14
th
– 25
th February 2016
 |
| Kuang Si Falls |
On the first
day in Luang Prabang in Laos Daimi and I booked joined an organised tour group that was
going to Kuang Si Waterfalls. The group we were with were the kind of tourist
that had come to Laos to party. They had brought beer and speakers so, once we
arrived, we ditched them and went off on our own.
 |
| Beautiful Place |
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| Can't see the tourist behind me |
This was one
of the most beautiful sites I’ve seen in SE Asia. There was a cascade of
waterfalls all following down into stunning blue pools. It was really hot and
the water was freezing so we really wanted to get in. We decided to walk up to
the top and explore first and then cool off.
 |
| Awesomeness |
Unfortunately,
like most tourist photos you don’t see the army of people around you getting in
your way with massive selfie sticks. It was still the Chinese holidays so I
think there were a lot of them there. There were also a lot of other westerners
that had brought alcohol and were playing music loud. This was mostly down at
the lowest and biggest pool where people were taking it in turns to jump of a
big rock into the pool. It really took away from the wonder of the place
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| This place is actually real |
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| The big falls |
Further up
there was less people and it was a bit more peaceful. I’m not sure why because this
was the best site. I thought it was just the cascading waterfalls, and clearly
other people do too but there is a massive set of falls at the top which looked incredible.
Almost too good to be believed.
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| Stairs next to the waterfall |
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| Wetlands at the top |
We found a
set of stairs that ran up the side of a smaller waterfall that took us to the
top of the big waterfalls. Up there we found more pools. I thought it would be
a simple river but it was almost like wetlands and there were bamboo bridges
taking you on a path to the other side.
 |
| Daimi on the dodgy bridge |
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| Long way down |
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| Holding on |
We had some
fun up here walking along the bamboo bridges and peering over the top of the
waterfall. It had been a very steep climb to get to the top and what goes up
must come down. My knees were hurting by the time we reached the bottom.
We walked
back down to the ‘party area’ where we cooled off in the water. The water was
freezing! It was quite hard to get in. Daimi didn’t even manage to get all the
way in because the small fish kept biting her feet and she hated it. Free foot
spa!
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| Wild bear! |
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| OK, not wild |
On the way
into the waterfalls there is a small bear sanctuary. We skipped this on the way
in as there was already a large crowd but we popped our heads in on the way
back. It was included in the ticket. I thought the bears looked quite bored and
one looked really quite fat. Maybe that’s normal.
 |
| Crashing the wedding |
This is
possible the most bizarre experience I’ve ever had. As our mini bus driver took
us to the waterfalls we had passed a wedding. He said they would be dancing when we
drove back. Someone asked if we could join them and he said yes. I thought he was joking but he wasn't.
We stopped
there on the way back. Everyone jumped off the bus and walked straight in. I
hung around at the back for a second while the others joined in the dancing. I
felt so bad that we were crashing this couples wedding. If this happened at home
they would be furious. As I stood at the back one guy did get angry but only
because I wasn’t dancing. He dragged
me over to the rest of the group.
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| Dancing |
 |
| Alcohol for you, you and you |
This was so
weird! I joined in the dancing with the others whilst one guy poured out a
mouthful of beer for everyone. They were so happy that we were there. They loved it.
We coped their dance moves, they copied ours. The woman kept pushing their
female friends next to the guys in our group and pushing us together.
 |
| Shaking the hips |
Daimi had
thrown on a sarong over the top of her bikini but kept adjusting it meaning she
was momentarily flashing everyone. The women gasped and giggled. She kept doing
it. In the end one of the woman found some elastic so that it wouldn’t fall
down.
 |
| Wedding photo |
As I said,
it was all quite bizarre but brilliant. We all enjoyed ourselves and so did the
wedding party. All except the bride it seems judging by this photo. We left
after 20-30 minutes and let them carry on with their celebrations.
