M Our last night in Thailand. A mini bus picked us up at our hotel at 9pm; our destination was Luang Prabang, Laos. There were 4 other people from our hotel getting on the bus and to be nice we decided to let them sit together. So we took the back bench seat that was beside all the luggage. I can not even describe how squished we were once the bus was full and all the luggage loaded. The seat is really big enough for 1 1/2 people or maybe 2 skinny Thai's, but not a guy Jesse's size and little me. We discovered we would be stuck in this cramped position until 5am.
Everyone else stretched out their legs and leaned on each other while we sat squished in the back with my legs bent up as the wheel well was under the seat. To make matters worse, our driver was crazy. He was speeding down the winding roads. I took 2 motion sickness pills and had my special wrist bands on that help with motion sickness, and still felt a bit ill. Being at the back of the bus as we went down the bumpy roads at top speed (lots of them under construction) we often bounced around, and on one particularly big bump we actually got air. We were very happy with our crazy bus driver though, as we pulled into the Boom-house at 2:30am rather than 5am. Finally we were allowed out of our prison.
We were told we could have a room until breakfast at 7am. Sure the bed was hard as a rock, but it didn't matter we were so happy to be able to stretch out. As soon as our heads hit the pillow we were asleep.
Everyone else stretched out their legs and leaned on each other while we sat squished in the back with my legs bent up as the wheel well was under the seat. To make matters worse, our driver was crazy. He was speeding down the winding roads. I took 2 motion sickness pills and had my special wrist bands on that help with motion sickness, and still felt a bit ill. Being at the back of the bus as we went down the bumpy roads at top speed (lots of them under construction) we often bounced around, and on one particularly big bump we actually got air. We were very happy with our crazy bus driver though, as we pulled into the Boom-house at 2:30am rather than 5am. Finally we were allowed out of our prison.
We were told we could have a room until breakfast at 7am. Sure the bed was hard as a rock, but it didn't matter we were so happy to be able to stretch out. As soon as our heads hit the pillow we were asleep.The next morning after breakfast we made our way to the pier. We took a small 'long boat' across the Mekong river to Houay Xai, Laos. Then our guide helped us get Visas. We were sure glad to be with a guide as we saw many others who were not standing around looking very confused. Once again (like in Turkey) us Canadians had to pay one of the highest amounts to get into Laos, $42 USD. Most other travelers were about half that. At least we get into China cheaper. We 've heard that if Canada charges a country a lot to let their citizens in then they will charge a lot to let us in.
Then, after we were told to exchange our money to Kip as they do not take the Thai Baht, and to be sure to buy food at the local supermarket as there is none on the slow boat - we found both of which were not true - we got on the slow boat. There are two boats you can take to get to Luang Prabang. One is the slow boat (which we took), the other is the speed boat. The slow boat was full of tourists with only a handful of locals. It seated well over 100 people and surprisingly went at a decent speed. Then there is the fast boat, uncovered, seating about 6 people max, and it goes about 3 or 4 times faster then the slow boat.. but because of this there have been accidents, the last one 
within the past month, one man died. Many travel agents simply refuse to sell fast boat tickets as they are too dangerous, but still we saw plenty of them out there. By the time we boarded the boat it was about 11:30am.
The scenery was absoulutely amazing! I just sat staring out at the lush mountains and the hill tribes as we floated along the mighty Mekong. We saw many people fishing with bamboo poles and nets, and people bathing and washing clothes in the river. As we went by, kids would wave frantically at us and we would wave back. The seats were wooden boards, and although we had purchased the reccommended seat cushion our butts were extremely sore. Jes spent a large part of the trip reading his new book he picked up at the book exchange (Blood Work). He also enjoyed his first
BeerLao, which he would come to enjoy everywhere during his travels around Lao, and we learnt is for sale absolutely everywhere.
We pulled into the small village of Pakbeng at about 5pm. We found our guest house up atop a huge hill. It was fairly clean, but the bed was hard as a rock (no exaggeration) and it had no hot water or A/C, but it did however have a mosquito net and a fan, so we were happy. In this and many small villages they have generators that run in the evenings for electricity. In Pakbeng, being a big stop on the way to Luang Prabang, we had power from 6am to 10:30pm, luckily we had our flashlights. The main street in the village was lined with restaurants and places selling Pringles and Oreos. On a side note the Pringles here are not the same as at home. Same container, same picture, same name, same shape, but they are
lacking a serous amount of taste. They are so bland no matter what flavor you get. Well as the shirts at the tourist shops say "Same Same, but different". That's a bit of a stab at all the locals who always tell you "same same", meaning my stuff is the same as everyone else, so no need to go else where, or this thing is the "same same" price as that one. lol Someone came up with the shirt, which we saw a lot of in Thailand, but the shirt in Laos says "same same" on the front, but on the back "but different". lol
So after cooling down in our room we walked down the main strip looking at a few restaurants. We had decided to go to an Indian food place when the guy at the place next door stopped us and asked us to come to his restaurant. These greeters were standing in front of all the restaurants. We said no and as we started to walk he started to pout saying "every night Indian restaurant full, not mine, not fair, every night". This made me want to go to his place of course, but not Jes. He told him that if the Indian place is always full, there must be a reason for it, and walked in.
