The Vang Vieng Adventure

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This is Matt (aka Gunja) reporting from Laos!

Each town we visit in an adventure and despite our map declaring Vang Vieng the "chill out town" we certainly had an adventure or two.

We stayed at a guesthouse called Pan's Place and it was a small yellow villa with a great vibe. Shortly after arriving we caught up with some of the other backpackers we'd previously met at one of the many restaurants that showed that US sitcom, 'Friends' and enjoyed some more Beerlao. The main road is dirt and shared by cats, dogs, chickens, motorbikes and Tuks-Tuks (the half motorbike half people mover). The road is lined with restaurants and despite the slow service the Organic Cafe was a favourite. The food was delicious and mulberry shakes were very popular for brekkie.

The next day we all arranged to go tubing down the Nam Song River. The river moves along at a nice pace and carried about eleven of us Falangs (Westerners) on big tractor tubes to stops where we could stop to drink beer, jump off flying foxes, huge swings and cliffs. It took about six hours and was a great day.

The next day Steph took the opportunity to update the blog and get some emailing done while Steve and I went caving. We hired bikes (which broke at the furthest point of our journey) and went crawling into the side of a mountain. Our guide up the mountainside to the cave entrances was about 5 years old and we called her Billy - short for billy goat. This was no adventure for the claustrophobic as it was such a squeeze at some points the small backpack had to come off. It was mostly clay with some veins of quartz. We also saw one bat up close ;-)

Again we enjoyed another big night with the backpacker crowd and decided everyone else would enjoy the caves. The next morning we went to two more caves. We got to the first by a tractor thingy. Basically a single cylinder engine with two wheels dragging a trailer! The first cave was most interesting as it was half full with water and we had to jump on inner tubes again. We followed a rope into the darkest but soon found ourselves paddling away under the mountain. In fact, after half an hour we'd gone so far that we didn't reach the end. So we turned back to avoid getting lost. It is quite eerie in a cave like that.

After lunch we visited another cave. This was the highlight of my trip so far. The cave was half way up a Karst (a small mountain) and the entrance let in light so that some boulders were covered in moss. The cave was about 10 stories high and it felt like the whole mountain was hollow. A raised mound of boulders and mud had a shrine with golden Buddha atop it. It was a magical sight. With our tiny flashlights we explored the further reaches of the caves which were equally impressive; in fact one cavern seemed 20 stories high and far up at the top thousands of tiny bats squeaked. In one of the deepest caverns we all turned our torches off and chilled out for moment. It was like, spiritual man. It was also scary as one could truly get lost or fall down a hole in the depth of those caves.

After clambering back down in the incredible humidity we went for a swim in a crystal clear lagoon. The water was clean and refreshing and large fish swam around as we swam and swung from swings. Words just cannot describe the beauty of the spot.

Stay tuned we'll post more up soon.

Matt

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Photos

Chocolate care package from Oz
The lovely Fi had sent a chocolate care package with Matt from Sydney. This is all of us enjoying the packet of Minstral s after a hard day's tubing. Thanks Fi-Fi Trixibell!!

Water Sprites
Our tractor had to traverse a few ponds and we found ourselves ambushed by naked kids trying to hang on!

Comments

[Duck]

G'day
Hey Gunja Long time no see! Duck (Kerri)