The tour had
taken the whole day so there wasn’t much time left for anything else. I think Diami and I went on a burger hunt and a couple of drinks before going to our
beds.
 |
| Mount Phousi |
The next
Daimi would be leaving around noon. I would be staying another night but she
has less time than I do and wanted to crack on. We got up early for a self-made
walk of the city starting with Mount Phousi.
 |
| Hell of a view |
 |
| Stop! |
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| The top of the hill |
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| All of Luang Prabang |
The monument
at the top really wasn’t anything special but the view was awesome. There were
360 degree views of the whole town, the Mekong River and the mountains around.
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| Temple |
 |
| The old king |
We stopped
off at the Royal Palace (now a Museum but it closes for a few hours in the middle of the day
which is rather inconvenient. We wondered kind of aimlessly down to the river.
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| The river flowing into the Mekong |
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| Bamboo bridge with monks |
We found a
bamboo bridges that crossed a smaller river next to the Mekong. It cost 5000kip
to walk across which is basically nothing so we did. This creaky construction
felt like it could fall down at any time. I was conscience one of the panels
would give way and I would fall through.
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| The village |
 |
| The Mekong |
On the other
side of the river there was a dirt road that led into village full of monks. We
walked through it for a bit but there didn’t seem to be anything else to see so
we went back.
 |
| The Royal Palace |
At this
point it was time to say goodbye once again to Daimi. It would only be for a day as
I would see her in the next town. I went back the Royal Palace. Its no Buckingham Palace but I was interesting to see how the royals
live in Laos. You weren’t allowed to take photos so I’m finding it hard to
remember what I saw.
 |
| Another king? |
One thing
I’m gutted to have missed out on was the UXO Visitor Centre. Its about the
unexploded bombs that litter the countryside in Laos. Its not exactly something
I wanted to see but felt like it was something I needed to see in order to
fully understand the history of the country. I would still get the chance to
learn more about at another centre in Vientiane but this one was supposed to
be better.
 |
| The culprit |
I’m not one
for taking pictures of food. No one wants that on their facebook feed. It just
so happens that by taking this photo of a delicious looking meal, I caught the culprit red
handed. This plate of edible goodness gave me food poisoning! I woke up in the
middle of night a few times to deal with it and then I had to catch a 6 hour
bus to Vang Vieng the next day.
 |
| Huge mountains |
I had got
through the worst of it overnight so I managed to hold my shit together on the
bus, literally! But I did feel quite sick and it took all my focus to not throw
up so I didn’t get to appreciate the stunning scenery passing by the window.
 |
| Scary mountain roads |
One thing a
did notice was the huge landslide that must have taken place pretty recently as
they were still rebuilding the road. Some of the barriers were still hanging
off the cliff which we had to drive inches away from to get through. It was a
little butt clenching and that’s something I did not need.
 |
| Vang Vieng |
Once I
arrived in Laos I went straight to bed and didn’t move for a few hours. It had
not been a pleasant day. I met Daimi in the evening and we went out for tea. I
was feeling a little better after I’d eaten and decided I would take on the
tubing the next day. Daimi was planning to leave after and wanted to have
friends with me when I did it.
I was
feeling OK in the morning so tubing was on although it was a bit of a faff
getting going. I waited a while for Daimi and some others she had met at her
hostel and then when we were walking to get the tubes we bumped into another
guy Kevin. We had bumped into him every day since getting the boat and he
wanted to join us tubing so we had to wait whilst he checked into his hostel
and got changed.
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| Getting out tubes |
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| At the starting point |
Eventually we got going. We were taken by tuk tuk up the river to the starting
point where we got given our tubes and jumped into the river. The water was
pretty cold but it was a hot day so pleasant enough.
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| The first bar |
It wasn’t
long until we got to the first bar. A man on the bank through a rope out to us
and towed us onto the bank. We stacked our tubes on the huge pile next to the
river and went and bought ourselves a beer. There was quite a lot of people
there already and a lot more drunk than we were. There was loud music and
people dancing but we found ourselves a bench and chatted for a while. I found
Sam and Alice who were an English couple I had spoken to at the hostel the day
before.
