Sunday, July 31. Tha Khaek to Tat Lo Waterfall, Laos, via the underwater bridge.

It stopped raining just long enough for us to load the bus this morning, and then started drizzling down again as we headed out of Tha Khaek.

We stopped for lunch along the way at a village known for its grilled chicken village. Up and down the entire street there was nothing but restaurants selling skinny, grilled chickens. We got some roasted corn, a chicken and some sticky rice for lunch.

Roasted corn was something we were starting to see a lot of, and for very cheap, so I wanted to try some. The colour of the corn was white, light grey, or light purple. It tasted like somewhere between white corn and indian corn or purple corn. I dug into the corn while we were waiting for the chicken to be done.

Our chicken was heated and served chopped up in a bowl. The feet were still attached to the drumsticks and the Head was also in the bowl. We were not feeling energetic or adventuresome enough to eat either of these, though. The chicken was good, but very lean in comparison what we get at the grocery store in the west. Good thing we had the corn and rice and that we weren't too hungry.

The roads after lunch weren't well maintained and very muddy from yesterday's rains, so it made travel very slow. The road was so slippery that at one point I thought we might slide off into a rice paddy. (Katie, at least the driver has slowed down a bit).

The landscape of this area was markedly different from much of what we experienced in Laos so far. Gone were the undulating mountainous roads and the jutting granite and limestone cliffs. Here there were mostly tree-scattered rice paddies on flat ground for as far as they eye could see. It looked similar to northern Thailand except with different style houses.

After about two hours of slow, bunking bronco roads (yes, that is two hours of slippery, pot-hole-filled mud roads), we came to a swollen river where the concrete bridge that crosses the water was an estimated 10-20 feet below the water level.

How does one cross an Underwater bridge you ask? Well at first we weren't sure. No one was attending a small old rusty ferry there, and the only thing that seemed to be grossing when we arrived were motorbikes on a makeshift 'ferry' consisting of longs laid across two longboats with a motor on one end of on longboat.

It took a while, but the ferry drivers eventually came down to get us going (they must have been having a drink up in the village we passed at the top of the hill). Once they got the boat (think metal raft with a tiny tugboat attached) lined up to the shore, we seemed to get onto the ferry alright. But once we got to the other side it was a different story. Due to the angle of the bank, the ferry had difficulty finding an angle to shore where they could get close enough for the bus to pull off without flooding the engine or getting stuck in the mud. Twice the ferry guys tried to get our driver to agree to pull off, but when the driver hiked up his jeans and walked in to test the height of the water, he was above his knees and told the ferry guys to pull back and attempt to get a bit closer. Eventually, on the third attempt our driver agreed to go and we held our breath, crossed our fingers, and said a prayer as the driver pushed forward. There were a lot of us holding our breath at each bump but the driver managed to slowly climb onto and up the steep, slippery slope of the shoreline to where the 'road' resumed.

Those from our group who had gotten off the bus while on the ferry had to hike their way through the water in the gap between the ferry and the shore, and then wade in ankle deep mud up to where the bus had paused. Stephen was one of these and we had to donate a large bottle of water to rinsing his feet and legs of the thick, caked-on mud.

It was another 45 minutes of muddy, bumpy roads until we finally hit pavement again. Everyone was so excited for a smooth ride again.

A short drive later we pulled off the main road to the Tat Lo Waterfall. We were staying in the bamboo cabins dotting the woods along the right bank of the falls. We unloaded our bags and as we entered the guesthouse complex we barely cleared a giant spiderweb that spanned the walkway above our heads. The diameter of the spiders legs was easily 6 inches, and it was mostly black with some yellow and red colouring on it. I snapped a close-up photo of the spider. It was pretty creepy looking!

Our 'bungalow' was of slightly more hardy construction than the ones in Nong Kiaw, and thought it was slightly cleaner with a western toilet it still had a good scrub to get off the coating of dirt/dust. At least it had a mosquito (well, sort of - it had a lot of hokes we had to patch).