We enjoyed our meal, then walked in the dark back to our guest house. The next morning we were back on the slow boat. Jes had his nose back in his book, and I was staring wide eyed at the lush mountains and hill tribe people. We read that 80% of Laos people live in villages, so we were observing daily life for a large number of people in Laos. Jes finished his book after a couple hours, and joined me in planning our trip and staring at the landscape. The cramped boat was full again of tourists, some playing cards, some sleeping, one guy was playing a guitar, and many others sat reading their lonely planet books.
We are so happy that we chose to do the slow boat rather than fly. We would have missed so much. We were told that Laos is a laid back country that you can not rush through. We now know what they mean. When we pulled into Luang Prabang we were surrounded by people either asking us to come to their guest house, asking if we wanted a tuk-tuk, or asking if they could carry our bags. We politely declined and pressed through the mob. We had chosen a guest house from our book, but when we arrived we found that it was full, and worse then that the price had gone from $15/night to $30/night. They claimed that when Lonely Planet put the book out 5 months earlier it was not the high season. So we left and followed a guy next door who was calling us to come to his guest house. It was $15 a night, but what a find! The room looked like a display from Ikea. It was very clean, it had satellite TV, AC, warm water, and the biggest shower we had seen yet. Unfortunately it was only available for 2 nights, but we took it.
The first weird thing we noticed in Laos is that prices for hotels, and many other things are in US dollars. It's nice as we are on par with the US dollar, so no need to convert in our heads, although we always pay in Laos Kip. Once settled we went out walking through this cute old town.
There were many French tourists as Laos used to be a French colony. I think many were surprised to find all the signs are in Lao and English, but not French. The French colonial buildings are neat. We enjoyed a nice dinner, then walked through yet another night market! Unlike Thailand, Laos is much less developed and the prices were generally cheaper. Also, people generally don't own a stall and would just lay a blanket on the ground and sit down beside thier goods. Those on the outskirts of the market who do not pay to have electricity sell thier items by candle light.
J On our first full day in Luang Prabang, we walked down the main strip. There were restaurants, massage parlors, travel agents, guest houses, and more of the same. We ran into the friends we had made on our long journey from Chiang Mai to Luang Prabang and talked with them briefly, they were headed to a waterfall just outside of town and we agreed to join them after brunch. We didn't have any money though (save for some US dollars left over from buying a visa) and so we went off to find an ATM. The first ATM we found made the sounds we expected but when it came to giving us money it said something about a device error. I was suspicious so I monkeyed with the machine, luckily nothing broke off during my investigation, so it seemed to be legitimately broken. We were getting worried though as we had no dough, but we eventually found the other ATM in town, which we had walked past earlier that morning. So when I was given the option of an amount, I decided upon the maximum of 700,000 Kip. Yipes, if I had taken out much more I would be an instant millionaire!
We stopped at a place called The Coconut and had a good size brunch, then we got our first bill in Kip. It came to 50,000. Although it seemed a bit much, it only worked out to about $5.5 for us both to have a decent breakfast. I was quickly learning something that I was not prepared for, eating out in Laos was even cheaper then in Thailand. YAY! We still had an hour before the tour to the waterfalls left so we decided to look into a trek. We went to at least four different places before deciding upon a 2 day trek, starting the next day, as we only had one more night in our current guest house. The company we went with was called White Elephant Adventures, although the tour we choose had no elephants. The first day was trekking, seeing a few different hill-tribes (ones that had not migrated to live beside the road selling goods to hoards of tourists), and after a home stay (sleeping in a hill-tribe home) we would trek a short distance before kayaking back to Luang Prabang. Exciting.
We met our friends and boarded the mini-bus that took us out to the Kuang Si waterfall, which was just 10 minutes out of town. Within the site was a habitat for "rescued" Sun Bears, and in her own separate cage, an 8 year old Tiger. The Tiger was in her pen for the day though and we didn't get any pictures, the bears however were out and about, sprawled all over the place eating, drinking, but mostly doing nothing. They looked so lethargic that we had to wonder if they were drugged.
The waterfall was amazing, many different pools had developed down stream of the main falls. We spent some time jumping in from about 10 feet, and there was a rope swing someone had tied to a tree. The local Lao people were thoroughly enjoying themselves as much as the tourists as we took turns jumped into the FREEZING cold water. At one point two Lao boys and I jumped in together making one of the bigger splashes that afternoon. I didn't dare do a cannonball though as most of the time my butt hit bottom, and luckily it was just sand.
