (the only way to Luang Prabang from Northern Thailand is by boat or by air to which our backpacker budget does not stretch)... This town is one we'll never forget and Leanne actually wants to get the name of the town, "Pak Beng" tattooed onto her bum, but she has to ask Cepta first!!! Pak Beng is basically a place with nothing to offer, where everyone is trying to rip you off because they know your in the middle of nowhere with nowhere else to go!!! After getting off the boat, we and a very nice sound Scottish couple who we met on the boat, Kirtsy and Robert ran up the town looking for accommodation (if your reading this Kirsty and Robert, you can pay me later for telling everyone that your a 'very nice sound couple') It was around 6pm and it was practically dark and we'd found nowhere....Anywhere we looked, well lets put it this way.........you'd
get better accommodation in Mountjoy!!!! Rooms were like cells!!!! After a while everywhere was booked up and the four of us along with another four boat buddies had nowhere to stay.....Eventually this guesthouse said that they'd let us sleep on their veranda......With that, men, women, children and beasts came from every angle with sheets of ply, lengths of 4 x 4, nails, mats, mattresses, mosquito nets, sheets and pillows.........within twenty minutes they converted our the veranda into our very own stable.....and whoever said "there's no room at the inn"....All I can say is, that there is always room at the inn for eight homeless backpackers and three narky tag-a-long Spanish travelers, when you've got a veranda !!!!
After we had found somewhere to lay our heads, our next task was to find food.....About twenty of the boat crew ended up in a restaurant.......I think it was called Roly's Bistro, NOT!! Now after a tough day, all we wanted was a decent meal....a bit of home would be nice....the menu promised much and.................delivered fcuk all!!!! We both ordered steak and chips, perfect after a hard day....after watching one old women slave over a gas stove in candlelight for one hour
Riverside Manor, Vang Vieng
Not bad for $8 a night (The room that is!!) trying to cook for at least eighteen people, we were ready to eat the leg of a leper but held ourselves back because it wouldn’t be long now, til we had our steak and chips!!!!! After the hour, Simon...another backpacker/waiter from Switzerland, brought us over our steak and four chips....It was a disaster....it looked a starter and Leanne reckon it was not a beef steak but more like rat steak.....so I ate hers and didn’t ask any questions....The plan was to get drunk so we'd all sleep better in the bed...all eight of us!!! Alex, a talented singer/songwriter form England gave us a blast of one of his songs 'Rick Stein' (watch out for this song, its sure to be a hit).....All was going according to plan when we were told that the electricity was going off in five minutes!!
Electricity in Pak Beng is supplied by a generator in the centre of the village....Lights go out in Pak Beng at 10pm, when the local 'generator' stops cycling and it is pitch dark from then on in!!! We trekked back to our stable under candle light.......very romantic....just the eight of us!!!......The night started to go at a snails pace
X-treme Sports!!
Leanne takes a plunge!!! after that.....we could hear rats scurrying around the place and other creatures.....it was probably best that we didn’t know what they were.....there were random noises and cocks crowing all threw the night and the town bells went off at around 4.15 in the morning........we think it was to wake up the monks but it probably wasn’t because they probably didn’t sleep either....I think everyone is too scared to sleep......in Pak Beng!!!!
The next day we heard all the stories from other backpackers who actually got rooms/cells in hotels!!!! One lad had a rat run across his chest, another had a rat run across his face!!! In the end, I think we were in the safest place in Pak Beng that night.........safety in numbers; you can’t beat it, even if it’s on a veranda in some strange place!!!!
The next day we got a different boat, still not the Titanic or anything but at least you could stand up straight and it didn’t sink!!! After a full day on that boat we arrived in Luang Prabang, a beautiful French Colonial City in Northern Laos (a designated UNESCO World Heritage Site no less). There was no chance of us being
too proud to accept an offer of accommodation here. We took the first place that was offered which turned out to be the honeymoon suite for 9 euro....its not easy this traveling lark!!! We went out for a pizza that night (much needed after the disaster of the night before!) with some people from the boat to a restaurant with a little pet monkey...think Marcel from friends- he was like a little baby!!!! The following day was purely a day of rest....We just wandered around the streets of Luang Prabang weaving in and out of the streets and market stalls....Actually, the night market is very fancy and there’s a simple order to it that’s not found in other places in Asia, making it very pretty and romantic (if you're into that kind of thing)!!! That night, about 13 of us decided we would rent bikes the next day and cycle to a waterfall in the vicinity.........32km away!!!