We walked back to the hotel entrance to get a view of the waterfall. By then the rain had stopped and the sun had peeked out. The view from the hotel veranda/restaurant was impressive. We took the somewhat-in-need-of-repair bridge just past our hotel's entrance that spanned the river just downstream from the falls and crossed to where the main part of town was and followed our Lao guide up to the elephant camp (outside the posh hotel) to see if we could ride the elephants in the morning. The elephants had already been taken back into the jungle for the night, but we could come back and see them in the morning. Two of the three elephants were injured and so we would not be able to ride the elephants, but we could see them feed tomorrow.

We walked back down to where the main street was and walked around town. There were piles of pumpkins everywhere, outside all the buildings, and people were loadinbg some of the into trucks. Was there going to be a pumpkin festival? We walked through town to the Wat and had a look across the river and back up at the waterfall. There were children sitting by the overhang there, and mothers with small children bathing in the river just below, I assume in preparation for dinner.

As dusk was approaching, we walked back to our hotel and sat on the veranda and enjoyed the views of the waterfall while sipping on fruit shakes and beers until it was time for dinner.

Some others from our group joined us and we went to eat at Tim's for dinner. Tim is a Westerner who opened a traveller's cafe, and also built a library and computer center for the community. We had the typical Lao cuisine of curries, Laap, etc, then headed back to our bungalows. It had been a long day.

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Saturday, July 30. Kong Lor to Tha Khaek, Laos, via Lieng Kham.

This morning we left Kong Lor at 10am and it was still poring rain. We had a few hours to drive, and stopped in Lieng Kham for some snacks. We were going to stop at a cave on the way, but the last 24 hours of rain had washed out the road to get to it. It was still raining when we got to Tha Khaek.

We checked in to the Thakhek Travel Lodge (note the spelling of the hotel is different from that of our guidebook, which says Tha Khaek. There appear to be several other English spellings of the town, too). Our room was nice and big and the bathroom was almost bigger than some of the rooms we had stayed in on previous nights. It had a separate shower and a nice big vanity around the sink. The bed was fit nicely with a canopy mosquito net, too.

It continued poring well into the night with periodic downpores, but always a steady rain. We had some lunch and a snack at the hotel and I caught up on some emails and blogging before taking a nap.

At 6:30pm, a few of us and our Stray guide decided to head into town for some dinner. We hired a tuk-tuk into town for 20k Kip each roundtrip and had a simple dinner at one of the restaurants near where we would meet the tuk-tuk at 9:30.

Apparently the power at the hotel went out for a bit while we were gone, and it flickered a bit while we were getting ready for bed. Not much excitement for the day, but sometime you need a slow day to mentally and physically recuperate.
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Friday, July 29. Tat Leuk to Tham Kong Lor, Laos, via Lieng Kham.

We packed up camp around 7am and were on the road by 7:45am. I'm not sure if Mr. Porn Star still had some LaoLao in his system from the night before, but he was in a real giddy mood, telling jokes and cracking up laughing before he got anywhere near telling the punch line.

This morning, his main joke revolved around two tribes comparing their intelligence through one of the guys capturing his farts in pieces of bamboo. Stephen and I tuned out after the plot began revolving around 'bamboo farts', so I cannot tell you what the punchline was.

We grabbed Breakfast in a town near Tat Leuk. I had fried eggs and Stephen had an omelette and we shared some fried rice. I also had an iced coffee that was so strong and so sweet it was nearly undrinkable. The Lao people seem to like their strong caffeine - coffee thicker than the Turks and a large selection of caffeine heavy energy drinks like Red Bull (a Thai creation I am told) and M150 (the Lao version of the same drink). You see more locals drinking energy drinks than Americans drink soda.

We got back on the road and stopped a few hours later for lunch at Lieng Kham. Stephen an I were still really full from from breakfast so we only had some water and I bought some dried fruit.

We got to Kong Lor and checked into our hotel before leaving to walk down to the entrance to the Tham Kong Lor cave around 3pm. Tham Kong Lor is a 7.5km long river cave where the river flows under a mountain. We rented a headtorch (as I had forgotten mine back at our hotel) and boarded a shallow longboat across the pool to the cave entrance. There we walked into the cave and caught another shallow longboat, this time with a motor. Each boat had a capacity of 3 passengers and two boat hands, but they made Stephen and I take our own boat as he was so large.

