Vang Vieng - 17th & 18th October 2009

Two more days tubing and on the second day I finally didn’t get a tube. It saved us 75,000 kip (just under 6 GBP but a LOT of money here – it’s SO cheap!!) and I actually did okay. I just had to swim across and back once and the worst part was getting OUT of the water as the current is that strong. Getting the tuk tuk back was SO much easier these nights as it hadn’t been raining and the lights were working most of the way so the path was far more navigable. I’ve promised Liam two whole days without me asking him to do anything so I’m going to go out and get him some food and then try to get this notes up on the blog!! As a postscript I’ve been tearing through books lately: Liam bought Revolutionary Road here recently (he’s currently reading my Blood River which took me two years and a re-read to complete!) and it was riveting. I’ve now moved on quite late in the day to The Kite Runner which I both thank and apologise to Grainne for! It’s taken me, what 2 years to START this on but hey, I did bring it with me and I’m over half way through in a couple of days so THANKS!! Books are pretty expensive here (more so than Thailand) costing nearly 7 GBP for a second hand one – Liam’s best cost him pence in charity shops back home!

Vang Vieng - 16th October 2009

Even though I wasn’t feeling too bad today the decision for another pool day was made which is just as well as we ACHE all over. I’m typing this listening to the intermittent chirping of a ghekko in our room. The room itself is nice but the bathroom has a healthy family of ants and so far we’ve seen 3 or 4 ghekkos coming through the bedroom. Liam also got a cricket out of the room the other day so we’ve definitely got lots of company! Although I’m usually pretty squeamish with the creepy crawly types these ones don’t bother me as I quite like ghekkos and as long as there’s nothing in the bed or on my stuff that’s fine with me. I don’t think I mentioned but there is a photo from the kohl anta of the FREAKIEST looking centipede/spider thing that was under my stuff on my first morning. Liam diligently got it out of the room but that definitely made me jump!!

Vang Vieng - 15th October 2009

Yes, with one day of recovery we were back at it again and I made the promise to myself to be a bit more adventurous this day. Although I didn’t touch the first (and highest – think I’ve mentioned that) swing I did every other one which included zip wires and swings of varying height. Although we didn’t make it to the slide bar I wouldn’t have gone on that again as far too painful. Again with just one tube we were asking everyone where the best/closest place to get a tuk tuk back was. This time it was apparently close to the mud bar (does exactly what it says on the tin). And even though we’d hosed the muck from ourselves before setting off we needn’t have bothered as the path was awful! With no shoes for grip we slipped and slided (liam seriously coming down on his arm into thorns at one stage) about 10 minutes back to the car park. We really need a better game plan for getting home the next time…

Vang Vieng - 14th October 2009

Although not yet 9am I’ve a feeling today’s a duvet day. Liam’s snoozing beside me and I reckon we’re too old (well maybe just me!) but two days partying in a row seems to be all I can handle these days! I’ve been pretty rubbish with the communicados lately so it’d be good to try skype some people later too. By the way we missed the Ireland wc qualifier on Saturday (bars shut early and no wifi access) and were gutted to see italy had equalised so late in the game. We caught a replay yesterday so saw some of the action at least. there’s a hotel down the road that has a swimming pool that overlooks the river that we can use for less than 2 quid a day so if liam doesn’t get up perhaps that’s what I’ll do…..i’ve also got just a few pages left in my book so that’s my next port of call!!

Vang Vieng - 13th October 2009

day two tubing and we thought we’d be right old smarty pants and just get one tube between us to save on a bit of cash. It’s pretty clear now that the first four bars are completely accessible by dry land but at the time we didn’t realize that so I put myself forward as the ‘swimmer’ (/clinger!). needless to say within a minute or two I had cut my foot on a rock (same foot and side as the recently healed coral cut people!) so that role was relinquished to the far more competent liam! We had factored in tuk tuk fare back to town and stayed at the last bar til well after dark thinking we could get a lift from there. We might as well have saved our money and floated all the way back as the distance to the nearest pick up point was actually pretty far and when we got there we had to walk bare foot up a pretty rocky path to get to it! Although we went home and showered and went back out the night before we headed straight out and then went home to stay.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned it yet but I’m not sure is it because of us westerners or is it the French influence but the amount of lovely bread here is astounding! In Thailand if you got toast with a breakfast it was made with really sweet small bread. Here if you get a salad it’s accompanied by a pretty large baguette of warm fresh bread! There's street hawkers here that sell all sorts but inevitably within a few paces you’ll come across someone selling filled rolls! So although we’ve been sampling the local food as much as possible, these last two days have seen us having bread for breakfast and for dinner! It’s a good base for a day out on the river and an extremely cheap way to eat!