We had a bite to eat and sampled fresh coconut for the first time, which
wasn't as good as the roasted coconut we had tried in Chiang Mai. We had been gone a good 3 hours and sadly had to board the bus back to town. After a quick stop to change out of our wet stuff and into clean clothes we were back in the thick of things. We had dinner and then decided to walk through some of the night markets. They weren't nearly as big as the one in Chiang Mai, but had different items. The biggest shocker was that at about 10:30/11:00 pm they all started packing up and going home. We found a keepsake for ourselves, and gave the lady a good price. Michelle was a little upset when she found out I paid almost $20 for two rocks. Carved into elephants and painted, but apparently made of rock, I hope to use them as book-ends when we get home.
We got back to our room with enough time to pack up our stuff as we had to get our bags to the tour shop by 8:30 am the next day. Once again we had a television, so I watched a bit of B.B.C. One other weird thing we learned about Laos, is that there is only one Laos T.V. station, so many people simply watch Thai shows, and subsequently learn a lot of the Thai language. Also Lao and Thai are quite similar, so we've been told.
The next day we got up bright and early, thanks to Michelle and her trusty travel alarm clock. We found a tuk-tuk driver as we walked around the corner from our guest house. That's when the madness started. There was already a guy in the tuk-tuk, but being so early and seeing no one else on the road we leaned out and the tuk-tuk stopped. The guy in the back was upset and told the driver to keep going but he refused. We learned that the fellow traveler was going to the North bus station, we didn't know where that was but with half an hour before we had to be at the tour office we weren't worried. The tuk-tuk was weighed down heavily with all our bags and three people in the back, and it went along at a snails pace. We were slightly worried as we noticed him pass the street we needed but felt it was only fair that the first passenger be taken to his destination first. Soon though we wondered if we were going in the wrong direction.
I thought I saw a road sign that said South bus station. Our companion with his heavily accented English (French I assume) continued to inform the tuk-tuk driver and in response he just kept nodding his head, assuring us he was going to the right place. When we got to the South bus station it was 8:20. We were told not to arrive later than 8:25 as the van for the trek left at 8:30 sharp. We immediately got out and went looking for another tuk-tuk, the confused tuk-tuk driver got a mouthful from the French tourist who was now quite late and at the wrong bus station.
We ran over to a waiting driver and explained where we needed to go. The young man seemed to have no idea as we told him "white elephant adventures", so then we tried to tell him "down town, tourist offices, ATM". Anything that would give him an indication of where we were going. He started to give us a nod and say "yes yes" so we jumped into the back of his tuk-tuk. As we flew down the road I recounted the direction and yes we were headed the right way. About three blocks to our proper street he started looking back at us, I gave him encouragement and tried to explain where we were headed but we soon found the language barrier too much. He stopped at one guest house and looked at us hoping he had guessed correctly. We told him no and to keep going, he was going really slowly now and watching us for directions. Everyone on the road was passing us. We tried to get him to speed up by saying "fast, rapido, quickly, go go go" but he had one speed, and that speed was slow. Finally after two or three more stops we arrived at the right place and I awarded our bullied driver with a big fare for his troubles. We were about ten minutes late, and apologized to the other trekkers as we explained the frustration we had just escaped.
We met the two other gentlemen that we're going on the two day excursion with us. Dave and Gavin, Aussies that (although unknown to us) had asked for a challenging two days of intense trekking and kayaking. We were told a slightly different story about the "easy" trekking from our salesmen. We were soon to find out that we could keep up with the two gentlemen that were quite a bit more fit then us.
M We met Derek, the Canadian owner of the company, as well as our 2 guides Bandit and Lee, then were off. After dropping off the 1 day trekkers we were given our free breakfast of banana, orange, yogurt, an other unknown fruit that's kinda like an apple-pear, and some purple sticky-rice wrapped in banana leaf. After treking for a short time, we came to a cave where villagers had hid out during the American/Vietnam war. Although claustrophobic I decided to go in to experience the type of place many people had to hide out in. It was dark, damp and cramped. I could not imagine hiding out there while hearing planes going overhead, and possibily bombs dropped near by. When we were leaving
we saw a HUGE spider. Worse than that, we had to squeese right past it to get out of the cave. I went first and Jes reassured me it was still hanging out on the wall once I was through. Jes was the last to leave though and started telling us to hurry once past the spider as he could not see it and worried it was crawling on him. Once out I throughly checked him over, it was nowhere in sight. Phew.
We continued on hiking stopping many times to take pictures of the jaw dropping scenery. We really enjoyed getting to know our new Aussie friends as well as our two guides. Bandit would often sing as we went. They really worked very hard and would do anything for us. We stopped for lunch and rested on a log. We were given a huge portion of rice with a chicken stirfry in a tasty sauce. We each had one serving, which I couln't finish, while our guides shared one. We then continued on. Lee would continually tell Jes, "not much more up, most flat and down", although we found this to be untrue as we continually turned a corner to find more uphill, Jes needed the encouragement however. After a few hours we eventually got out of the up/down/up/down rhythm of the hills, and Jes got a chance to catch his breath and talk to the guides. Between the four foreigners we ended up teaching our Laos guides a few things. A little bit about computers, some English, and at one point the guys took turns teaching Bandit how a compass worked and what it meant by 90, 180, or 360 degrees. Lee and Bandit smiled all the way, even when they were confused.