The cave was very dark and you could tell the waters were quite high this year. The first part of the journey went fairly smoothly. The boats were a bit rickety so I was a little nervous about my nice camera getting wet, but soon we arrived at the lighted part of the cave where they have illuminated the more fascinating of the stalactites and stalagmites. Here you get out and walk along the path. Although our eyes adjusted well to the lighting, it was a bit difficult to get good photos in the cave in general, but it was truly the most spectacular cave of the trip.

After we left the walking portion, we boarded our boat again and were off. We bottomed out the boat twice on some sand dunes, and the second time happened just before we reached the exit of the cave. The propeller caught and we spun around and almost capsized as the boat began taking on water. The driver and guide jumped out to right the boat and managed to catch us before we completely went over I had my camera up in the air ready to keep it above water just in case. They managed to get us turned around despite the strong current. Stephen got the job of bailing the water as we proceeded further upstream.

We emerged from cave shortly after our near capsize into an open river and paused at a bank on the other side where there was the remnants of village or market where only a drink and snack stand remains (maybe they close the rest during rainy season). Our drivers didn't speak English, so we weren't sure what we were supposed to do. After about 10 minutes, one of the drivers came over and tried to make us think we needed to stay the night at a homestay as it was too dark to go back. Eventually we got him to understand that we had paid to go there and back and that we needed to go back today. Then just like that we all got back in our boats and headed back into the cave for the return journey.

Already nervous about another potential capsize opportunity, it got even worse when our drivers headlamp went out during a very curvy portion of the cave. Somehow the boy guide in front of me managed to get his off and walk it to the driver in the back without us tipping over or running into anything. Had I not had my camera, I probably wouldn't have been so nervous as we had lifejackets and would have eventually floated downstream out of the cave. I really didn't want to lose the photos from our trip, or my camera.

It was a very tense journey for me from that point as even though my headlamp contributed to the light of the driver, there really wasn't enough light to safely navigate in my opinion. Several times we thought we might crash into some rocks, and I said about a hundred prayers for our safety enroute. But we made it safely out of the cave and I just about kissed the ground.

But we still had the trip across the pond, and as we were the last boat to leave they loaded our boat up with 4 extra workers returning from the cave for the day. Zyrah, one of the gals from our trip, was also in our boat and she nearly hopped off the boat before we were fully docked as she too was nervous about the overcapacity of the boat.

When we got back to our room, there were som ants in our food bag. Despite most things being sealed up, we had to throw out most of what we had. We then took showers and headed down to the dining area of the lobby for some dinner before we were leaving to go watch a Baci (Baasii) ceremony. I had some stir fried pork with veggiesand rice, which was very tasty.
It was about a 10 minute walk to where the Baci ceremony was being held, but it took us nearly 20 min as it was now raining and the roads were quite muddy and hard to walk. The ceremony is performed to send out the bad spirits and call back the good spirits to ones body, as the local people believe they wander away and need to be called back fo safe travels so all your good spirits can travel with you. This is done through holding of a chicken or egg while white strings are tied around ones wrists, all while sitting around an altar made of banana tree leaves. Stephen and I just observed as we did not believe it was appropriate for us to participate given our strong Christian beliefs. But it was very interesting.

We also drank some home-brewed 'whisky' made of letting rice and corn ferment in a clay pot for several days. It tasted more of yeast than of alcohol.

I'm not sure if it was the 'whisky' or my dinner, but I soon felt quite sick to my stomach and had to excuse myself to head back to the hotel. On top of feeling ill, I discovered that the ants were back and had fund my daypack to be their target this time. I had to take evrery single thing out of the backpack and de-ant it and then had to completely rince out the backpack, too. It seems a renegade pretzel bit and some cashew crumbs that had broken free from an earlier snack were the culprits.

With the ants handled, Stephen was back and we went to bed on the incredivly springy mattress. It was so bad I had to sleep on top of my fleece doubled-up to protect my ribs from being poked. Oh the joys of budget travel......

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Thursday, July 28. Vientiene to Tat Leuk and Phu Khao Khuay NPA, Laos.