Vang Vieng - 12th October 2009

we caught our first tube today man (rough quote from point break said keano reeves stylee!!). so even mum had heard of bad things on this river and within 30 minutes we saw an example. The first bar had a ‘swing’ that dropped people from a serious height into the river and as I have a fear of cutting myself (especially after the coral incident) I kind of knew that although higher up the further out you swung the chances were the water was deeper too so it was probably safest. The first girl to do the jump that day that we saw clearly thought she’d done her achievement by jumping off the platform and let go of the swing far too early to do a spectacular belly flop into shallow water. She managed to swim close to shore pretty shook up but the second she made contact with a tuber she passed out. She came to and was fine after that and continued her day but it was certainly a lesson that although hilarious to watch people jumping, if you’re lacking in confidence it’s a bad idea! Naturally my confidence grew as the day went on and although liam jumped on the first (and highest) swing and tried out pretty much everything there was, I saved myself til the 5th bar and lowest swing to have a go! We also tried the slide which I thought would be pretty harmless but boy did that hurt! With no control over entry as you’re catapulted at speed from the bottom you end up slamming your back on water which is never a good thing. It had started to rain by that stage and light was fading fast so it was back to the water to try to go home.

As we’d seriously under estimated the deposits we needed to pay for tubes and dry bag rental we had spent all our money on alcohol and hadn’t enough for the tuk tuk fare back to town. We knew the drift downriver from the last bar was approx 50 minutes so we set off in a pack of tubes all clinging on to each other! Within minutes we had separated and it was me and liam and one other guy on our own in the dark and with rain and now thunder and lightening to guide us! Thank god he was there because I reckon on our own I would’ve freaked out! We made it back and will look back on that journey with fond memories but knew we would not be doing it again too soon!!

Vang Vieng - 11th October 2009

the realisation has finally dawned that the traveling part of traveling is actually quite exhausting. This town is known primarily for it’s party style tubing (literally sitting on a tractor inner tyre and floating from bar to bar down the nam xong river) but we still couldn’t muster up the energy. If Vientiane reminded me of cork then vang vieng definitely reminded me of goleen (west cork)! First impressions showed us an incredibly laid back, relaxed and sleepy town. We should have known but there was actually more than 200 people out on the river doing all sorts of craziness!

Vang Vieng - 10th October 2009

One day was really enough to see the sites of Vientiane so we took off to our next destination on a 10am bus with 9.30 pick up from the hotel. If I was petrified on the flight to laos then I was most certainly uncomfortable on the bus! For a vehicle that might squeeze in 16 people for a 5 hour journey the fact that they managed to get 23 on is quite amazing. The aisle had collapsible seats so that every conceivable space was used - very enterprising! No overhead storage space either so carry on bags were either on laps or given valuable leg room for the journey. We literally took the first hotel we were offered on arrival and slept for most of the day.

Vientiane (Laos) - 9th October 2009

Took us a while but we eventually got up and did a big walking day trip around the ‘city’. It reminded me of cork for some reason…the fact that it was a capital city but was actually quite town like! Sat by a bar to watch the sun set into the Mekong river…although it was high and powerful all day it somehow disappeared 20 minutes before sunset…liam captured it quite well on camera I think. You can really see the French influence is still pretty evident – we walked along the champs eleysees to the laos arc de triumphe after a glass of rose at a French wine bar followed by our most expensive meal yet at a French restaurant that night. Liam’s fine accent saw me dining on a taste of home – ‘pomme de terre purree’ yum yum yummy!!

The fifth corner - 8th October 2009

Getting a flight from the island of koh samui (with 3 hour stopover in bangkok) to vientiane (capital of laos) was probably twice the price of 20 hours bussing it but we were assuming more than twice as comfortable/tolerable. This may be true but at the time I must say it was an ordeal. It was probably in most part down to the fact that we were feeling awfully sorry for ourselves – not to mention ill – and yes this was self inflicted but I will relay the tale to you at any rate! The following is taken from notes I scribbled on the flight from bankgok to Vientiane to keep my mind preoccupied…..