Then, after we were told to exchange our money to Kip as they do not take the Thai Baht, and to be sure to buy food at the local supermarket as there is none on the slow boat - we found both of which were not true - we got on the slow boat. There are two boats you can take to get to Luang Prabang. One is the slow boat (which we took), the other is the speed boat. The slow boat was full of tourists with only a handful of locals. It seated well over 100 people and surprisingly went at a decent speed. Then there is the fast boat, uncovered, seating about 6 people max, and it goes about 3 or 4 times faster then the slow boat.. but because of this there have been accidents, the last one 
within the past month, one man died. Many travel agents simply refuse to sell fast boat tickets as they are too dangerous, but still we saw plenty of them out there. By the time we boarded the boat it was about 11:30am.The scenery was absoulutely amazing! I just sat staring out at the lush mountains and the hill tribes as we floated along the mighty Mekong. We saw many people fishing with bamboo poles and nets, and people bathing and washing clothes in the river. As we went by, kids would wave frantically at us and we would wave back. The seats were wooden boards, and although we had purchased the reccommended seat cushion our butts were extremely sore. Jes spent a large part of the trip reading his new book he picked up at the book exchange (Blood Work). He also enjoyed his first
BeerLao, which he would come to enjoy everywhere during his travels around Lao, and we learnt is for sale absolutely everywhere.We pulled into the small village of Pakbeng at about 5pm. We found our guest house up atop a huge hill. It was fairly clean, but the bed was hard as a rock (no exaggeration) and it had no hot water or A/C, but it did however have a mosquito net and a fan, so we were happy. In this and many small villages they have generators that run in the evenings for electricity. In Pakbeng, being a big stop on the way to Luang Prabang, we had power from 6am to 10:30pm, luckily we had our flashlights. The main street in the village was lined with restaurants and places selling Pringles and Oreos. On a side note the Pringles here are not the same as at home. Same container, same picture, same name, same shape, but they are
lacking a serous amount of taste. They are so bland no matter what flavor you get. Well as the shirts at the tourist shops say "Same Same, but different". That's a bit of a stab at all the locals who always tell you "same same", meaning my stuff is the same as everyone else, so no need to go else where, or this thing is the "same same" price as that one. lol Someone came up with the shirt, which we saw a lot of in Thailand, but the shirt in Laos says "same same" on the front, but on the back "but different". lolSo after cooling down in our room we walked down the main strip looking at a few restaurants. We had decided to go to an Indian food place when the guy at the place next door stopped us and asked us to come to his restaurant. These greeters were standing in front of all the restaurants. We said no and as we started to walk he started to pout saying "every night Indian restaurant full, not mine, not fair, every night". This made me want to go to his place of course, but not Jes. He told him that if the Indian place is always full, there must be a reason for it, and walked in.
We enjoyed our meal, then walked in the dark back to our guest house. The next morning we were back on the slow boat. Jes had his nose back in his book, and I was staring wide eyed at the lush mountains and hill tribe people. We read that 80% of Laos people live in villages, so we were observing daily life for a large number of people in Laos. Jes finished his book after a couple hours, and joined me in planning our trip and staring at the landscape. The cramped boat was full again of tourists, some playing cards, some sleeping, one guy was playing a guitar, and many others sat reading their lonely planet books.
We are so happy that we chose to do the slow boat rather than fly. We would have missed so much. We were told that Laos is a laid back country that you can not rush through. We now know what they mean. When we pulled into Luang Prabang we were surrounded by people either asking us to come to their guest house, asking if we wanted a tuk-tuk, or asking if they could carry our bags. We politely declined and pressed through the mob. We had chosen a guest house from our book, but when we arrived we found that it was full, and worse then that the price had gone from $15/night to $30/night. They claimed that when Lonely Planet put the book out 5 months earlier it was not the high season. So we left and followed a guy next door who was calling us to come to his guest house. It was $15 a night, but what a find! The room looked like a display from Ikea. It was very clean, it had satellite TV, AC, warm water, and the biggest shower we had seen yet. Unfortunately it was only available for 2 nights, but we took it.
The first weird thing we noticed in Laos is that prices for hotels, and many other things are in US dollars. It's nice as we are on par with the US dollar, so no need to convert in our heads, although we always pay in Laos Kip. Once settled we went out walking through this cute old town.
