Got Net?

Went on my expensive guided tour today ($50) with Green Discovery. They do a lot of eco-friendly tours all over Laos. I'd have got it cheaper but it was just me on it, and my insanely chirpy guide Yong.

First stop was some caves. I'd been in a cave system on Koh Lanta last year where it was just downright dangerous, slippy mud, steep bottomless drops with tiny bamboo bridges to get across, etc etc. And we did it in shorts and dodgy flickering torches. A health and safty inpectors nightmare. So I was sort of expecting the worst - turns out it was relatively tame and easy enough to get in and around them - some of the caves were excellent.

Inside Tham None

Tham None (I think) and Tham Hoi first. Tham None consisted of three huge cathedral like caverns, full of stagtites and sparkly rock formations. There were huge swirly formations on the floor - its other name is Snake Cave for obvious reasons when you see them. Tham Hoi was pretty uninspiring, we only went a few 100 metres in to the big tunnel-like cave - it sort of looked like an unfinished subway construction project. Apparently though its huge, 10, maybe 20km long. Nobody seems to know for sure. Apparently some Canadian dude went in 10 years ago and never came back. Eight years later a relative mounted an expedition inside the cave and his remains were found 10km inside. It might all be tour-guide ledgend bollocks though.

Lunch was really tasty water buffallo kebabs, rice and bananas. Sorry, I mean steak kebab. Obviously.

The next cave was much more fun. I think it was Pha Thao. In English its the "water cave". Getting in was fun in itself. Sitting in the freezing cold water in an old tyre innner-tube pulling myself along in the pitch black with a dodgy head torch powered by what looked like a mini car battery strapped to my chest. Eventually we got out in cavern then had to crawl on our stomachs for 15-20 meters through a silty mud slit in the rock face, before emerging in an ancient underground river system, all white limestone tunnels and lumpy stalagtites.

Buffalo kebabs for lunch	Entrance into Pha Thao

Inside Tham Pha Thao (water cave)

I was up to my waist in water at one point, and my completely non-waterproof head-torch kept turning off. Wasn't as nice as one of the other caves (no sparkly glittery rocks), but getting in and out through the water, mode of transport (inner tube), and general shear stupidity of it all made it brilliant. :) hehehe.

Kayaking

After a 2km walk around the base of the karst mountains we got picked up and driven to the Nam Xong river for a 8km kayak down the river.

The new buffalo - hand tractors!

Buffalo cooling off in the Nam Xong

Its the begininging of the dry season, the water level was very low so it was hardly white water, but at one point we rounded a bended and I had a truely horrible Apocalyse Now moment. Remember the scene where its dark and Martin Sheen and his pals are going up river and they come across the crazy party place? There's a bridge getting shelled, people listening to music, and soldiers out their heads on acid shooting ghosts. Apart from it was daylight and no bombs going off it was a little bit like that. Maybe a few hundred western tourists pissed out there heads on Lao Beer, jumping from rope swings into the water, bamboo platforms with crap distorted techno being played on knackered sound systems, everybody shouting from both sides of the river. Loads of drunk people boinging around in the water on tubes. Utter chaos. I like getting drunk, I like music, On a good day I might even jump 20feet from a rope into the river, but this was just mayhem, and looked just plain crap. No idea where we were, but I could even tell the guide though it looked like the worse place ever too. Like Mr Sheen said, "Never get out of the boat. Absolutely goddamn right". Meh.

Figured the best way to see a bit of Laos would be to rent a mountain bike and have a scoot around. I'd heard about the twin Kaeng Yui waterfalls in the mountains, it seemed as good as any a place to go. Its not visited very often, the best advice I could get was "go to Na Douang". Turns out Douang is a small village 5km out of Vang Vieng. Its not a tourist place, there's no guesthouses, bars or restarants. It was slightly surreal arriving on my trusty bike while all the local kids chased after me yelling "sadai di" in Lao or "hello, where you from" practising their English. Eventually I found a girl who spoke fairly not bad English and arranged for her dad to take me. When we left with him carrying a huge machette I had a suspicion this wasn't gonna be a wee walk in the woods.

Oh dear. It got interesting pretty quick. After walking through some rice paddies and a fairly well worn trail into the forrest it gave out pretty quickly. Now, I've been in jungles before, in Thailand and Cambodia, but there's always been some sort of path, however vague. This was nuts, thick undergrowth, massive bamboo plants/trees (or whatever they are) small rivers, rocks, you name it, it was in the way. Course it didn't help matters my guide and recently discovered new best friend (on account of if he left me I'd been utterly, utterly feked) was half my size, twice my age and had the agility of a mountain goat. I on the other hand was crashing through pretty much everything. Initially I was worried about snakes or bugs falling on my head, but realised pretty quickly they'd have all scarpered at least 15 minutes before I got there, due to the noise I was making.

