Halloween in Vang Vieng

Last night Karrie and I got dressed up as 'fairy and mischief' it was a lot of fun. There were a lot more people dressed up than I thought there was going to be. :) I ran around tagged things and people all night. Met some great people from England and Ireland and drank/partied with them until 4:30am. I was really happy about drawing a cock and balls on the drunkest guy last night when he passed out.

Off to get our Cambodia visa today I believe, I still can't believe how much money we spent Luang Prabang it was the most expensive place yet.

Leaving Luang Prabang

The posse.

I believe it will have been four nights here and we are ready to leave this relaxing resort type town. We ate some delicious food and the scenery is amazing but it felt like I didn’t even leave Canada since I was surrounded by so much western food and upscale resort type guest houses. 

Today was an eventful day since the past couple days we have been laying low due to Karrie’s short term illness.  Don’t worry she is fine and healthy and we are heading out back to Vang Vieng for a round two because our visas to Cambodia and Vietnam, since it is much cheaper there and we are not making another pit stop in Vientiane on our way down south to the islands. 

In the morning we grabbed breakfast and then off to rent bikes. Okay so to rent a bike it costs about 2 dollars Canadian. Instead of leaving our passports as collateral we decided to leave some Canadian dollars behind. I find it strange that the more East we travel the more they want American dollars. (ex. on receipts here they print off the total in Kips, US, Baht and I can’t remember what the last one is.) 

The bike story, Karrie’s breaks didn’t work so well, my front breaks sounded like dying piggy’s when I used them and one of my bike petals was going to fall off all day but didn’t.  Our attempts to fix it were futile.  

Whatever we already rented them for the day, off to go biking with the camera. Down the river side we saw a million palm trees, upscale guest houses and a ton of river side restaurants. Today was surprisingly windy.  We made a pit stop for some yummy mango sticky rice and veggie spring rolls and off to find our bus tickets for tomorrow. As we park our bikes and lock them up to hit up some travel agencies the lock broke and when I say broke I mean the bikes are locked together and the part where the key goes in had come right out springs and all. WTF? Off to find the guy he uses a screw driver and we are free once again.

In the evening we meet up with our posse (all 7 of us) for one last dinner and some drinks at a place called Utopia. We do have to say we loved this part of our journey with them; they were fantastic travel buddies that weren’t over bearing and tons of fun to hang out with. I even got a free book, I love books! A nice dinner and beers at a river side restaurant and bar then off to another place for some more drinks, ended up drinking wine outside on the main street to say our last good-byes. Somewhere in the city there were people setting off mini hot air balloons I never found out why I wonder if it is the same as when they do it in China. (I drank my apple juice it was so darn yummy) 

One of the biggest tress I have ever seen.

Karrie was sad to say good-bye to the people we have grown to love over the past few days, I know that I have just kind of gotten use to saying them so often in the past two years I don’t think about it much. She is sensitive for the both of us in this particular matter. The walk home was cold...it think it was about 18C we were wearing sweaters and scarves, talk about getting climatize quickly.

Arrival in Luang PraBang

After a 8 hour bus ride much longer than intended we have arrived. Through mountains and beautiful scenery we have been placed in a haven of lush nature and next to a couple small rivers and the Mekong River.

Tomorrow we are going to rent some bikes and check some more of the local view. We have again lucked out with our guest house and have found another place that is only 40,000 kips = $2.66 CAD.

The bus that we took.

Totally out of topic but I have had my first veggie burger (at Lao Lao beer garden) in over a year now drinking my beer Lao. Here are some pictures of the lushness of North Laos.

Tubing in Vang Vieng on Nom Song River

The first bar before you start tubing at and to get your drink on.

River side bars

Lao Lao

Sunset on Nom Song

So we picked up our tubes at noon then we were off to the starting point upstream of the river in a tuk-tuk. Karrie and I thought it was going to be nice and quiet float down the river surrounded with beautiful scenery. As soon as we arrived there was thumping music on both sides of us and people pre drinking beers and buckets before they have even started tubing.There was cans of spray paints and stencils for your body and people giving out string bracelets for free buckets at different bars in the city later in the evening.

We ourselves stopped at 5/6 bars before it was time to head to the ending point to drop off your tube by 6pm. So after experiencing it first hand I realized that no one can get to the end by 6pm since there are about 8 bars right at the beginning of the river, eventually becoming more sparse and nothing near the end....there is about 3km from the last bar to the end and by then if you haven't already gotten a good head start to float down you are going to hit sunset and that is when it starts to become cold, dark and disorienting. So along the way before the end there are Lao people on the side screaming tuk tuk at us to get us back into the city on time and make a buck or should I say some kips.

Side note: Lao Lao a traditional rice whiskey. There is a picture of it above, I was offered some and I just couldn't bring myself to drink it. Karrie on the other hand had the balls to do it. Karrie says, "It could remove paint and it tasted like chemicals, umm like turpentine and it could have kicked Everclears ass."