There were many French tourists as Laos used to be a French colony. I think many were surprised to find all the signs are in Lao and English, but not French. The French colonial buildings are neat. We enjoyed a nice dinner, then walked through yet another night market! Unlike Thailand, Laos is much less developed and the prices were generally cheaper. Also, people generally don't own a stall and would just lay a blanket on the ground and sit down beside thier goods. Those on the outskirts of the market who do not pay to have electricity sell thier items by candle light.J On our first full day in Luang Prabang, we walked down the main strip. There were restaurants, massage parlors, travel agents, guest houses, and more of the same. We ran into the friends we had made on our long journey from Chiang Mai to Luang Prabang and talked with them briefly, they were headed to a waterfall just outside of town and we agreed to join them after brunch. We didn't have any money though (save for some US dollars left over from buying a visa) and so we went off to find an ATM. The first ATM we found made the sounds we expected but when it came to giving us money it said something about a device error. I was suspicious so I monkeyed with the machine, luckily nothing broke off during my investigation, so it seemed to be legitimately broken. We were getting worried though as we had no dough, but we eventually found the other ATM in town, which we had walked past earlier that morning. So when I was given the option of an amount, I decided upon the maximum of 700,000 Kip. Yipes, if I had taken out much more I would be an instant millionaire!
We stopped at a place called The Coconut and had a good size brunch, then we got our first bill in Kip. It came to 50,000. Although it seemed a bit much, it only worked out to about $5.5 for us both to have a decent breakfast. I was quickly learning something that I was not prepared for, eating out in Laos was even cheaper then in Thailand. YAY! We still had an hour before the tour to the waterfalls left so we decided to look into a trek. We went to at least four different places before deciding upon a 2 day trek, starting the next day, as we only had one more night in our current guest house. The company we went with was called White Elephant Adventures, although the tour we choose had no elephants. The first day was trekking, seeing a few different hill-tribes (ones that had not migrated to live beside the road selling goods to hoards of tourists), and after a home stay (sleeping in a hill-tribe home) we would trek a short distance before kayaking back to Luang Prabang. Exciting.
We met our friends and boarded the mini-bus that took us out to the Kuang Si waterfall, which was just 10 minutes out of town. Within the site was a habitat for "rescued" Sun Bears, and in her own separate cage, an 8 year old Tiger. The Tiger was in her pen for the day though and we didn't get any pictures, the bears however were out and about, sprawled all over the place eating, drinking, but mostly doing nothing. They looked so lethargic that we had to wonder if they were drugged.
The waterfall was amazing, many different pools had developed down stream of the main falls. We spent some time jumping in from about 10 feet, and there was a rope swing someone had tied to a tree. The local Lao people were thoroughly enjoying themselves as much as the tourists as we took turns jumped into the FREEZING cold water. At one point two Lao boys and I jumped in together making one of the bigger splashes that afternoon. I didn't dare do a cannonball though as most of the time my butt hit bottom, and luckily it was just sand.We had a bite to eat and sampled fresh coconut for the first time, which
wasn't as good as the roasted coconut we had tried in Chiang Mai. We had been gone a good 3 hours and sadly had to board the bus back to town. After a quick stop to change out of our wet stuff and into clean clothes we were back in the thick of things. We had dinner and then decided to walk through some of the night markets. They weren't nearly as big as the one in Chiang Mai, but had different items. The biggest shocker was that at about 10:30/11:00 pm they all started packing up and going home. We found a keepsake for ourselves, and gave the lady a good price. Michelle was a little upset when she found out I paid almost $20 for two rocks. Carved into elephants and painted, but apparently made of rock, I hope to use them as book-ends when we get home.We got back to our room with enough time to pack up our stuff as we had to get our bags to the tour shop by 8:30 am the next day. Once again we had a television, so I watched a bit of B.B.C. One other weird thing we learned about Laos, is that there is only one Laos T.V. station, so many people simply watch Thai shows, and subsequently learn a lot of the Thai language. Also Lao and Thai are quite similar, so we've been told.
The next day we got up bright and early, thanks to Michelle and her trusty travel alarm clock. We found a tuk-tuk driver as we walked around the corner from our guest house. That's when the madness started. There was already a guy in the tuk-tuk, but being so early and seeing no one else on the road we leaned out and the tuk-tuk stopped. The guy in the back was upset and told the driver to keep going but he refused. We learned that the fellow traveler was going to the North bus station, we didn't know where that was but with half an hour before we had to be at the tour office we weren't worried. The tuk-tuk was weighed down heavily with all our bags and three people in the back, and it went along at a snails pace. We were slightly worried as we noticed him pass the street we needed but felt it was only fair that the first passenger be taken to his destination first. Soon though we wondered if we were going in the wrong direction.
I thought I saw a road sign that said South bus station. Our companion with his heavily accented English (French I assume) continued to inform the tuk-tuk driver and in response he just kept nodding his head, assuring us he was going to the right place. When we got to the South bus station it was 8:20. We were told not to arrive later than 8:25 as the van for the trek left at 8:30 sharp. We immediately got out and went looking for another tuk-tuk, the confused tuk-tuk driver got a mouthful from the French tourist who was now quite late and at the wrong bus station.