After a few
drinks we grabbed the football that was being kicked around and went onto a
little field next to the bar. I’m no footballer so I was in goal. I was still
as shit at it as I was in school but this time no one minded.
 |
| Cruising down the river |
The bar
began to empty as people realised there was a long way left to float. This time
we were on the water for a bit longer but this time we had brought beers with
us so we didn’t mind. It was the middle of the dry season so the river wasn’t
very high. I realised this as my arse kept hitting rocks. Quite a few times
there was only a couple of inches of water and I had to lie across my tune
rather than sit in it so that I didn’t beach myself.
 |
| Party time |
The second
bar was even more lively than the first. There was a hose pipe attached to a
pole just to randomly soak people whenever someone felt like it. We were told
that this was the last bar so we made the most of it. There was all kinds of music. I remember doing the Macarena! I loved it!
 |
| Just coz |
They brought
out some fire for limbo which was just too irresistibly. I seemed to have lost
the little flexibility I had but at least I didn’t get burned.
There was
still a long way to go so we got back on the river. We saw all the other bars
that had been ripped up when they clamped down on the tubing here. I think
people used to hurt themselves which wouldn’t surprise me. There used to be as
many as 27 bars before the government came in and changed everything. The only
bars open now are the ones owned by the police. Figures.
We bought
some more beers from a random guy on the bank. He waved us over with a sign
saying ‘Beer Lao’ so we paddled over. Everyone was quite drunk by now and my
arse was sore from hitting the ground so much.
We really
did have a long way to go and as the sun was setting, we were getting cold and
still not near the end. We spotted a tuk tuk doing pickups on the bank so we
jumped in that. This must be good business for them as there were about 5 or 6
tuk tuks waiting to pick up the stragglers to meet the 6 o'clock deadline. If we
were late we had to pay extra for the tubes.
Once we were
back in town we all went back to our hostels to get changed and then I met
Diami and our two new Dutch friends. We went for and Indian. I was feeling
pretty rough aftert this as wave 2 of the food poisoning was setting it. The
plan had been to go out that night but I certainly was not feeling up for it.
The next day
was such a non day. I was feeling pretty rough and still not up to much because
of the food poisoning. I think the tubing might not have been the best idea. I
seemed to have handed the batten on though as Daimi was now also ill from food
poisoning. She had got it from the Indian place the night before. I think they rushed
to cook it because they seemed to forget about her food and she had to ask for it.
The hostel
where Daimi was staying had a little restaurant out the front with these rugs
that had a pillow. They are quite hard to describe but quite comfortable to lie
back on and watch the TV. They had ‘Friends’ on loop. I must have watched about
10 episodes of friends that day!
 |
| Going exploring |
The next day
was much more productive. Diami had changed her plans to stay in Vang Vieng
whilst she recovered but she wasn’t up for doing anything. There’s a lot of
caves in the area and there are many tours taking you out to them. The most
popular is Blue Lagoon but I didn’t fancy being herded on a tourist route
today. I decided to go off into hills and explore for myself and this was much
more rewarding.
 |
| Through the farms |
I crossed
the rived on a bamboo bridge and walked west out of town. I was following a
path that I had found on my map that would take me to some caves. It was a dirt
road that was barely used and took me across some farm land. This looked pretty
cool against the backdrop of the big mountains.
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| Caves? |
My map was a
little vague so I thought I had arrived when I saw a man sat at a bamboo desk asking
me for money. I asked him if this was the caves and he said yes. It was more
like a small hole in the ground and not at all the place I wanted to see. The
man must have known what I was after but unfortunately that’s how they do things
in Laos. They will quite happily lie to your face to get money out of you. It
makes it very hard to trust anything people are saying. Its never a lot of
money but that’s not the point.
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| Conquered the hill |
Luckily my
money was completely wasted as these ‘caves’ were underneath a huge rocky mound
set apart from the rest of the mountains. I climbed to the top by climbing
rickety bamboo bridges and clambering over rocks. Not at all safe but I like
the lack of health and safety they have here.