The waterfalls were pretty awesome - two big 30-meter high falls right next to each other. Because it hasn't rained for a couple of months it was hardly Niagra falls though. When we were leaving he sign-language explained there was more if I wanted to see them. Oh hell yes, lets trek through more completely untouched, natural wilderness that probably only sees a dozen or so people a month at most. So I said yes. hehehe.

There's a video of me stumbling around the waterfalls, river and foliage below. Needless to say I was slightly blown away - all I'm doing is banging on about "jungle, jungle jungle"! Still, you sort of had to be there to appreciate it.

More scabbling around on rocks, ducking all sorts of plants and trees and we found another. At one point even my aging guide that would put Bear Grylls to shame looked like we were a bit lost. Dissapointingly no wildlife, no snakes, scorpions, giant bugs or anything larger than a red ant really.

The last waterfall - found after stumbling down the river

Three hours traipsing through hot tropical jungles in the mountains utterly destroyed me. When we got back he invited me into his house and while we were doing our Indiana Jones thing his daughter had cooked us a Lao meal of sticky rice, bamboo soup, spicy papaya salad and some completely random meat dish which I've no idea of the ingriedients. All I know is it either had a chicken foot it in or something boney and spiney. I gave that bowl a miss. I think I cocked up the meal thing a little. The idea is you take a ball of stick rice in your hands and dip it in one of the dishes, a sort of Lao tapas. Except I was dipping it into the soup, which we had small chinese-style spoons for, Doh. Daughter and woodsman/jungle exploring maniac/farmer dad gave each other odd looks a few times. Or maybe it was because I wasn't touching the weirdy meat dish.

Climbing Pha Poak

I'd seen the Kaeng Yui waterfalls and was back in Vang Vieng by lunchtime. Stuck for something to do I thought I'd go take a closer look at Pha Poak, a small karst mountain just in front of the main range to the west of Vang Vieng. It turns out for 10,000Kip it was possible to climb up. I thought I was done with climbing for the day. It was pretty difficult, with bamboo ladders over some of the harder bits, then a scramble up some steep, sharp rocks to the top but the view from the summit was well worth it.

View from the top of Pha Poak peak

There's a video recorded from the top here:

Slightly ever so shaky hands!

This is a summary of a month long trip of SE Asia - it links out to other detailed articles. Laos first, then Thailand where spend Christmas & New Year with friends Anne and Fiona from home. Christmas and New Year on the beach - bring it on!

• Arriving in Vientiane
• Exploring waterfalls in Vang-Vieng
• Journeying to the centre of the earth

This map shows where I am:

13 Dec

Left wet, rainy, cold glasgow - huzzah!

14 Dec, 2am local time

Arrived in Dubai, possibly one of the swishest airports I've been in. I love the fact there's people from all over the world here. Everytime I come through this airport I know i'm on my way to start a Big Adventure. I've never, ever, tried McDonald's Arabic attempt at fast food though - the McKofta. The new Terminal 2 is biblical in proportions, its the first time I've see it open. Huge doesn't even begin to describe it. Its so long that it actually has a vanishing point.

14 Dec midday

Woo-hoo!! Almost in Laos! Until I got outside Bangkok airport it didn't really sink in that I was back, then the heat and smells all kicked in and I realised I was back - yay... happy days.  I wasn't too sure I'd even end up here at all after the protests a few weeks ago, but its all good now. I've got 5 hours to kill before my flight to Vientiane in Laos - from previous trips I know there's a shop just outside the airport where I can get a few beers. Just round the corner from *that* there's a small garden. Ahhh... beer in the sun in December. No idea why this wee garden isn't packed, seems nobody else really knows about it. (Neil if you're reading this - I was sitting in exactly the same spot as last year :)

15 Dec - Vientiane

I'm here! 36 hours of planes and airports and I've landed, in a small turbo-prop plane.Absolutely knackered by the time I arrived. Hotel is much, much nicer than I expected. As is the whole of Vientaine really.  Its  very clean and tidy - even the traffic isn't that bad. Its a little bit like Chiang Mai, except like wandering around a big park. So far Laos is and isn't what I expected. Vientiane is the capital, so there's a lot of embassies and posh government buildings. Everything is very low-rise, hardly any buildings are over 2 or 3 stories tall, and its very green. Loads of trees, fountains and gardens everywhere. [2 DAYS in VIENTAINE article to be added]