We couldn’t believe our luck when our extremely friendly check in clerk offered us seats on the earlier flight to Bangkok (thus saving us a wait of 1.5 hours – we’d over estimated on travel times!). not only this but he offered to check our bags through to Vientiane even though we’d booked with two separate carriers! He advised us that we needed to check through ourselves in Bangkok for our boarding passes and gave us a slip of paper with the appropriate gate/section. He also put stickers on us and we were on our way! With no time to get water for our dehydrated throats we boarded the Bangkok airways flight outa there! There was an in flight service but to our dismay there was nothing for sale (where’s ryanair when you need them ey?!) so we had to make do with the thimble size cups of water and juice to quench our thirst. This as you’ll rightly say is no big deal…..the trouble started when we got to Bangkok! I had been thinking on this first flight of the next flight we were to catch – with Lao Airlines. This instantly brought images of ‘Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom’ back when Indi escapes the evil Lao by getting on a plane with the taunt of ‘Better luck next time Lao Che!’ of course to close the door to reveal that he’s doomed on board ‘ Lao Airlines’. What fate was to behold us?

Upon arrival in Bangkok our stickers had identified us to a lady who directed us off to a security entrance where she subsequently closed off the entrance behind us. Although we had at least 4 – 5 hours until our flight we felt like we’d just made it on time as we were hurried through! It wasn’t until we were upstairs wandering into the ‘transit lounge’ that we realized we’d no boarding cards for the next flight. This then produced the wild goose chase that was trying to locate the check in desk as per the details on the slip of paper we had. It took us nearly 2 hours to find despite numerous directions being given. It really was trying to find the fifth corner of a square room as we were wandering around concourses 'a –d' only to be told we needed to get to e!! we eventually found the elusive entrance to that particular area which was a door with no handle on one side HIDDEN BEHIND A WALL!!

So we get to the pretty small plane and with the propellers outside the wing it really did hark back to the Indiana Jones image. In my musings on the previous flight I wondered why we were supplied with life jackets and not parachutes as surely they’d be far more effective than a device you can only use if you’ve survived the plummet into the ocean?! Indiana Jones didn’t have a parachute or a life jacket…but at least he had a raft. That’s more than I can say for us! Liam wondered what the sign “USE BOTTOM SEAT CUSHION FOR FLOTATION” meant on the back of the seat in front. This question was answered upon reading the safety leaflet. Nope, no life jacket for us as it wouldn’t fit under the seat most likely. Yes, we were expected to actually rip the seat cushion up and use THAT as our saving floating device!! The noise is deafening and my stomach’s lurching as much as the plane did during take off…..

Needless to say we survived the flight and managed to muster the conversational chatter to share a cab into the city, get some food and collapse exhausted into bed for hours.

Koh Samui - 7th October 2009

So finally we’ve come round and decided instead of extending our thai visa we’re gonna leave the country. Caught the boat to koh samui and coincidentally met our friends from home who luckily showed us a sweet hotel that was super cheap! Had another BIG night which we most definitely regretted the next day…..

1 month in, the count so far..

3 countries.........
3 books.....
2 trainers....
2 pairs of flip flops.....
3 tv series & many films
numerous t-shirts /tops/shorts
and 1 camera

photos are now on flickr from Koh Phagnan....

Koh Phangan - 5th & 6th October 2009

Day one of recovery despite the optimistic start of alcohol just after breakfast. There was a pretty big group continuing the party in the bar downstairs but I really didn’t have the stomach for all that so we retired to the room pretty quick!! I discovered a serious and cheap indulgence in the 7eleven at the top of the road – a POPCORN machine, seriously the nicest popcorn I’ve ever had. And no it’s not sweet, I’m old school and favour the butter and salt combo!!

Day two and not suffering too badly but as it’s our last night here and the visa’s running out (Friday) and typhoons are battering the places we wanted to go next a rethink is needed…..but not in the mood for it today!!! By the way…on day 19 of coral cut watch it appears to be nearly completely mended, i.e. I’d be happy going into the water again – imagine that: such a hot place and - apart from a drunken pool party – not being able to go swimming!! Also, we’ve bought a new camera so have some snaps of Koh Phangan. Unfortunately trying to upload them is taking a bit of time so we’ll just have to add them at a later date… :(

Koh Phangan - 4th October 2009

FULL MOON PARTY, body paint is the name of the game. As you’ll see from the pics Liam dabbled in his own art whereas I went for the more professional look! Great craic had by all and the moon shone brightly for all to see…not so great was the amount of people (male and female) using the sea as their wc….glad we’ve a pool to swim in now and when we’re back!!