We got up in time to go down to join everyone for breakfast in the lobby at 9am. We would be losing half our group today, and we were really looking forward to a last morning together. Zyrah and I really wanted to see the COPE visitor center and exhibit before we were departing at 11am, but there wasn't much time and we were torn between spending time with our departing friends and seeing this well acclaimed exhibit about the secret war and US bombing of Laos. Fortunately, our Lao and Stray guides said we could stop enroute to our next stop, which was a camping excursion in a national park.

We depart 11am from the hotel, as planned, said our goodbye's to friends departing, and welcomed one new passenger for our trip south. We stopped down the street at a western grocery store next to the Joma Bakery Cafe to buy lunch to eat enroute later. We bought some Doritos for about $4 (pricey, I know, but after several weeks without seeing any familiar salty snacks, we were craving them). We also got some oatmeal cashew cookies and then two sandwiches from the Joma Bakery.

Our next stop was at the COPE visitor center. COPE is an organisation that provides locally-made, high-quality prothetics for those who have lost limbs in explosions caused by unexploded bombs that were dropped on Laos during the Vietnam war. There are an estimated 80,000 remaining cluster bombs and pineapple bombs still undetonated across Laos, many located along the Ho Chi Minh trail area of Southern Laos and in the hills and mountains near the Vietnam border in Northern Laos. COPE also helps provide prothetics for those injured in vehicle accidents.

The COPE visitors center is an educational facility where locals and international visitors can learn about when and where the bombs were dropped, what they look like, and what to do if you find an unexploded bomb to enable crews to come safely dispose of it.

Although Lao people are very forgiving and welcoming of Americans, despite the history between our two nations, diplomatic relations have definitely been affected and the Laos government is still skeptical of receiving any aid or assistance from the US -- as is seen by their demonstrated response to building a monument to the dead killed in the conflict with the concrete from the US that was offered to help rebuild the bombed out runways in Vientiene after the conflict ceased. Wouldn't you be skeptical, too, if your country was the recipient of more bombs per square mile than any other place in history?

It was a very sobering part of the trip, and I was encouraged at how much COPE was doing to help those affected return to as much a normal life as possible. I bought several items in the giftshop to give as gifts. Thought I could have gotten these same items for a fraction of the price elsewhere, I was happy to be supporting a good cause and even gave a little extra as a donation.

We were now hungry and it was definitely lunchtime, so we dug into our sandwiches as we boarded the bus. The Joma sandwiches were positively delicious! I only wish we had bought more....

On our way out of town we stopped at a food market that locals use for our Lao guide Porn to pick up some items to cook at the campsite for our dinner tonight. We would be camping next to the Tad Leuk Waterfall at the Phu Khao Khuay NPA this evening.

The market was very colourful and very much not anything like what we have in the west. Everything is open air. The only thing refrigerated was the meat from the butcher and a few sodas. Porn bought Coriander, some large cuts of beef, tomatoes, onions, bamboo shoots and a very large bag of sticky rice to put into the cooler in the back of the bus. We'll see what he makes of it later.

We then had about a 1.5 hour drive before we stopped at small town at turn-off to national park to buy water and beer for the evening. Then it was a 30 min drive on dirt road into the park and to the waterfall and camp.

There are two large streams tha feed together just before Tat Leuk. The waterfall itself is quite powerful at the moment with a 2-3 story drop of fast-rushing water. Our Stray guide says that during the dry season the water flowing over is quite tame and people are able to swim in both the upper and lower pools.

The camp overlooked the waterfall drop, and the roar of the water was constant in the background. The food hall (a large timber pavillion with tables and chairs) was right on the edge of the rock overlooking the water and next to it was a large clearing where the tents are usually set up. As it was expected to downpore that night, the park ranger and his friend set up the 5 tents for our group on the very large porch of the visitor's center (a large building with simple exhibits about wildlife, vegetation, and conservation in the national park) that was just a dozen meters or so up the hill from the food hall.

Phu Khao Khuay NPA was home to several dozen elephants that were living and breeding quite successfully, but there have been issues with poachers and the park authorities have to do regular surveys to catch and prosecute poachers. The sentences are fairly harsh, including fines and jail time. For an elephant you could possibly lose your life.

While Porn began making friends with the park rangers and starting preparations for dinner, the rest of us went along the path to find a swimming spot upstream where water was calmer. Just downstream from where the two streams met there was an large, shallow eddy. The water was cool and refreshing in the hot afternoon sun.