Most people get a tuk tuk to see Khung Si waterfall but we thought that'd be too easy!!! Eight people showed up at our breakfast rendez vous the next morning....I think the previous night took a few casualties!!! We rented mountain bikes and headed off....Now Leanne hasn’t been on a bike in about 10 years so it took her a while to get used to it but at the end of the day, cycling is like riding a bike, once you learn once you'll always be able to do it!!! Leanne slowly got into the groove as we left the city hustle and bustle for the open countryside, passing through villages along the way. (Seeing how the real Laos people live - a worthwhile experience!!) . Plenty of chickens, ducks and geese all over the place so I think I'll be ringing Dermot Ahern again to see if he can pull a few strings to shorten our stay in quarantine when we get back to Ireland!!! Don’t think they know what bird flu is over here - I haven’t seen any fowl coughing and spluttering yet so I think we'll be alright!! The cycle was fairly tough, basically 32 km off road, up and down Croagh Patrickesque hills (slight hyperbole, but only slight....some of the climbs were very steep). Leanne found it grand going up the hills for the most part but I reckon the place we rented the bikes from had to order a new set of shimano brake pads, because they were heavily used on the way down the hills - very funny!!!
The waterfall was well worth the sore arses and palms, very beautiful indeed. We arrived and went for a dip in a natural pool half way up the waterfall itself (The picture should give you an idea of what it was like)... After a while lazying around (general theme of Laos) at the waterfall we decide to make tracks to ensure we got home before dark....Only three of us cycled back, myself , Robert and Frank (51 year old guy living in London who had a bit part in the film "Good Morning Vietnam" - sound man!!)... Leanne and the others decided to load the bikes onto the back of a tuk tuk van and get a lift home....was probably a good idea! The three of us arrived in a village outside Luang Prabang as it was getting dark....after 64 km of tough cycling we treated ourselves to a nice bottle of Beer Lao (as nice a beer as you'll get) in the company of a few locals and some of Laos’s pop music!! Afterwards we met up with Leanne and the four of us went for an hour long foot and leg massage......I thought it was a tad expensive at $2 but hey, you can’t have everything....only joking!!!
The next day it was up and out of the honeymoon suite early and we got a bus to Vang Vieng....beautiful scenery as we again twisted and turned through the hills....actually, the bus driver twisted and turned a bit too fast.....overtaking on a bend at the top of a cliff is an experience id rather keep to a minimum!!! An old local got on at one of the villages and was full of chat. He'd good English but it was very funny when he asked me "does it snow-white in Ireland?". He also informed me that a bus had gone over the edge of the cliff a month earlier killing all the people inside...not what I need to hear with our crazy bus driver!!! The road is called Route 13 and its well known that there are ambushes on the road ( a few tourists were shot dead there a few years ago)......Leanne informs me that i was snoring my head off at the time but its not surprising Leanne and a French dude got a bit nervous when they saw a load of fellas coming out of the bushes with rifles and camouflage gear on! They seemingly followed us for a bit - all part of the experience!!!
Vang Vieng is basically a bit of a tourist backpacker place....not much to offer really but its the place to go if you want to do a bit of kayaking and tubing down the river....After doing the cycle and the bus trip, all we wanted to do was chill which is what we did for a few days in a very nice wooden chalet overlooking the river (the scenery was amazing!!)...Donkey loved it there!!! Vang Vieng is a bit weird....backpackers just lye around on beds in restaurants watching re-runs of friends all day - a funny sight really!!! Instead of sitting on a bus to get to the Capital Vientiane, we decided we'd kayak some of the way (12-14 km) and get a bus the rest of the way...it was part of the package.....the company transported our bags so it was all good!!!
The kayak was good craic. Leanne and I shared a two man kayak and lets just say, it took a while for the left hand to know what the right hand was doing (I’m not saying who was the left hand and who was the right hand but after a few times being turned upside down in rapids and floating down a river, we quickly learned and we decided we 'would' continue to travel the world together!!!!!!!!) We had lunch on a big rock.... After lunch we did a bit of cliff diving....first from three meters and then from ten meters (which is very high when you’re standing at the top of it by the way!!)... I did it and I think I cracked my tail bone on the way into the water...... After about 7-8 minutes standing on the edge, Leanne also jumped (don’t know how she jumped after looking down for that long....very impressive indeed). There were a few bruises that night as proof of her jump!!! We kayaked further down the river and got the bus to Vientiane which was promised.....actually it was the back of a tiny van with wooden benches with twelve of us cramped in on a dusty bumpy road....
We eventually arrived in Vientiane that evening and got a place to stay!! We went for some lovely Indian food and a few pitchers of Beer Lao!! We went back to the guesthouse where I sat up and watched Man Utd and Middlesborough (Duggan/Jay - I don’t want to hear it, right!!!!) with the owner and his mate....funny characters!!!
The next day we met Kirsty and Robert and decided to take the easy option and fly to Hanoi (yes that’s HANOI, as in 'the' Hanoi where 'the' A-Team escaped from a jail) instead of taking a 23 hour bus journey!!
Overall, (apart form Pak Beng, and sure as they'd say; "what doesn't kill you will make you stronger"!!! PS. I don’t know who 'they' are but 'they' seems to cover it anyway!!!) Laos is a beautiful unspoiled country...well worth a visit!!!!!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.121s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 6; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0496s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
StevieD
non-member comment
Kelly Utd are Cat!
Ronan two words spring to mind when I watch Utd these days "piss" and "poor".