So to rent a tub and deposit for returning it at 6pm totaled out to 115,000 Kips ($15.00CAD) and 60,000 of that was the deposit so when you bring your tube back after 6pm they charge you 20,000 pretty much everyone ends up paying this fee.

Besides this small bit about the deposit of the tube and having everything on the riverside preventing you from bringing it back on time, I highly recommend it to everyone who comes to Laos, Vang Vieng.

This has been my favorite city of my trip so far, I am sure that this opinion very well will change as we travel more.

BTW: they play pendulum, some reggae and drum and bass everywhere in Vang Vieng even along the riverside bars.

Arrival in Vang Vieng

So after going from the travel agency and when I mean travel agency  and by that I mean a guest house that organizes people to get to from one place to another.  On to a tuk tuk then onto a nice and fairly  comfy old school A/C bus a 4 hour ride to Vang Vieng a head us. 

So we caught the end of the festival ‘’AWK PHANSA’’ So here is some information on it. Monks make ‘heua fai’ (a little bamboo boat and float them down stream. Thousands of people everywhere are buying these little boats; they look like these beautifully crafted pieces of organic art with candles on them. So by floating these downstream they believe that their bad luck will float away with them. I was just wondering where these little boats go.

With the arrival in Vang Vieng we got here for the last day of the ‘’BUN NAM’’ (River festival) boat races are held across the country of Laos. Rowing teams get together for three nights and there are tons of food stalls set along the river side and I have read that there are carnival games and discos being held during these three days. Since we didn’t know in advance about it, I think we missed the chance to enjoy these awesome perks of the Bun Nam festival. 

So back to trying to find a guest house, after meeting a fellow traveler from New Zealand we were off to find an acceptable place to stay for the night until we go tubing and finding a new place tomorrow. We are working on a budget now and trying our best to stick with it. So after checking tons of places and with our luck the Bun Nam was going on during our  afternoon arrival giving us some hassle. 

1. Guest houses were full

2. They were charging high season prices                                            

                                                              

After a relentless search after vetoing a place where we had to pay a fee to cross the bridge every time even thought it was only 4000 Kips the guest house didn’t have screens on the windows.... we finally found a place splitting the cost of the room with 2 others (one more not including Karrie) it ended up costing us 20,000 Kips = $2.67CAD a night per person. That is about as much as a meal costs! 

During our early, but felt like a late dinner we ran into our two Switzerland friends we made back in Chaing Mai. I like how when you travel this particular route around South East Asia you are bound to meet some people you partied with in previous cities.  

Heading down what seems like bar street in what I believe to be the Northern inner city of Vang Vieng we see places that have signs saying that it has the coldest beer and TV screens playing F.R.I.E.N.D.S. J For the people who know me well enough I love my friends.

Leaving Vientiane

Child Size burger only 10,000 Kips

Lime, salt and a knife.

Being cowgirl.

I am thinking what I am thinking. Odd isn't it.

Mess of wires

I got my Thai visa (2 entry, 90 day each time)and is ready to head on out of Vientiane.
Off to Vien Viang tomorrow at 2:00pm to go tubing!

Last night went bar hoping it was a bit of an epic fail.   At least there was a hilarious build up with tequila, stolen cutlery, bought limes and salt in a bag.

Grabbed breakfast this morning, art supplies, Halloween costumes and got lost for an hour!

Finances set, route planned. Next big art project ready for action. [coming soon to a blog near you.]

Arrival in Vientiane, Laos

Okay so after leaving Pai (2:30pm) we were on the same windy road back to Chiang Mai,
4 hours later we arrived in Chiang Mai we had 2 hours to kill before heading off to Nong Khai.
We ate some dinner and was back on a new mini bus. (7:30pm)
After tossing and turning we made a pit stop at a 7-11 gas station and we were off for the last part of our journey in Thailand.
We arrived in Nong Khai (6am) filled out our visa forms for Loas and eat some toast with jam and down a cup of coffee, I was really excited to see the Mekong river and head over the friendship bridge in to Laos. (8am) We finally made it through borders obtained a Laos visa.
Now besides coming to Laos to laz around in a hammock I had to get a Thai visa extension.
Off to the Thai Embassy in Vientiane (9:45am), by 11am I had finally finished my visa application, got my recipet and was ready to eat some darn lunch.

After a short time we were drinking Beer Lao and having a beef burger. Okay so I have to say that going vegetarian is going to be an easy turn over. 1. I use to be vegetarian. 2. My burger was very raw. 3. I heard some stories about upset tummies shortly after my arrival from eating meat.

I then went to exchange my money for some Kips (Lao currency) btw for the people out there who don't know 1 Canadian dollar = 7666.83 Kips. So I exchanged $110.00CAD = 842,662.83 Kips I have alot of large dividens of money now. I will take a picture later. I have some videos that are going to follow this note from thailand since I didn't have a good enough connect to load them at the previous guest houses.