We ran over to a waiting driver and explained where we needed to go. The young man seemed to have no idea as we told him "white elephant adventures", so then we tried to tell him "down town, tourist offices, ATM". Anything that would give him an indication of where we were going. He started to give us a nod and say "yes yes" so we jumped into the back of his tuk-tuk. As we flew down the road I recounted the direction and yes we were headed the right way. About three blocks to our proper street he started looking back at us, I gave him encouragement and tried to explain where we were headed but we soon found the language barrier too much. He stopped at one guest house and looked at us hoping he had guessed correctly. We told him no and to keep going, he was going really slowly now and watching us for directions. Everyone on the road was passing us. We tried to get him to speed up by saying "fast, rapido, quickly, go go go" but he had one speed, and that speed was slow. Finally after two or three more stops we arrived at the right place and I awarded our bullied driver with a big fare for his troubles. We were about ten minutes late, and apologized to the other trekkers as we explained the frustration we had just escaped.
We met the two other gentlemen that we're going on the two day excursion with us. Dave and Gavin, Aussies that (although unknown to us) had asked for a challenging two days of intense trekking and kayaking. We were told a slightly different story about the "easy" trekking from our salesmen. We were soon to find out that we could keep up with the two gentlemen that were quite a bit more fit then us.
M We met Derek, the Canadian owner of the company, as well as our 2 guides Bandit and Lee, then were off. After dropping off the 1 day trekkers we were given our free breakfast of banana, orange, yogurt, an other unknown fruit that's kinda like an apple-pear, and some purple sticky-rice wrapped in banana leaf. After treking for a short time, we came to a cave where villagers had hid out during the American/Vietnam war. Although claustrophobic I decided to go in to experience the type of place many people had to hide out in. It was dark, damp and cramped. I could not imagine hiding out there while hearing planes going overhead, and possibily bombs dropped near by. When we were leaving
we saw a HUGE spider. Worse than that, we had to squeese right past it to get out of the cave. I went first and Jes reassured me it was still hanging out on the wall once I was through. Jes was the last to leave though and started telling us to hurry once past the spider as he could not see it and worried it was crawling on him. Once out I throughly checked him over, it was nowhere in sight. Phew.
We continued on hiking stopping many times to take pictures of the jaw dropping scenery. We really enjoyed getting to know our new Aussie friends as well as our two guides. Bandit would often sing as we went. They really worked very hard and would do anything for us. We stopped for lunch and rested on a log. We were given a huge portion of rice with a chicken stirfry in a tasty sauce. We each had one serving, which I couln't finish, while our guides shared one. We then continued on. Lee would continually tell Jes, "not much more up, most flat and down", although we found this to be untrue as we continually turned a corner to find more uphill, Jes needed the encouragement however. After a few hours we eventually got out of the up/down/up/down rhythm of the hills, and Jes got a chance to catch his breath and talk to the guides. Between the four foreigners we ended up teaching our Laos guides a few things. A little bit about computers, some English, and at one point the guys took turns teaching Bandit how a compass worked and what it meant by 90, 180, or 360 degrees. Lee and Bandit smiled all the way, even when they were confused. 
We walked past 2 villages. The first one was just for a short stop to sit in some shade and take a break. The second one had some ladies selling bracelets, and we needed to have a local tribe member take us to the next place for safety. Luckily our guides not only knew Lao and some broken English, but Bandit knew the local village language of the first place and Lee knew the language of the second one, as they had both grown up in a hill tribe villages, and had moved to the city to go to school and get work. As we walked by the kids would stare at us. We would wave and say "Sabadee", which is hello.. and then watch as the childrens blank stares changed to smiles as they waved back. We also saw many farm animals roaming around.
Near the end of the trek we were walking and started to hear a crackling/poping sound. When we asked our guides calmly told us, fire! As we came up the hill we could see a huge forest fire raging. There was a young boy standing very close to it. We were told the villagers were burning it so they could make rice fields. They did not seem too worried and we walked on. Our guides explained that the village we were going to has only been there for 7 years. Like many villages in Laos their source of income had been to grow opium but in the year 2000 the government cracked down on drug growing, and now they have moved down the mountain to an area where their new biggest income is growing hops for making beer. lolWe had read that 80% of Lao people live in villages. We asked our guides why they choose to stay and not move to the cities, they explained that they do not have money or education. In the village they live off the land, building thier houses with trees they cut down, eating food they grow, etc. If they moved to the city they would have to pay for rent, they would have trouble getting jobs as they are uneducated.. so they stay in the wilderness, where everything is free.
We were very happy when we finally made it to the village we would be staying at, we learned we had hiked a grueling 18kms in 6 or 7 hours. Once in the village we were surprised to see something we had not in the last two.. other tourists. There were three groups of tourist who had arrived, us, a group of 5, and a French couple who I attempted to speak French too with somewhat success. I worried that the villagers would feel like animals in a zoo as we came to observe their way of life, but it was really the oposite. As we walked through people of all ages would stop what they were doing and stare at us. They were always very nice and would say "Smila" which is hello in their language.
Bandit talked with a local villager, then we were shown our "rooms". We stayed in an upstairs portion of a village house. It was one big room with sheets hung up to separate the sleeping areas. The outside walls were weaved wood, and did not give much privacy at all. The beds were thin mattress on the floor with a mosquito net. Then it was shower time as we had become very sweaty hiking in the hot sun. The shower, which was made for the tourists as they usually put on a sarong and shower outside from a local pump, was a small cement building with no lights, but holes at the top to let in sun. Along the wall was a small shelf to put your clothes on. Besides that there was a large cement tub filled with freezing cold water, and a plastic scoop sat in it. There was also a low tap for filling the tub, and of course a drain in the middle of the small room. Still we were grateful that it was available.
