Our Laos adventure continued from Phonsavan to Vang Vieng on another long, windy bus journey with more spectacular views and more stomach lurching turns. Vang Vieng is situated along the river with impressive Karst hills along the banks. The views across the river are lovely, however that's really not the main reason that people come to Vang Vieng - as is immediately apparent when you walk through the small town and see bar after car showing re-runs of Friends to travellers tucking into burgers and pizza. Do I sound disapproving? Maybe, however I certainly watched an awful lot of episodes in the few days we were there and yes, I enjoyed it! (8 months travellig is my excuse and I'm sticking to it!) The main draw to Vang Vieng however is the tubing - a bit like white water rafting but in a tractor tube inner and involving far more bars along the way. We'd heard good and bad things about this - on the negative side people have died doing it and it takes away form the natural beauty of the surroundings, on the positive side it's a lot of fun and provides income to 1,550 families in the area. Of course we were doing it - there was no stopping Kev!
We set out around 1pm on our chosen tubing day, relieved that the sun was shining. We got taken to the starting point by tuk tuk and to the first bar, where we stayed for a while having a go on the slides and zip wire into the river. Then it was time to start tubing. Basically, the current takes you down the river in your tube until the next bar you choose to stop at. We had a great afternoon in the sun with a few drinks (well, quite a few. But not too many of course!) and great company as well as the added fun of zip wires (scary!) and slides which got higher at each bar we stopped at. Kev has now learnt not to dive into the river when it's not quite deep enough, and I have learnt to listen to plans more carefully. When we left the penultimate bar, I was firmly under the impression that we were beginning the hour or so float back to Vang Vieng and totally ignored the final bar... whilst everyone else stopped off. There is nothing quite like floating down a river in the dark, on your own to induce panic! Clearly on a one way river there was little chance of me getting lost, however the hour seemed like the longest I had ever experienced. I got back (finally) to find that Kev had caught a tuk-tuk from the last bar and been back for ages wondering what had become of me.
So, that was our Vang Vieng experience, and it truly was one of the most fun things we have done this year so far. This is clearly why so many people stay and do it every day for a week, but we are far too old for that as it took us about 4 days to recover. After Vang Vieng we headed to Vientiane, which we had been told by many people was not really worth spending too long in. In some ways they were right - there isn't a huge amount to do, however it is a really lovely small capital and we enjoyed a day sightseeing and enjoying the markets.
We are now back in Thailand having crossed the Friendship Bridge to Nong Khai, where have watched unexplained fireballs shoot into the sky - more about that next time!
Sunday, 24 October 2010
Tuesday, 19 October 2010
Laos - Luang Prabang to Phonsavan
After a night in the border town of Huay Xai (not really worth spending too much time in itself) we caught a bus to Luang Prabang in the North of Laos. We decided against the popular 2 day slow boat trip having already spent our share of time on the Mekong river of the past few months. The bus journey was an overnighter and our first experience of a bus that we couldn't lie down on for that length of time. I just looked the journey up actually, and according to Wikipedia,
'The road from Huay Xai (the Laos town across the river from Chiang Khong) to Luang Prabang is poorly maintained, remote, unlit, unmarked and extremely dangerous for the unfamiliar traveler, particularly in the wet season. Regular buses nonetheless do run, taking 14–16 hours'.
Worse than the aching in our legs, the winding country roads and general lack of sleep was the fact that the air-con was cranked up to the extent where one fellow traveller described it as 'a fridge'. Still, the starry night was beautiful to gaze out at (at 4am...) and we made it in one piece in the morning at Luang Prabang, a city which is a UNESCO World Heritage sight and for good reason. The city itself is beautiful. It lies along the banks of the Mekong and was, until the Communist takeover in 1975, the Royal capital and seat of Government of the Kingdom of Laos. We spent our first full day there looking at some of the temples, visiting the old Palace (now also a museum) and spending the evening at the night market.
The second day we decided to hire bikes (again) and took off into the countryside. After an hour or so we came across a small waterfall up a stony track and sat for a while reading and dabbling our feet in the river. Sadly, the track on the way down proved too much for my tyres and I got my second puncture of the trip so far. Luckily they seem to be used to this around here and it didn't take long to find someone able to fix it. We carried on a few more kilometres, along roads with mountains either side until the continuing uphill battle became a bit too much for my legs and we decided to turn around and find somewhere for a late lunch. At this point, Kev got a puncture so we had to find another place to get it fixed.