I'm not sure how long we were down there, but it felt great just sitting an relaxing in nature's cool pool. Stephen decided to play a game of seeing how close he could get to the current in the center of the raging stream without being drawn in. When it was time to head back, he drifted downstream to the eddy closer to camp while I brought back his shoes.

After changing and getting our tents ready, we headed down to the food hall to check on dinner. Porn was cooking away over an open fire that was very smokey, and so we sat down and broke open the Doritos with a beer.

There was an annoying cat that kept jumping up on the table and howling at us for some food. It got so annoying that every time we removed her from the table she made it back that we had to lock her in the men's bathroom across the room.

The food hall was surrounded by trees with little breeze and the air was so still, humid and scorching from the day's sun that Stephen and I went down the steps to sit along the waterfall on the cool rocks with our feet in the cool water. It was the only way to keep from sweating immensely. Down by the waterfall everything else was drowned out by the sound of the falling water and it was very soothing and relaxing.

It was getting dark, so we went back up to the food hall in anticipation for dinner. Food was served shortly after dark, the tables lit only by small oil lamps made from old M150 beverage bottles. Porn had made grilled beef strips marinated in lemongrass, with steamed bamboo shoots, the reheated sticky rice, and Porn's special homemade dips (think Lao version of Salsa, one a roasted tomato juice and the other a tomato and onion puree, both with with coriander and local spices for taste and chilis for heat). It was absolutely delicious!

The ranger and his friend were getting really drunk now off of their Lao Lao moonshine, which had a stick in it. The ranger kept talking to our Stray guide, the gist of which was something about our guide being a stud and wondering which gal from the group he was going to hook up with that night. Our guide tride to explain that isn't how his interaction with the group works, but the ranger couldn't wrap his head around it. In Lao culture it is absurd to them to think a guy is single by choice unless he is working the field. Their idea of a young man's motivations is very simple and doesn't allow for men to be motivated other than through physical desire in these circumstances. But our Stray guide was a proper gentleman and definitely wasn't swayed by their prodding.

We went to sleep fairly early as it was so dark and there was little else for us to do. Besides, we would be getting up quite early. The tents were spacious and we had small padded mats to sleep on, but there was poor ventilation (I think because we set them up so close together, and the wind was being blocked by the building and the other tents. Stephen was sweating just lying still. I put in my ear plugs and fell to sleep quite quickly.

In the morning I would discover Stephen had turned himself around and had his head practically out the the door to the tent. He had turned around trying to get any air he could -- he had been kept up by the sweat trickling down him and in the middle of the night was trying anything to resolve the matter. Poor guy.

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Friday, July 29. Tat Leuk to Tham Kong Lor, Laos, via Lieng Kham.

We packed up camp around 7am and were on the road by 7:45am. I'm not sure if Mr. Porn Star still had some LaoLao in his system from the night before, but he was in a real giddy mood, telling jokes and cracking up laughing before he got anywhere near telling the punch line.

This morning, his main joke revolved around two tribes comparing their intelligence through one of the guys capturing his farts in pieces of bamboo. Stephen and I tuned out after the plot began revolving around 'bamboo farts', so I cannot tell you what the punchline was.

We grabbed Breakfast in a town near Tat Leuk. I had fried eggs and Stephen had an omelette and we shared some fried rice. I also had an iced coffee that was so strong and so sweet it was nearly undrinkable. The Lao people seem to like their strong caffeine - coffee thicker than the Turks and a large selection of caffeine heavy energy drinks like Red Bull (a Thai creation I am told) and M150 (the Lao version of the same drink). You see more locals drinking energy drinks than Americans drink soda.

We got back on the road and stopped a few hours later for lunch at Lieng Kham. Stephen an I were still really full from from breakfast so we only had some water and I bought some dried fruit.

We got to Kong Lor and checked into our hotel before leaving to walk down to the entrance to the Tham Kong Lor cave around 3pm. Tham Kong Lor is a 7.5km long river cave where the river flows under a mountain. We rented a headtorch (as I had forgotten mine back at our hotel) and boarded a shallow longboat across the pool to the cave entrance. There we walked into the cave and caught another shallow longboat, this time with a motor. Each boat had a capacity of 3 passengers and two boat hands, but they made Stephen and I take our own boat as he was so large.