I am off to get come cake!

Good bye Pai

This bird is puking milk into my coffee.

So we are leaving for Laos tomorrow afternoon above is the picture I took at the travel agency to note the travel route that we are taking. 17 hours later we are going to get dropped off at Vientiane.

I can't wait to get a new patch on my bag don't you worry I will have a picture posted when I am done traveling around!

A night in Pai

So Karrie and I went out on a fabulous date nite.
That is right I said DATE NIGHT.

We got dressed up and were ready to have a night out in Pai. (BTW: Pai is a beautiful hippie haven, with art, environmentally friendly people, hand made crafts and good people)


So we started off with dinner, Chili Cheese Nachos with Chicken Quesedilla....and blue lagoon margaritas.
After wards we went walking down the walking Saturday street market, bought each other gifts and a blue berry pancake for the road.

We got flyer'd for a bar called Ting Tong, the bar was a beautiful located outdoor. They gave us a free shot upon arrival (Thai whiskey) this was not good. Some beers and tequila sunrises later we left. I decided it was time to eat again, so we stopped off at with a live band and open stage bar ate an omelet on rice. I fail at tiny jenga (see picture below) and Off to the reggae bar.... bought a rasta bucket. YUM. (Rasta bucket - Captain Morgans, Sam Song and something else.)

Karrie did her first burn in Thailand, not only was it cool it was sexy.

I had a face to face combat with a praying mantis. Whoah. Jen says, " That is not a cricket, that is a muther fucken Praying mantis yo!!!" Shit son. Flail. Flail. Flail.

I lost at pool. Tis was gay.

I was hungry, so I left, Karrie yelled at me, I walk to fast. I yelled at her, left her on a bridge, then i felt bad.
We hugged.

Off to 7-11 to get food. We bought: Miranda root beer, water, cake sandwich., bugles, ham and cheese sandwich, pistachios, Hawaiian pizza, spiral croissant and raisin bread.

We ate it, well most of it.

When we woke up there were pistachios and bugles in the bed and on the floor and opened cans of root beer that are still full.

Arrival in Pai

So we left Chiang Mai this afternoon and got on a what I like to call a tuk-truck to the bus stop.

I do have to say that I will miss living on the fourth floor and having a balcony to watch over the alley in Chiang Mai. Also I will miss the hammock on the roof! I won’t miss the construction that was going next door of our guest house though.  

After picking up a total of 8 people, onto a mini bus with 12 folks!!  The view was spectacular I have never seen a jungle so green and lush in my life. The trees had leaves growing out of the trunks, you couldn’t see bark on any of them, after many windy roads we made a pit stop. 

Grabbed an ice coffee, I sure love that condensed milk in my iced drinks. YUM.

Heading back in the bus I started to feel really nauseous. The windy roads were making me seriously ill, Karrie told me about a pressure point on my wrist and I think it distracted me long enough to make it to Pai.

Along the way I saw my first wild water buffalo and Thai cows (which were brown btw) wandering near the side of the road. 

After we got off the bus I realized I DON’T HAVE MY HAT...SHIT. Okay, so I ran back to the bus stop got the lady to call the bus and she hopped on a moto bike and picked it up for me. Bless her efforts. I have a feeling I am going to lose on a bus somewhere along the way. I have over 4 months to lose this hat I figure if it can make it to Canada it was meant to be my travel hat.

We enjoyed a nice pineapple-banana shake and a Pad Thai when we arrived, I am pretty sure by the end of this trip I will have eaten a life time worth of Pad Thai. I lost count after 10 I would like to think that I am at about two dozen.

So we went hunting for a place with wifi ended up paying 350BAHT (and the wifi doesn’t work) we got a double bed A/C room which by the way is the oddest room I have ever stayed in. (okay so I am going to try to describe this room for ya, so there are two beds...one single in front of the windows there is a fan above it. The second bed is in a different room where the A/C and another fan are located. There is a back door that leads to some smoking tables. Okay this is the weird part Karrie pointed out that the art on the wall in the hallway is the same as the art in the ceiling but is only two tiles. Umm WTF? To top this off the sink is outside of the bathroom....which we have seen before but still leaves me wondering why it isn’t in the bathroom. ¼ of the room is painted yellow, leaves me to think that someone got lazy. So all in all there are 4 pseudo rooms and we have a front and back door that leads to smoking tables. See pictures below. 

Two tiles in the ceiling that left me wondering.

The one on the wall.

Our inside outside bathroom

the bed in front of the windows, there is a door to the left that leads to another room with a bigger bed.

Since I have been here the feeling that I get from Pai is pretty darn relaxed nothing but mountains and jungles all around us. Soon we will have to figure out how to cross the border into Laos and our journey continues.

P.S. The crickets here are bigger than the geckos.