We made it back to Luang Prabang in the late afternoon and decided to go and upload some photos. Then we went for a beer. Then we met some lovely Finnish guys and had a couple more beers and a few games of pool. Suddenly it was midnight (how did that happen??) and we were back at our guesthouse having a couple more drinks with the Finnish guys. When we finally went to bed at around 2am (once I'd packed..) we realised that the hard drive, where all our photos and important documents are stored, was no longer in the bag. Obviously 2am was not really the time to be charging back to the internet cafe, the bar and the room where the Finnish guys stayed, however with a bus to catch at 8.30 the next morning we were desperate. To cut a long story (and long night!) short, we found the hard drive at 8am in the internet shop where Kev had forgotten to unplug it and made the bus to Phonsavan.
The road to Phonsavan was fairly similar to the road to Luang Prabang, with the added worry that every passenger was given a plastic bag to throw up in. Many did. The Laos scenery is truly stunning and there was plenty of time to admire it! At around 3pm, the bus stopped in the middle of nowhere. For 4 hours. Yes, we had broken down on a narrow winding road with no signs of civilisation to be seen. Nobody seemed even a slight bit concerned about this and everyone kept smiling as various attempts to fix the engine failed. The sight of a group of Laos men taking apart a DVD player to somehow fix a bus engine (nope, I don't get it!) in the pitch black whilst laughing and joking will stay with me for a long time!
We were only spending one day in Phonsavan, which is famous for the nearby 'Plain of Jars'. The Plain of Jars is basically an area of 7 sights (3 of which are popularly visited) dotted with huge stone jars used for unknown purposes around 2,500 years ago. As well as this, the area is full of unexploded ordinance from the Secret War conducted against Laos between 1965 and 1973, some of which has been cleared but the majority of which has not, leaving huge areas uninhabitable. After deciding against going on an organised tour, we hired a motorbike, blithely ignoring the warnings of rain. What's a little rain? we thought to ourselves. We dressed in trousers, raincoats and proper shoes (first time since Scotland) and were actually still cold. We figured the temperature here must be pretty low. Kev looked it up afterwards - 17 degrees. Brrr. Anyway, we arrived at the first jar sight, an eerie kind of place as the huge jars are just dotted about the countryside but with huge bomb craters in between them, and areas that are out of bounds as they haven't been cleared surrounding them. A really strange, strange sight.
We carried on driving ( in the rain now) to what we thought was the second sight but got a little lost, and ended up 30km in the wrong direction. Oops! By the time we backtracked, the rain had come on strongly and we were getting pretty soaked. Added to this, the second sight was up a dirt road which wasn't really coping too well with the rain and probably wasn't the best idea for a motorbike novice to be riding up. We made it unharmed and, after seeing the second sight, decided not to risk the conditions for the third but to drive back to Phonsavan. Having made it safely through the rain and mud and bad conditions, it seemed ironic that we crashed the bike back in the town right outside our guesthouse. I should add very quickly that no person or bike was hurt. Still, it left us a little shaky and we thought maybe we should have done the tour after all!
Since then we have been to Vang Vieng and are now in Vientiane, but that will have to wait for another day!
'The road from Huay Xai (the Laos town across the river from Chiang Khong) to Luang Prabang is poorly maintained, remote, unlit, unmarked and extremely dangerous for the unfamiliar traveler, particularly in the wet season. Regular buses nonetheless do run, taking 14–16 hours'.
Worse than the aching in our legs, the winding country roads and general lack of sleep was the fact that the air-con was cranked up to the extent where one fellow traveller described it as 'a fridge'. Still, the starry night was beautiful to gaze out at (at 4am...) and we made it in one piece in the morning at Luang Prabang, a city which is a UNESCO World Heritage sight and for good reason. The city itself is beautiful. It lies along the banks of the Mekong and was, until the Communist takeover in 1975, the Royal capital and seat of Government of the Kingdom of Laos. We spent our first full day there looking at some of the temples, visiting the old Palace (now also a museum) and spending the evening at the night market.
The second day we decided to hire bikes (again) and took off into the countryside. After an hour or so we came across a small waterfall up a stony track and sat for a while reading and dabbling our feet in the river. Sadly, the track on the way down proved too much for my tyres and I got my second puncture of the trip so far. Luckily they seem to be used to this around here and it didn't take long to find someone able to fix it. We carried on a few more kilometres, along roads with mountains either side until the continuing uphill battle became a bit too much for my legs and we decided to turn around and find somewhere for a late lunch. At this point, Kev got a puncture so we had to find another place to get it fixed.