The cave was very dark and you could tell the waters were quite high this year. The first part of the journey went fairly smoothly. The boats were a bit rickety so I was a little nervous about my nice camera getting wet, but soon we arrived at the lighted part of the cave where they have illuminated the more fascinating of the stalactites and stalagmites. Here you get out and walk along the path. Although our eyes adjusted well to the lighting, it was a bit difficult to get good photos in the cave in general, but it was truly the most spectacular cave of the trip.

After we left the walking portion, we boarded our boat again and were off. We bottomed out the boat twice on some sand dunes, and the second time happened just before we reached the exit of the cave. The propeller caught and we spun around and almost capsized as the boat began taking on water. The driver and guide jumped out to right the boat and managed to catch us before we completely went over I had my camera up in the air ready to keep it above water just in case. They managed to get us turned around despite the strong current. Stephen got the job of bailing the water as we proceeded further upstream.

We emerged from cave shortly after our near capsize into an open river and paused at a bank on the other side where there was the remnants of village or market where only a drink and snack stand remains (maybe they close the rest during rainy season). Our drivers didn't speak English, so we weren't sure what we were supposed to do. After about 10 minutes, one of the drivers came over and tried to make us think we needed to stay the night at a homestay as it was too dark to go back. Eventually we got him to understand that we had paid to go there and back and that we needed to go back today. Then just like that we all got back in our boats and headed back into the cave for the return journey.

Already nervous about another potential capsize opportunity, it got even worse when our drivers headlamp went out during a very curvy portion of the cave. Somehow the boy guide in front of me managed to get his off and walk it to the driver in the back without us tipping over or running into anything. Had I not had my camera, I probably wouldn't have been so nervous as we had lifejackets and would have eventually floated downstream out of the cave. I really didn't want to lose the photos from our trip, or my camera.

It was a very tense journey for me from that point as even though my headlamp contributed to the light of the driver, there really wasn't enough light to safely navigate in my opinion. Several times we thought we might crash into some rocks, and I said about a hundred prayers for our safety enroute. But we made it safely out of the cave and I just about kissed the ground.

But we still had the trip across the pond, and as we were the last boat to leave they loaded our boat up with 4 extra workers returning from the cave for the day. Zyrah, one of the gals from our trip, was also in our boat and she nearly hopped off the boat before we were fully docked as she too was nervous about the overcapacity of the boat.

When we got back to our room, there were som ants in our food bag. Despite most things being sealed up, we had to throw out most of what we had. We then took showers and headed down to the dining area of the lobby for some dinner before we were leaving to go watch a Baci (Baasii) ceremony. I had some stir fried pork with veggiesand rice, which was very tasty.
It was about a 10 minute walk to where the Baci ceremony was being held, but it took us nearly 20 min as it was now raining and the roads were quite muddy and hard to walk. The ceremony is performed to send out the bad spirits and call back the good spirits to ones body, as the local people believe they wander away and need to be called back fo safe travels so all your good spirits can travel with you. This is done through holding of a chicken or egg while white strings are tied around ones wrists, all while sitting around an altar made of banana tree leaves. Stephen and I just observed as we did not believe it was appropriate for us to participate given our strong Christian beliefs. But it was very interesting.

We also drank some home-brewed 'whisky' made of letting rice and corn ferment in a clay pot for several days. It tasted more of yeast than of alcohol.

I'm not sure if it was the 'whisky' or my dinner, but I soon felt quite sick to my stomach and had to excuse myself to head back to the hotel. On top of feeling ill, I discovered that the ants were back and had fund my daypack to be their target this time. I had to take evrery single thing out of the backpack and de-ant it and then had to completely rince out the backpack, too. It seems a renegade pretzel bit and some cashew crumbs that had broken free from an earlier snack were the culprits.

With the ants handled, Stephen was back and we went to bed on the incredivly springy mattress. It was so bad I had to sleep on top of my fleece doubled-up to protect my ribs from being poked. Oh the joys of budget travel......

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Wednesday, July 27. Vang Vieng to Vientiene, Laos.