Bandit and Lee worked hard preparing our meal for us. Again it was tasty and abundant. The spread included rice, veggies, and buffalo meat. After dinner Jes got a deck of cards and we taught Bandit and Lee, who had never seen cards, how to play a card game we call Janitor. They had so much fun. They were smiling and laughing the whole time. After seeing how much they liked playing cards Jes decided to give Bandit the deck as a gift.Once it got dark the villages generator powered up, and a few of the houses had TV`s. The house we were in had one and as we played cards a dozen people gathered around, their eyes glued to the TV despite the fact we were playing cards on the opposite side of the room. It was truley incredable, they did not talk to one another about the show and the kids did not get up and run around even during the commercials. It was like they were all in a trance. Lee then informed us that it was not even in their language as many of them know Laos; it was in Thai.
It was closing in on 10pm we asked our guides what time the generators would cut out. He asked the family and the response was whenever we go to bed. Once we went to bed they would turn off the TV and also go to bed. We felt a little ackward as we did not want to pull them away from the TV, but also did not want to keep them up all night. It was true, once we went to bed everyone left and jumped into bed also. That night we had a hard time sleeping. Not only was the bed hard, but we could hear cows walking around with their cow bells ringing, a baby kitten crying, roosters crowing at all hours of the night, and other strange sounds.
The villagers were up and at 'em at 6am. We rolled out of bed by 8am. After brushing our teeth in a place we hoped the kids would see and be encouraged, we enjoyed breakfast, again prepared by our guides. After using the outhouse, I witnessed the French gentleman using an electric razor. There were about 10 kids and a man just staring at him perplexed. The French man showed the village man how in worked. He was fascinated. We packed up and then realized that we were missing Gavin. Dave went in search of him and found him playing a game of soccer with some kids. The "soccer ball" was a small rubber ball about 2 inches in diameter. The kids were always passing the ball to Gavin. He was the star of the game. Not only had Gavin spent time with the kids, but he approched a woman we had seen the day before limping as she worked in the feild. As he approached her he saw that she had a large cut on her foot between the toes. He took her to the water pump and explained as best he could as non of the villagers spoke English, that she needed to clean it out or it would get infected. Once clean he helped her put antiseptic cream on it and a bandaid. Then out of kindness he left the antiseptic cream with her. We would have like to stay longer, but we had to get moving as we did not want to be kayaking in the dark. Once again a local villager took us for about an hour up the path. It started with a very big incline and we worried what the day would be like, although we knew we were only hiking for 2 hours, then kayaking the rest of the way back. After the first big incline it smoothed out and we enjoyed an easy hike talking along the way. We then crossed a huge bamboo bridge and made it to where we would be kayaking.
After our last kayaking experience we were a little nervous, and it was not long before we could see that Gavin and Dave were quite experienced. The river was quite low as we were visiting during the dry season, so we had to avoid many rocks, and at a few points almost got stuck. We paddled for an hour down calm water enjoying the view, then stopped at a beach area for lunch. After scaring away the local buffalo pack that was sitting on the beach when we arrived, we had lunch. Afterward we swam for a bit in the river, watching as fishermen nearby attempted to scare fish into their nets.
After our last kayaking experience we were a little nervous, and it was not long before we could see that Gavin and Dave were quite experienced. The river was quite low as we were visiting during the dry season, so we had to avoid many rocks, and at a few points almost got stuck. We paddled for an hour down calm water enjoying the view, then stopped at a beach area for lunch. After scaring away the local buffalo pack that was sitting on the beach when we arrived, we had lunch. Afterward we swam for a bit in the river, watching as fishermen nearby attempted to scare fish into their nets.Once we started back down the river we came to our first set of rapids. There were 3 main sets of rapids in total. The first set we made it through without too much trouble. On the next set though we did not last long before tipping. I could not hold onto the kayak as the current was so strong. Jes did and the guides were soon at his side as I stood on a rock. A local man fishing told me to go to the side. I assumed he knew the river so started that way. After a few steps I was swept away. Jes was yelling at the guides to grab his flip-flop which was floating down the river, then as I went by he stopped, and yelled "forget my shoe, get my wife!" rofl
Our guides told me to swim to the bank closest to me and I managed to get there with only a scraped up knee. I was very glad I had a life jacket on and a helmet this time. They got Jes to the side with the kayak, then Lee came over with his Kayak to pick me up. A little shaken up, but ok, we were back at it. Then came the second set of rapids. We made it through the hard part, but then just at the end we hit a big rock and it sent us into the water again. This time we were able to stand on the big rock and get back in without much trouble. Needless to say our guides kept a close eye on us for the rest of the trip down the river.