We made it back to Luang Prabang in the late afternoon and decided to go and upload some photos. Then we went for a beer. Then we met some lovely Finnish guys and had a couple more beers and a few games of pool. Suddenly it was midnight (how did that happen??) and we were back at our guesthouse having a couple more drinks with the Finnish guys. When we finally went to bed at around 2am (once I'd packed..) we realised that the hard drive, where all our photos and important documents are stored, was no longer in the bag. Obviously 2am was not really the time to be charging back to the internet cafe, the bar and the room where the Finnish guys stayed, however with a bus to catch at 8.30 the next morning we were desperate. To cut a long story (and long night!) short, we found the hard drive at 8am in the internet shop where Kev had forgotten to unplug it and made the bus to Phonsavan.
The road to Phonsavan was fairly similar to the road to Luang Prabang, with the added worry that every passenger was given a plastic bag to throw up in. Many did. The Laos scenery is truly stunning and there was plenty of time to admire it! At around 3pm, the bus stopped in the middle of nowhere. For 4 hours. Yes, we had broken down on a narrow winding road with no signs of civilisation to be seen. Nobody seemed even a slight bit concerned about this and everyone kept smiling as various attempts to fix the engine failed. The sight of a group of Laos men taking apart a DVD player to somehow fix a bus engine (nope, I don't get it!) in the pitch black whilst laughing and joking will stay with me for a long time!
We were only spending one day in Phonsavan, which is famous for the nearby 'Plain of Jars'. The Plain of Jars is basically an area of 7 sights (3 of which are popularly visited) dotted with huge stone jars used for unknown purposes around 2,500 years ago. As well as this, the area is full of unexploded ordinance from the Secret War conducted against Laos between 1965 and 1973, some of which has been cleared but the majority of which has not, leaving huge areas uninhabitable. After deciding against going on an organised tour, we hired a motorbike, blithely ignoring the warnings of rain. What's a little rain? we thought to ourselves. We dressed in trousers, raincoats and proper shoes (first time since Scotland) and were actually still cold. We figured the temperature here must be pretty low. Kev looked it up afterwards - 17 degrees. Brrr. Anyway, we arrived at the first jar sight, an eerie kind of place as the huge jars are just dotted about the countryside but with huge bomb craters in between them, and areas that are out of bounds as they haven't been cleared surrounding them. A really strange, strange sight.
We carried on driving ( in the rain now) to what we thought was the second sight but got a little lost, and ended up 30km in the wrong direction. Oops! By the time we backtracked, the rain had come on strongly and we were getting pretty soaked. Added to this, the second sight was up a dirt road which wasn't really coping too well with the rain and probably wasn't the best idea for a motorbike novice to be riding up. We made it unharmed and, after seeing the second sight, decided not to risk the conditions for the third but to drive back to Phonsavan. Having made it safely through the rain and mud and bad conditions, it seemed ironic that we crashed the bike back in the town right outside our guesthouse. I should add very quickly that no person or bike was hurt. Still, it left us a little shaky and we thought maybe we should have done the tour after all!
Since then we have been to Vang Vieng and are now in Vientiane, but that will have to wait for another day!
Monday, 18 October 2010
Monday, 11 October 2010
Chiang Mai
I've just opened this new post and realised I can't quite remember where the last one finished, but I guess we'd probably arrived in Chiang Mai, been bundled into a truck at the train station and taken to a guesthouse with a lovely big swimming pool. My first impressions were good - the temperature seemed lower for starters which was a grest relief, and the pool was the icing on the cake.
The first day there we went for dinner with a nice Dutch couple who had been staying for a few weeks as she had broken her foot just one week into their trip. Having just talked to someone else (whilst swimming lengths inthe pool) who had had a nasty motorbike accident we began to realise just how lucky we've been so far! Back to the dinner though - Kev had a steak pie with mashed potato and gravy and I have to admit I was very jealous as I ate my papaya salad and sticky rice. I guess we're ready for some good English food...
The next day we decided to go to Tiger Kingdom, about 20km outside Chiang Mai. Now, Kev has been desperate to stroke a tiger ever since he learnt about Tiger Temple close to Bangkok, but after a newspaper article and some online comments I read I was very uneasy about this - reports of mistreatment and drugging of the tigers seemed all too likely to be true. However, most of what I could find about this place was much more favourable, and I decided I was happy to see what it was like. And really wanted to play with a baby tiger... Having now been there twice (once to go in with the tigers, once on the way back from trekking just to look at them and read more about the place) I feel confident that they are well treated and certainly not drugged. Whether they should be bred there as a tourist attraction in the first place is another matter, however I can be as self righteous about this as much as I like but the truth is I loved tickling a tigers tummy.