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| Epic |
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| Amazing |
The view
from the top was staggering. The scenery around Vang Vieng is not to be missed.
Big karst limestone towers overlooking the farmlands next to the river. I sat up there a
little while taking it in. When I arrived there was a group of Americans at the
top playing music loud through a speaker but when they left it became a very
peaceful spot to sit at. One of the Americans left their t-shirt at the top and
as much as they had annoyed me, I thought I would be the good Samaritan and take
it down for him. He was grateful.
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| Into the jungle |
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| Tight squeeze |
I continued
along the path through more farmlands and into a valley to find the caves I had
been looking for. I paid another man for another ticket. If there's money to be
made then they’ll find it. I also got a torch as it was pitch black inside the
caves. The entrance was up a steep set of stairs and I had to squeeze through I
gap in the rocks to get in.
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| Where the river flows in wet season |
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| In the caves |
There was no
one in the cave but me and it was extremely spooky. The only sound I could hear
apart from my own footsteps was the gentle echoing drips of water from
somewhere in the cave. It was also pitch black. Once I was inside the cave I
turned my torch off for a second to see if I could see but that only freaked me out.
The cave was
quite long with many caverns to explore. There were a few wooden planks over
parts where the floor had given way and I was a little concerned I would step on
a rock that would fall through like some kind of trap door. There were various
parts roped off so there was a little bit of health and safety but I had a
feeling it had to be really bad for them to have done that. After about 20
minutes of slowly walking though the cave I decided I had gone as far as I dared.
It was eerily quiet and so dark. If I wasn’t on my own I would have gone
further.
Back in town
I had some lunch and then had a walk around the rest of the town. I walked
across the old airstrip which is now just a big lump of tarmac in the middle of
town. They had a wedding here over the weekend. Weddings are a big event in Laos. The music
starts blasting ear damagingly loud from 8am until the early hours and it goes on
for two days. My hostel was next to it so I invested in some ear plugs!
On my last
day in Vang Vieng and wandered aimlessly to another set of caves that were
marked on the local map that I had. These ones weren’t on trip adviser so I
didn’t expect to much. I just fancied the walk through the farmlands and
forests again. This time it was a couple of girls about 10/11 years old who
were asking me for money. This place really didn’t look official. Not that any
of them did but this one especially just seemed to be there in case anyone
wanders that way and they can charge them money.
These caves
weren’t even caves. Just a few big cracks in the rock you could scramble down.
I didn’t even take any pictures as they weren’t interesting. The path continued
in a vague direction I wanted to go in so I thought I would follow and it and
see if it would take me to some other caves I wanted to visit.
It worked
and I found where I wanted to go. Just before I got there I noticed some
children playing under a tree. As I past them one of them spotted me and held
out his hand, “Money” he said. “No chance” I replied and carried on walking.
Cheeky shit.
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| Watercave |
 |
| Go for a swim? |
I got to the
official path towards the cave and suddenly there were tourist everywhere. So
many Asian tourist with selfie sticks chucking peace signs. The main attraction to
this place is the crystal clear pool that you can swim in. It’s at an entrance
to a cave so if you’re strong enough you can swim against the current into the
cave where there is supposedly a big cavern. I didn’t do this as there were far
too many people there and I didn’t want to leave my bad unattended.
 |
| Suspension bridge |
I crossed a
big orange bridge that connected these caves to the town. I noticed that there
was a pay station that I had missed by walking the long way round. I had sort of
paid those to girls so I didn’t exactly feel guilty.
I met Daimi
at her hostel who was feeling better and was catching the afternoon bus down
to Vientiane. I said goodbye but, again, it wouldn’t be the last I saw of her
as the next day, after a quite night, I also caught the bus down to Vientiane.
The bus ride
was very uneventful. I barely even remember it.
I checked
into my hostel and went in search of food and who should I see walking down the
street, Diami! And to make this small world scenario smaller, I had noticed a
bag in my room that looked remarkably similar to hers and it turns out it was!