Koh Phangan - 3rd October 2009

A day of lounging by the pool then met up with buddies from London (arranged not coincidence). Liam convinced three others to join him in more poker…..and he took all their money, plus the money of 16 strangers!! A free night out, woo hoo! I did have to have a word with Liam about the dangers of fire….even though we’d been told (and seen the guy after) a horror story about someone completely catching fire after jumping through a SKIPPING ROPE OF FLAMES…..he still did it anyway – I nearly lost my life.

Koh Phangan - 2nd October 2009

The weekend of the Full Moon party is upon us so there’s a big fight (Thai boxing) plus pool party but we’re not able for it after last two days….Liam tried his hand (and lost) at poker in a pub down the road so who knows if he had won he might have been up for the party!

Koh Phangan - 1st October 2009

Woke up and thought – why not we’re on holiday, so continued the party all day!!

Koh Phangan - 30th September 2009

Christmas shopping isn’t so exciting but just really finding accommodation for Christmas and New Year. Christmas isn’t the problem it’s just the New Year’s full moon party is the busiest night of the year so all the resorts that take pre-bookings are full. There were a few that didn’t book in advance but for the time of year that’s in it we wanted somewhere nice and confirmed for when we come back! You’ll be glad to know that although it’s taken a few days we’ve now booked a lovely place (bit pricey but worth it we hope) with pool and most importantly – FREE WIFI!!! To celebrate our long day of trekking about we went to the pool party at our resort. Not so sure how great it is living just upstairs when someone (Liam!) suggests getting swimmers on and getting in!! He seems to like the pool after a few drinks…..well at least it’s not the sea!

Koh Phangan - 28th - 29th September 2009

A couple of days of chillaxing – we’re getting too old for parties! – and besides we’re planning on going CHRISTMAS SHOPPING tomorrow so need to have our wits about us!!

Koh Phangan - 27th September 2009

After staying one night in a pretty pricey ant infested room we moved down the beach to a cheaper resort with a pool…and pool parties!! The half moon party was on in the jungle that night which involved a taxi ride there and back – great craic!

Koh Phangan - 26th September 2009

Time to move on, this time to Koh Phangan to take in a full moon party on the 4th October. The journey took 8.5 hrs to complete so it’s lucky we had a combination of card playing, movie watching (Liam’s media player – god send!) and a packet of biscuits to keep us sane!

Ao Nang - 24th - 25th September 2009

Nothing much but rain these next two days but we had changed hotel which had free wifi so happy days. Managed to download skype and give some people a call so please let us know who has it so we can do it for free next time we have the luxury!!

Ao Nang - 23rd September 2009

Collected at 8am for a day trip which included rafting, quads and elephants….and a hell of a lot of driving in between to get to these places!! I know I’ve said I’m not keen on getting on an elephant (I’m not keen on getting on donkeys/cows/horses at home) but it seems like EVERY day trip includes them as part of it. Needless to say I won’t be doing that again, poor things! The other activities were ace, especially the rafting, defo doing that again when we can. Unfortunately the torrential downpour we missed at lunch at the raft site we caught up with when we got to the quad biking place. The guy on the bus said bring your camera etc and poor liam had the task of trying to mind it while we went around these now flooding mud tracks in the pouring rain!! So yes the camera broke which will explain the lack of photos over the coming days. We drowned our sorrows too that night with some whiskey in the room and then out to recreate the craic liam had the night before. Unfortunately the strip of bars he’d ended up on (with a couple we had met, not on his own thankfully) was absolutely teaming with ‘ladies’ of the night so we moved on pretty swiftly.

Ao Nang - 22nd September 2009

Lounged by pool all day, really beautiful and SO quiet! Had a pretty mellow night as we had to be fully prepared for our big day the next day…..

Ao Nang, 21st September

Left Koh Lanta for Krabi and didn't stay there very long (20 minutes perhaps). Headed straight for the beach resort of Ao Nang and have bagged us a lovely hotel which has a swimming pool on the roof – lush! Liam went out that night but not for me as finally suffering from dodgy tum and need my foot to heal!!