The next day we decided to start planning the rest of our trip, both in Chiang Mai and for the rest of our year abroad. This included the big move of booking flights back to England for February 16th. Now we really will have to make the savings last until then! Over the next few days we also booked flights to the Phillipines, Indonesia, Borneo and to Kuala Lumpar. God Bless Air Asia! We then found a tour operator to book us a tour into the jungle for the following 2 days, including trekking, elephant riding and bathing and whitewater/bamboo rafting.
The tour was great - we started with a trip to a butterfly and orchid farm, then to a market before being dropped off at the start point of our first day trekking. 4 hours through the jungle, across streams and up hills left me covered in bites (despite 4 applications of spray!), hot, sweaty but feeling good. On the way, our guide caught a tarantula. Later he barbequed it. Kev ate 3 legs.Our trek finished at the elephant camp where we would be spending the night in an open air bamboo hut overlooking the camp. After a dip in the lake (well, pond), we went to meet the elephants and took a 50 minute ride. Not the most comfortable experience ever! That night we sat around the camp fire (complete with tarantula) and chatted and sang some songs with a couple of Chang beers, before headin gup to the hut to sleep. Unfortunately the hut wasn't too waterproof as we discovered when it started to rain very heavily about an hour later...
The second day began with a bath with the elephants, where I got to experience sitting on an elephants head scrubbing it whilst it stood up and walked back to it's home with me still clinging on! Great fun, and very muddy. The morning's trekking took us to a waterfall, after clambering over many rocks and streams and makeshift ladders. The waterfall was beautiful, but very, very cold. I went under it. Kev didn't. Then it was time for whitewater rafting (really good fun) and bamboo rafting (less good fun as it kept sinking) before heading back to Chiang Mai. A really good couple of days.
We wanted to do more in Chiang Mai (for example a cooking course) but decided that, as we would be back in Thailand in 2 weeks time we would leave it until another time. We met up with James and Amy again for a few drinks and games of pool, spent some time in the markets and booked ourselves a bus to the Laos border. We arrived yesterday and crossed the river to take us from Thailand to Laos. Great border - it actually feels like entering a new country for once. Being used to slightly scary officials and borders, we were taken aback by the passport control man teaching us some Laos on our way through. Our first experience of the notoriously friendly Laos people.
The first day there we went for dinner with a nice Dutch couple who had been staying for a few weeks as she had broken her foot just one week into their trip. Having just talked to someone else (whilst swimming lengths inthe pool) who had had a nasty motorbike accident we began to realise just how lucky we've been so far! Back to the dinner though - Kev had a steak pie with mashed potato and gravy and I have to admit I was very jealous as I ate my papaya salad and sticky rice. I guess we're ready for some good English food...
The next day we decided to go to Tiger Kingdom, about 20km outside Chiang Mai. Now, Kev has been desperate to stroke a tiger ever since he learnt about Tiger Temple close to Bangkok, but after a newspaper article and some online comments I read I was very uneasy about this - reports of mistreatment and drugging of the tigers seemed all too likely to be true. However, most of what I could find about this place was much more favourable, and I decided I was happy to see what it was like. And really wanted to play with a baby tiger... Having now been there twice (once to go in with the tigers, once on the way back from trekking just to look at them and read more about the place) I feel confident that they are well treated and certainly not drugged. Whether they should be bred there as a tourist attraction in the first place is another matter, however I can be as self righteous about this as much as I like but the truth is I loved tickling a tigers tummy.
The next day we decided to start planning the rest of our trip, both in Chiang Mai and for the rest of our year abroad. This included the big move of booking flights back to England for February 16th. Now we really will have to make the savings last until then! Over the next few days we also booked flights to the Phillipines, Indonesia, Borneo and to Kuala Lumpar. God Bless Air Asia! We then found a tour operator to book us a tour into the jungle for the following 2 days, including trekking, elephant riding and bathing and whitewater/bamboo rafting.
The tour was great - we started with a trip to a butterfly and orchid farm, then to a market before being dropped off at the start point of our first day trekking. 4 hours through the jungle, across streams and up hills left me covered in bites (despite 4 applications of spray!), hot, sweaty but feeling good. On the way, our guide caught a tarantula. Later he barbequed it. Kev ate 3 legs.Our trek finished at the elephant camp where we would be spending the night in an open air bamboo hut overlooking the camp. After a dip in the lake (well, pond), we went to meet the elephants and took a 50 minute ride. Not the most comfortable experience ever! That night we sat around the camp fire (complete with tarantula) and chatted and sang some songs with a couple of Chang beers, before headin gup to the hut to sleep. Unfortunately the hut wasn't too waterproof as we discovered when it started to rain very heavily about an hour later...