We came down from our room with our bags expecting to load them right away on the Stray Bus. The bus wasn't there, so Steve stayed with the bags while I went to get a banana 'pancake' for breakfast at the cart on the corner.

These 'pancakes' aren't made like the traditional Crepe or pancake. She rolls out a piece of dough into a round sphere (like with a pizza dough) that is very thin. Then she lays it on a frying sheet with oil to fry one half. Then the banana slices are added and it is folded into a square, which is fried further. Then the
'Pancake' is cut into squares to eat with tiny chop stix.

After returning with my Banana Pancake and a fruit shake, the Stray Bus was still not there. We then learned that one of the 4 girls who was to join our bus that morning had passed out and hit her head early that morning, and she was rushed to the local hospital. Our Stray guide and the local Laos guide had gone to the hospital with the other three girls to check on her progress and offer translation services.

Our guides returned with the bus about 10:30am, 30 min after our scheduled departure. The injured girl would need to be transferred to a larger hospital in Thailand and her friends had cone back to pack up their things and ride with her in the medical transport. So we loaded up our luggage and theirs and dropped them off at the hospital to make sure they were safely on their way before we got on our way to Vientiene.

[We were later told the gal was being held at the hospital in Thailand as she continued to have seizures due to the brain swelling from her head trauma. We were also told they did an amateur job of stitching her up in Vang Vieng and that one was better off having a friend stitch you up the healthcare was so unadvanced there. Note to self and other travellers to be extra cautious when engaing in high risk activities -- one more reason to rent that lifejacket or helmet and to stay away from 'happy' foods and drinks.]

We stopped by the Tham Jung Cave on the way out of Vang Vieng. It was a large, cavernous cave approx 200 steps up into a mountainside. There was a clearly marked path through the cave and made for easy exploration. Definitely one of the more impressive ones we have seen on this trip.

Along the route we stopped at the Thaua Village near a fishing reservoir. They had all sorts of fish bagged and ready to sell at their roadside stands. None of it was live and none of it was refrigerated or on ice. I bought some Squid snacks (think Cheetos in the shape of a squid and flavoured like squid) -- something interesting to eat as a snack later in the day. They tasted pretty good! Like squid, as advertised.

We arrived in Vientiene at around 3:30 and checked in to the Intha Phoungchampa Hotel, before reboarding the bus for a short city tour. We visited first the Thatluang Stupa, which is the national symbol of Laos. This was the third one, built in 1930's by French, as first two were burnt down by raiders. We also visited a neighbouring Wat that had a very large reclining Buddha under construction.

Next we went to the Victory Arch, which was built in 1950s and 60s to commemorate those killed in war. It is like the Loas version of the Arc de Triumphe. In an efort to snub US efforts to apologise for their indiscriminate, secret bombing campaign, the Arch was built with concrete from US that was meant to repave the Vientiene airport's runway. For this reason it is referred to as the 'vertical runway'. As the Arch was never finishedn, the surfaces are largely left undecorated (only the underside is partially finished with gold and decorative tiles. A placque near the monument actually describes itself as a 'concrete monster', as it is seen by locals as largely unaethetic. Compared to most monuments in the US, however, it seemed to me quite decorative. It just goes to demonstrate the Lao people's love for decor.

After returning to the hotel, Stephen and I went for a walk to a nearby western grocery store, as he was hungry and wanted a snack that would not disrupt his tummy. We then headed back to rest and shower before dinner.

We all met up and went to a nearby Indian restaurant located along the Mekong. This Indian food was much better than the Nazim indian place in Luang Prabang. The best dish was one selected by a fellow traveller, the vegetarian Butter Masala, which had cashews, pineapple, bananas, potatoes, etc.

Following dinner we retired to a rooftop bar for after dinner drinks where I ordered a Lao Gria for 35k Kip, not realising it wouldbe a massive pitcher of the Lao Lao version of Sangria. I got a whole pitcher of drink for less than one glass of Malibu Rum and Coke. It was a little on the sweet side, but otherwise fairly pleasant.

In the morning we would lose half of our group as there would be only 7 of us continuing further South into Laos. The rest were returning to Bangkok to go down to the Thai islands or flying to Hanoi to explore Vietnam. We said goodbyes before heading to bed, but agreed to all get up and have breakfast together at the same time.
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Tuesday, July 26. Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng, Laos.