Wat Simuang	Vientiane skyline from the top of Patuxai :)
Buddha Park - the giant pumpkin	Naga, Wat Chanthabouli

So far I've discovered breakfast is the best meal here. Because of the French influence (a lot of SE Asia used to be under french rule) you can get freshly-baked, still warm bread and excellent coffee and bagels. Found a deli this morning where I'd just like to eat in everyday. Fantastic toasted bagels and free refills of excellent fresh coffee. Don't even get me started on the cakes. yum yum yum.

I read in the back of the guidebook I have that there are are hill tribes in the north that until as recently as the 1950's used to perform human sacrifice (they are called the Alak and Katu tribes - look it up) Mental. Fortunately I'm not going that far so there's little danger of me being eaten. I'd imagine bright red bald scotsmen are seen as a rare delicacy... :)

17 Dec - Vang Vieng

oooh... me likey... me likey a lot. VV reminds me a bit of Pai in Thailand, but the massive karst mountains are much more impressive. Its uber chilled here, and there's loads to do. Kayaking down the Nam Xong or mountain biking or caving. I'm a bit wary of the of the caving thing after wandering into a cave on Koh Lanta in shorts and t-shirt last year when we should have really have been kitted out in full safety gear. The one on Lanta was dark, wet and slippy, with drops presumably going all the way to the bad firey place. I watched Journey to the Centre of the Earth on the plane on the way over though, so I might give it another try. Think I'm going to try renting a mountain bike tomorrow and going cross country to a waterfall. The book I have says its rarely visited, so it wouldn't surprise me if there is a road, museum and souvenir shop there by now.

Random photos from around Vang Vieng

Was sitting by the river earlier in what felt like a bizarre petting zoo, hens, chickens, ducks and young kids all wandering around. There's a rickety bamboo bridge spanning the river, when more than two people go on it at once it make waves like that famous suspension bridge in the States thats always shown on those Discovery channel engineering programs.

18 Dec- Na Douang & the Kaeng Yui waterfalls

Figured the best way to see a bit of Laos would be to rent a mountain bike and have a scoot around. I'd heard about the twin Kaeng Yui waterfalls in the mountains. The waterfalls were pretty awesome .So much in fact there's an entire post about them here.

The Kaeng Yui waterfalls - read more here

Tomorrow its some sort of caving/kayaking thing, which I've paid a comparative fortune for ($50 compared to my $6 local jungle trip). Somebody was there when I was booking it who'd just done the same trip. "In a cave, 500meters underground, up to your neck in water" isn't a phrase you hear that often. Yikes.They've even asked for my insurance details.

19 December - Caving and Kayaking

Went on a guided tour today with Green Discovery. They do a lot of eco-friendly tours all over Laos. It was a half day exploring caves, lunch, a bit of a walk through the country side, then an 8km kayak down the Nam Xong back into Vang Vieng. The main post is here.

Buddha inside Tham None

Paddy fields around Vang Vieng

20 December - random mountain biking

I was only planning on staying in Vang Vieng for a few days then heading to the Plain of Jars, but I'm starting to run short on time and I know from previous trips visiting a place for three days is a little bit different from actually seeing it. One of the best ways of getting around is mountain bike or moped, especially given the state of the roads once you leave the main highway.

So I spend the day cycling around, exploring caves and swimming in mily blue pools like the one below. There's lots more about it here.

The natural spring at Pou Kham

24 December - Krabi, Thailand

Hanging out with Fiona and Anne in Krabi, brilliant to see them over here, in my fav country. Went to the beach today - tomorrow its a BBQ in the beach. Went to Macro of all places this afternoon and bought loads of booze. Including a bottle of Chivas Regal. You can take the Scotland out of Scotland, but not the Scotland out the Scotsman :)

Happy Christmas

27-29 - Ko Jum

Finally moved out of Anne's house in Krabi town and hit the beaches properly. We spent two days at the Oonlee Bunglaglows on Ko Jum on our way to Lanta. After Christmas it was an excellent way to chill out before heading off to Kantiang. Find out what it was like here.

29 Dec - until nearly the end - Kantiang, Ko Lanta

Kantiang is quite possibly my favourite place in Thailand. Anne, Fiona and I headed there for New Year. It was as good as always, but so much happened its getting its own page

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