Tubing

Vang Vieng people!!!! this is the place to be. I have just come in after my second day of tubing. What is tubing you may ask? Well esentially it invonlves me getting into an old tractor tyre tube and floating down a river. Now that doesn't sound all that exciting. Well that is where you would be wrong. What I didn't tell you was that every 100 metres or so there is a bar set up at the river bank where you can buy beer and swing into the rier from platforms at leasdt 5 or 6 metres high. it is the best fun ever on this planet. You meet loads of people and have the laugh and ,as an Irishman, get sunburned. Some of the swings into the water are really scary. There was one that was definitely 8 or 9 metres high and I swear I was really shitting (excuse the language) myself. For another one it took Colin about 5 minutes to actually jump off the platform. We really had to convince him to do it. It is such a great day and it only costs $4 to rent the tube. Beers along the way cost a dollar. I love this country!!!!!!! The town of Vang Vieng is really cool too. Every bar here has loads of TVs and they are showing either Friends, The Simpsons, or movies all day long. Seriously, if you wanted you could lounge around all day watching 10 or 20 episodes of Friends if you felt like it. What a cool town. Guys, if you ever come to this part of the world you have to get your ass to Laos and Vang Vieng. its wicked. Chat later. Gotta go get food and watch a movie. bye bye

a few photos from Laos

ok so these are just a couple of photos from our 2 day trek we did in luang Nam Tha. The villagers were the best and also the little piggies. How I love bbq pork :) Check out the evil eye on the little guy. It was one of the coolest experiences being in the tribal village.

Pi Mai water festival

I've come to realise that all the guest house owners and tuk-tuk drivers will sell you weed if you show even the slightest interest. Its so funny with the tuk-tuks. The first question is do we want a tuk-tuk, the next is automatically do you want weed. I guess its obviously the natural progression from asking if you want to be driven somewhere. Why don't our taxi drivers in Ireland not ask us these questions? We are now in Luan Prabang, a lovely town with loads of character and charm and beautiful sights. Of course I haven't seen any of it. We have been too busy soaking people on the main street of the town. Ah yes, the Lunar New Year I was talking about. In Thailand its called Songkran, here in Laos its called Pi Mai. Its all the same though. We have just spent 3 days soaking people and getting soaked. It is the best festival that I have ever, ever been involved in. Its fantastic. I couldn't possibly do it justice in description but I'll try. Early morning is calm, about 11 o'clock a small group will start throwing buckets of water at passing cars and tuk-tuks. From then on most shops close down and stay closed until around 6. Between that time the whole town comes out onto the streets and goes crazy. Its absolutely mental. It like nothing else I've seen. Even if you don't want to get wet, your going to. In fact for those who are dry, its like aneon sign saying "wet me", and everyone duly obliges. You can't do anything around town because you know that you are going to be drenched. I broke my camera on the first day so I have no photos of me and everyone else covered in oil and flour, which appeared on the second day. Before you leave this world you ahve to get to Luan Prabang for the 14, 15 and 16 April. Crazy, crazy, crazy!!!! i'm so pissed off that I can't show you the photos. it would really have given you an idea of just how mad the fun was. i guess you are just going to have to use your imagination this time.

Aaah Laos!!!

Laos is wicked!!!! it is such a relaxed country and nothing like Thailand. It seems such a simple life here. The boat ride was really scenic. To be honest some stretches of the river really had an Apocolypse Now feel about them. i could just imagine arrows coming flying out from the trees at any moment, or seeing some half naked, half wild natives lining the banks. Our first night in Loas was a funny one. Our guest house was as rough as we've seen. Our room had a resident mouse. And as you know mice are not my best buddies in the world. But out host came to kill the moust with some random jagged piece of wood he probably found out back somewhere. The guy was totally stoned out of his tree. Everyone was in stitches laughing, especially him, but the mouse got away. The electricity in the town was shut off at half 10. We all got back to our rooms after dinner to find it in darkness except for a few candles. Rustic doesn't quite describe it. It was grand though. There was a group of us who had met on the boat so everything was fine. Its Laos after all.