We loaded the Stray bus at 7am and were on the road by 7:20. We had our same Stray guide back, but we had been introduced to a new Lao guide, Pompillon but he goes by Porn, during the waterfall tour yesterday. The Stray team affectionately refer to him as 'Porn Star' and he finds this quite humorous. He seems to like telling what we would consider off-color jokes, but you don't always catch on right away as his accent and translation are not always clear at first. He told us this one local village joke about three bulls and a cow that needed to cross a river. Either Stephen or I can enlighten you about this story upon our return as it is better told orally than in writing. But we could tell there would be some fun times ahead with this jolly fellow -- in fact he kind of reminds me of a Lao version of Stratus (he is my mom's crazy, fun Greek, chef, limo driver husband for those of you not familiar with my family).

As we pulled out of Luang Prabang into undulating hillsides, the sun shone high and bright, and as we climbed there was a haze of low clouds hovering in the valleys, giving the drive an surreal feel as we wove between picturesque jungle- and Banana Tree-covered mountains.

We stopped at a little roadside town for a restroom break, snacks and walk around at around 9:15. Everywhere you looked there were gorgeous and dramatic views. Then it was on the road again for another 1.5 hours.

We were in the Phu Khoun region, which means 'high mountains', with an elevation of 1,800m you can see why (that's over a mile high and similar in elevation to Denver, Colorado USA).

We arrive in Vang Vieng and check in to the SomPhaThai Guesthouse, which is right near where all the tubing vendors leave from. The guesthouse has spacious rooms and newly tiled bathrooms. It is the first place we have stayed since Bangkok with a fresh, crisp coat of paint in the rooms. Also, it is the first bathroom since Bangkok to have bright bathroom lighting to enable me to tweeze my eyebrows. And although we do not have air conditioning, the building is brick/cement and remains fairly cool with the fan blowing.

We decided not to go tubing on the river as the water was high and fast-moving, so it was relatively expensive for the anticipated 1-hour journey on the river at 55k Kip, plus 60k deposit and 20k for lifejacket. There were also several bars along the river on the way and we didn't feel like fishing drunk tourists out of the river. Besides, unlike our UK travel mates, we could go tubing in the US on much cleaner rivers just about any summer. Instead, we took a tuk-tuk with Kirsten out to Cave Tham Phu Kham and the Blue Lagoon to cool off there.

It was a bumpy, 30+ minute tuk-tuk ride out to the Cave and Lagoon. Recent rains had left a lot of muddy areas that the river had to slow down and carefully navigate. We passed by a variety of villages ad rice paddies along the way and most of the children said Sah-bei-dee (hello) and waved as we went by.

The park cost 10k Kip to visit the lagoon and the cave. The aqua green-blue waters of the lagoon were very inviting after a hot day. The water level was very high to the point where the tree swings hanging over the water were 1-2 feet below the surface, so clearly the current water level is 3-5 feet above normal. The water was cool, crisp, but very refreshing.

After a bit of swimming, we decided to go explore the cave. It was a steep 100m ascent up steep, uneven rocks to the cave entrance. The cave was 5 degrees or so cooler than the outside air, and the mouth of the cave quickly opened into a big cavern with ribbon-like stalactites hanging from the ceiling. Inside the cave was a reclining Buddha statue. We couldn't go too far inside the cave as we weren't wearing appropriate footwear or a flashlight. But we definitely got a good feel for it.

We went back down and swam a little bit longer, before heading back around 5pm to get back for a shower and short nap before dinner.

We ate dinner at a riverside restaurant that had the typical mix of Lao and Western food. It was nice. And then we retired to a riverfront bar down the way that had pool tables and small tables with cushions to sit around. It wreaked of pot, but then again all the bars in Vang Vieng did, and most had 'happy' additives to choose to be added to your food or drink. We, of course, did not participate. But like pot smoking in Amsterdam, people tended to look at you a little strange for not paticipating. In their view, why else would you go to Vang Vieng.

I retired after one drink. Steve had already returned to our room, but we heard others in the group had stayed out into the wee hours of the morning.

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