We had booked the same room in the same hostel. She was just returning from visiting the Buddha park which I never got round to
seeing.
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| The night market |
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| A statue of someone important |
We chilled
in the afternoon and then went to check out the night market next to the Mekong
River. There was a lot going on at these markets. It was packed with people and
the stalls were all selling the usual touristy stuff.
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| Cheap and very nasty |
We got some food
and went back to the hostel where we had been promised free vodka. It seems a
thing here to give out free alcohol. Its so cheap that its just like a hostel
that gives out free coffee or something. They charge a ridiculous amount for
coke though. It wasn’t even vodka, it was gin! Blugh! We googled it and it
turns out this is the cheapest alcohol in the world. $1 for the whole bottle.
It was disgusting and we gave up on it pretty quickly. There was a group of us
by this point and we decided we’d stick with the beers.
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| Back on the Mekong |
I didn’t do
a whole lot the next day. Diami was catching the overnight train that evening
and this time I didn't think I would be seeing her again. She was going to the Full Moon Party in southern Thailand. We hung around the hostel playing pool with a few people until it
was time for her to go.
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| Sunset at the river |
I went for a
run that evening and it was so dusty and smoky that I was coughing for the
next week!
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| That famous guy again |
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| The royal residence |
On my last
full day in Laos I went for a big walk to explore the city. Everything was more
or less within walking distance. The first stop was a statue which I think is
of the king because the royal palace is just behind it.
A twenty minute walk from the palace down the main highway there is the Laos answer to
the Arch de Triumph. The concrete that its made from was donated by the Americans to build a new airport but they built this instead. It’s a war
memorial dedicated to those who gave their lives for independence from France.
I walked around it and sat by the fountain for a while before continuing.
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| Pha That Luang |
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| Shiny |
Another
twenty minute took me to arguably the most iconic building in Laos (its on the
bank notes). Pha That Luang is a huge golden stupa in the middle of the city
that was originally built in the 3rd century. They must polish it
regularly because its very shiny.
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| Fancy building |
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| Another lazy buddha |
It was part
of a larger temple complex that was quite impressive when walking around. I sat
by the reclining Buddha and had my picnic lunch that I brought (cheap version
of pringles).
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| Bombs |
The last stop
was a bit less fun but had much more of an impact. The COPE visitor centre is
similar to the one I wanted to visit in Luang Prabang but this charity focuses
on helping those that have lost limbs due to the UXO bombs. There were lots of
rudimentary wooden limbs on display as well as the more recent developments. It
didn’t take many pictures as I didn’t feel like it was one of those places you
should be snapping away.
Next to the
limb section they had various relics and signs explaining about the secret war
on Laos. I also watched the documentary Bomb Harvest that explained a lot about
what happened here. For the Americans to have set foot in Laos during the
Vietnam War would have been a violation of international law so they just
bombed the shit out of it instead. This was done to stop the trade routes from
North Vietnam to its supporters, the Viet Cong, in the south.
They dropped
over two million tons of ordinance on Laos, 30% of which did not explore leaving
50 million bombs unexploded in the countryside of Laos. Thousands of people
have died since the war with a large portion of them being children searching
for scrap metal which is big business in Laos. The UXO charity are fighting
hard to destroy as many of these leftover bombs as possible. America have contributed
to the clean up. Since the war they have donated an amount equal to the money
spent in just two days of bombing!
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| Exercise time |
Anyway, rant
over. I walked back to my hostel. I did a lot of walking on this day. Just
before I got back I walked down the river and saw the locals doing there daily
exercise routine.
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| Goodbye Laos |
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| Crossing the Mekong, again |
That's the
end of that one. Another country ticked off the list. The next day and caught a
bus to the only train station in Laos which would take me across the border and
back into Thailand. I mostly enjoyed my time in Laos (food poisoning, not so
much). I learned a lot about the country and its history. Now it was time to
explore somewhere new but first I had a couple of nights in Bangkok where I
would meet Katie.