Maybe Thailnad isn't so great

Would you believe it but I got sick as well. What are the chances. I don't get sick for 3 months, Colin pukes only a few days ago and now I get sick. It was a bloody pizza too, to add insult to injury. Fecking Western food. I couldn't possibly have picked a worse time either. We were getting a 6 hour bus journey to the Laos border and I puked five minutes into the journey. We were stopped at a guest house picking up some passangers and I ran for the toilet. I actually blocked their toilet. Oops. Hope they don't mind. It was the worst bus journey of my life. I threw up out the window too. Memories of all the people in India puking out the bus windows came flooding back. Eventually We made it to the border town and I collapsed into bed and didn't get up at all, except to puke one last time. Thankfully the next day I felt fairly ok. Just as well because we were going to be tking a baot 7 hour bot ride down the Mekong and I didn't fancy being ill for that. Hopefull this will be my one and only sick on the trip story that I will be telling you guys. i'm sure you feel the same way.

Still in Thailand

Right, so we left Chiang Mai and headed for a tiny little village called Pai. It is a pure hippy place. You know how you always wondered where hippies go when the get older. Well they all come to Pai. There are more hippies there than would be at a hippy convention. Its a cool little place. totally laid back and easy going. We rented scooters and away we went. No drivers licence needed or anything. No obligation to wear helmets either. Health and Safety where are ya!!!! It was so cheap too, only about $3 for 24 hours. We drove around and did touristy things. It was fun. Unfortunately Colin got sick that night. The first time in nearly 3 months. He reckons it was the mango and stick rice he bought from a street vendor. It could have been worse. He threw up a few times but that was it. We were meant to leave the next day but Col was feeling a tad tender so we stayed another day. Around these parts the people celebrate the Lunar New Year. They do so with a water festival. In Pai the festivaties begin a bit early and there were some people throwing water at every cyclist passing by. I felt an obligation to partake so I bought a water pistol in the shape of a sword and found poeple who had a barrel of water and started soaking everyone around me. Obviously I was drenched myself. It was mad craic though. The fun had to end and so the next day we packed our bags and headed back to Chiang Mai. Julie's once again. I swear, I could stay in this guest house for weeks. We decided to bail out of Thailand and go to Laos. I'm realy looking forward to Laos because everyone who we talk to says that it is the best country in Southeast Asia. We shall wait and see.

more Thailand

Bless me friends for I have sinned, its been too long since my last profession. i will tell you a little about our time in Thailand. Well When Colin headed for England I was delighted to see the back of him. I needed a break from him. But then I realised that i was no good at planning and wanted himback. But I survived. I met a few people along the way and travelled around with a German and South African. We had a blast and saw loads. When Colin came back we were heading north towards Chiang Mai. one mini adventure we had was that Derek stupidly locked the room key into our room about an hour before we were hoping to get a train. We had the added misfortune to be in a guesthouse which was run by a complete muppet. He didn't appear to have a master key and couldn't do anything before ringing his mother first. Three hours later the mother comes back and gets the master key and opens the room for us. Thankfully our train was delayed and we got the later one. So four of us headed for Chiang Mai. Christian (German) had heard about a cool place to stay so we headed there. It was a totally relaxed and chilled out guest house which I highly recommend, called Julie's. We organised a 3 day trek and a cookery course from there. THe trek was real good. tHe group that we were doing it with were all sound and everyone got on fantastically. Colin bought a bag of fried worms and a couple of grasshoppers. It sounds disgusting but they tasted fine really. Kinda like fried chicken. Our cookery course was the funniest thing in the world. It was run my a woman called Mieow. I have never met someone so crazy. Any time a photo was being taken she would pose and shout "Sexy". The food we cooked was delicious. I never knew Thai cooking could be so easy. If you ever come to Thailand do this cookery course in Chiang Mai. Well worth the money. before I go and update any more blogs I must apologise because my memory card is now lost and so I cannot post any photos until I get myself a new camera. Sorry guys.