Our sore arms were very happy to see our bus after 4 hours of kayaking under some tense conditions. Kayaking we have decided is really a marrige test. You either break and start screeming at each other or bond and work together to push through. "Team Ball" was happy to be back on dry land, although we would say we did enjoy the trip as tense as it was. We loaded up the kayaks onto a large tuk-tuk headed down the road back into town. We made a stop at someone's house to drop off the kayaks and heard quite the commotion coming from next door. We found a bunch of men standing in a circle and staring toward the ground, Lee explained they were watching a cock fight. They are quite common in Laos I guess. The 3 guys went over to watch, but I felt a little out of place, so I stayed with our bags. They said they were surprised as it was not as grewsome as they thought it might be.
We then went back to the travel agency and said goodbye to our guides. After getting settled in our new guesthouse we met up with Gavin and Dave to go out for our free BBQ dinner that we got for signing up for a 2 day tour. The waitress brought a bucket of burning coal to our table, and put it underneath and removed a center piece of the table. We then cooked our meat and veggies on a little metal plate right infront of us. Although neat the portion sizes were very small, particularly for 3 young men who just finished a day of hiking and kayaking, so we headed for the food market for some fish on a stick and dessert. After that we went to a popular nightclub called "The Hive". We met a fellow Canadian and an American there and talked until midnight. Exhausted we went back to our guesthouse where the friendly guy at reception "Potatoe" let us in. Yes he really goes by Potatoe. We asked what his real name was and he said to just call him Potatoe.
That night I woke up at 3am to the sound of mosquitos buzzing around my ear. I had not noticed them before and wondered where they were all coming from. I looked up and found the window open. I was sure the screen was shut and the curtains closed when I went to bed, but now the screen was pushed open and the curtain pulled through the bars on the window. I woke up Jes and we did a quick look at the room which looked fine. Then after killing about 5 mosquitos, we put our-the-head mosquito nets on, and went back to bed. The next morning is when we realized that my purse was missing. We didn't immediately put two and two together, so we figured I must have left it at the bar. We walked back there, but they did not have it. We then came back to the guesthouse and let Potatoe know what happened. Jes and Potatoe went for a walk around the back of the guesthouse.
That night I woke up at 3am to the sound of mosquitos buzzing around my ear. I had not noticed them before and wondered where they were all coming from. I looked up and found the window open. I was sure the screen was shut and the curtains closed when I went to bed, but now the screen was pushed open and the curtain pulled through the bars on the window. I woke up Jes and we did a quick look at the room which looked fine. Then after killing about 5 mosquitos, we put our-the-head mosquito nets on, and went back to bed. The next morning is when we realized that my purse was missing. We didn't immediately put two and two together, so we figured I must have left it at the bar. We walked back there, but they did not have it. We then came back to the guesthouse and let Potatoe know what happened. Jes and Potatoe went for a walk around the back of the guesthouse.
Although there was a fence around the building, they could see how a skinny person could get in, sure enough just outside the window was a bunch of things from my purse. Then as Jes walked around the building he looked at the clothes lines and sure enough my purse was hanging there. Potatoe went inside talk to the ladies who do the laundry for our guesthouse as the towels and other things on the clothesline belong to our guesthouse. They showed him a pile of things that were in my purse that they had thrown in the garbage, apparently the manager had found the purse in the back yard and had left it in the kitchen are for the staff. For some reason they had thought it was to go with the washing, so after dumping its contents and salvaging our notepad, yes they ripped out the written on pages, they washed the purse and hung it to dry! Jes was not impressed, he told them how bad it looked, and that the purse which has a Canadian flag on it should have not been tampered with whatsoever, but we doubted that the theft had been done by any of the staff, as they have access to the rooms for cleaning anyway.
Unfortunately as we went through the garbage we did not find my credit card or drivers licence. So immidately we headed to a local internet cafe to call to have it cancelled. The manager would be back in after a few hours, and Jes let Potatoe know we expected to speak with him upon returning. Mastercard let us know the card had not been used and immediately issued us a new one, it was very reassuring and we were quite happy with how they handled the call.
Afterward calling and stopping for breakfast we came back to the guesthouse and spoke with the manager. He was extremely apologetic, and every time we passed him he would look at the ground and say "very sorry, very sorry". The manager apparently called the police already but they said they would be by the next day. He also offered us a different room on the 2nd floor, but we said we would just move our stuff away from the window. Jes was happy with an apologie and an assurance that something would be done so noone would be able to push in the screen again.
We thought it was our last day in town and we wanted to do the things we had been putting off, so we headed for the museum. When we got there it was closed, although it was only 1pm, we figured that was because it was a holiday, so instead we decided to hike up the 346 stairs to the top of a hill with a temple on it. It was an incredible view and we were glad we did it although our legs were still quite sore from our trekking adventure. Once down we went shopping in the market a little more then had dinner. We attempted to book a bus out of town for the next morning but learned we had waited too long and everything for the next day was booked, so we called it a day and headed back to our room to watch some TV and go to bed.
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