3 people will be glad to know that my other name, Sue, is sticking around out here. Stu seems too hard to pronounce. No one though (Cookie, Pete, Kate if any of you read this), has called me Hot Jesus.

It’s been a while since we posted anything. I blame this country. There is a certain laziness to the Lao people that is infectious. We leave this glorious country day after tomorrow and that will be a sad sad day.

I could right at great length about all the things we’ve done whilst here but instead, as i’m now lazy again (at least until we cross the border), I won’t. The Beerlao i had with dinner is partly to blame. If anyone ever ends up here, you must visit Luang Nam Tha. You must eat at least 1 meal in Pa Pa Ya restaurant. And you must do some trekking. A quick google or read up on Lonely Planet will tell you about how awesome it is. But actually doing it is more awesome still. Vic and I paid up for a 2 day trek with an overnight stay in a remote ethnic village. Our guide, who shall remain anonymous, was a great man. If there was anything edible in the forest, we ate it. He spoke good english, prepared amazing lunches and reluctantly (at first) got drunk with us and some of the village men over shots of Lao Lao rice whiskey (as nasty as it sounds) and Beerlao. Just as the celebrations (a joint house warming / our arrival / 9 day holiday) were reaching their peak the local law man walked past. He didn’t make it. Within minutes, a villager had coaxed (dragged) him in to join us. He put his automatic rifle down on some rice sacks behind me for the 4 year old of the house to think about playing with and necked a couple of shots.

We left before it got too messy to wander the village and play with the local kids and we got some great photos of some very very cheeky faces.

What else have we done? A 7km long, 100m wide cave was visited, along with a village homestay. The Plain of Jars – some stone ‘jars’ in various fields. We hired a moped for this trip and I loved the ride around the country side which was the longest yet. Vic did too. By the time we got back onto tarmac I noticed a loud noise that shouldn’t have been there. A stone had dented the chain guard, which had caused the chain’s split pin to come off. I found this out at the bus station when the owner of the station’s guest house fixed it for us for free. He was a top bloke. The hire company didn’t notice a thing!

More? Few days in Luang Prabang – couple more than we expected. Vic got a nasty bug. Visited an incredible water fall. and some more stuff around the country. That will do I think. I need a wee and this rain’s not helping… If I get a chance once we’re in Thailand I’ll get some more photos up.

posted: Tuesday, January 26th, 2010 at 13:55
under: travels.
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