The second day began with a bath with the elephants, where I got to experience sitting on an elephants head scrubbing it whilst it stood up and walked back to it's home with me still clinging on! Great fun, and very muddy. The morning's trekking took us to a waterfall, after clambering over many rocks and streams and makeshift ladders. The waterfall was beautiful, but very, very cold. I went under it. Kev didn't. Then it was time for whitewater rafting (really good fun) and bamboo rafting (less good fun as it kept sinking) before heading back to Chiang Mai. A really good couple of days.
We wanted to do more in Chiang Mai (for example a cooking course) but decided that, as we would be back in Thailand in 2 weeks time we would leave it until another time. We met up with James and Amy again for a few drinks and games of pool, spent some time in the markets and booked ourselves a bus to the Laos border. We arrived yesterday and crossed the river to take us from Thailand to Laos. Great border - it actually feels like entering a new country for once. Being used to slightly scary officials and borders, we were taken aback by the passport control man teaching us some Laos on our way through. Our first experience of the notoriously friendly Laos people.
Wednesday, 6 October 2010
Ayutthaya and Lopburi
After losing my temper with the 3rd tuk-tuk driver who wanted to take us to the tourist office (I sense more commission!) instead of the train station we had asked to go to, we finally got there to take a train to Ayutthaya, only an hour and a half from Bangkok. It was an easy journey (apart from the jaw achingly sweet coffee I made the mistake of buying!) and within 5 minutes had ourselves a guesthouse to stay in run by a puzzle/magic obsessed man who claimed to be called David Cameron. I now know all the countries in the world with 4 letters. I know which countries begin and end in the letter A. I know at least 4 new magic tricks, and I can make a 3 by 3 grid of the numbers 1 -9 with all sides adding up to 15. At first he was entertaining. Then we starting to avoid him...
Our first (and only) full day was spent on bicycles exploring the ancient temples of the town. I really enjoyed seeing the temples here as they were spread out throughout the town so that just riding through we saw many of them. We stopped at 3 of the major ones for some proper sightseeing. We then took the bikes a bit further and promptly got lost - Ayutthaya Old Town is situated on an island surrounded by river. We seemed to cross this river a few times and so were never sure whether we were on the island of not. As we looked around us, completely clueless about where we were, we saw ominous rain-clouds forming, heard thunder and realised were not only lost; we were about to get VERY wet. Finally, with 30 minutes to spare before the bikes were due back and just the first spots of rain starting to appear, we entered the city and finally found the shop. Where we also found 2 English guys who lived locally and had clearly been in the bar next door for a few hours. The beers they bought us were very welcome after the long ride! The teaching job offer may come in useful in the future as well!
The next morning we left for Lopburi, an further on the train and another temple - rich town. However, it is mostly visited for one temple in particular with a large resident group of renegade monkeys. They stole our food, they climbed on my back, and we watched in fascination as they jumped into pick-up trucks waiting at traffic lights and stole anything they could find from the back. They were great to watch and a good way to spend the day before catching a night train to Chiang Mai, where are currently.
Tigers, elephants, cooking, trekking, biking, rafting... it's going to be a busy week - more to follow!
Our first (and only) full day was spent on bicycles exploring the ancient temples of the town. I really enjoyed seeing the temples here as they were spread out throughout the town so that just riding through we saw many of them. We stopped at 3 of the major ones for some proper sightseeing. We then took the bikes a bit further and promptly got lost - Ayutthaya Old Town is situated on an island surrounded by river. We seemed to cross this river a few times and so were never sure whether we were on the island of not. As we looked around us, completely clueless about where we were, we saw ominous rain-clouds forming, heard thunder and realised were not only lost; we were about to get VERY wet. Finally, with 30 minutes to spare before the bikes were due back and just the first spots of rain starting to appear, we entered the city and finally found the shop. Where we also found 2 English guys who lived locally and had clearly been in the bar next door for a few hours. The beers they bought us were very welcome after the long ride! The teaching job offer may come in useful in the future as well!
The next morning we left for Lopburi, an further on the train and another temple - rich town. However, it is mostly visited for one temple in particular with a large resident group of renegade monkeys. They stole our food, they climbed on my back, and we watched in fascination as they jumped into pick-up trucks waiting at traffic lights and stole anything they could find from the back. They were great to watch and a good way to spend the day before catching a night train to Chiang Mai, where are currently.
Tigers, elephants, cooking, trekking, biking, rafting... it's going to be a busy week - more to follow!
Sunday, 3 October 2010
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