Koh Tao 13/5/12 - 16/5/12

Koh Tao was our last opportunity to sit out and enjoy the sun. Our next stop is Dubai and the weather forecast is 43 degrees, so I doubt we'll be sunbathing in that!


The boat from Koh Phangnan took nearly two hours and left us both feeling a bit sea sick. The accommodation was a lot more expensive than Koh Phangnan, so it took us a while to find somewhere. Koh Tao is one of the most popular diving spots in the world, which probably explained it.

We found somewhere to stay right on the beach. Well, the reception and restaurant were on the beach, our room was about 200m inland! We spent the day sunbathing and then made our way to the biggest sports bar to settle in for an evening watching the last day of the Premiership season. We had a pub full of Man Utd 'fans' from all over the world, so we enjoyed Man City getting their late winner! We had 6 different matches on the various screens and it was amazing to watch! 

On our second night in Koh Tao we met up with some people from our hill trek in Chang Mai. We had a good night out with them and somehow ended up watching a cabaret show with a load of drag queens. Some of them were quite convincing, although I think the one who planted a kiss on my cheek as we left had forgotten to shave that morning as I could feel stubble! One of the drag queens also looked like Steve Fletcher, the AFC Bournemouth player. Jenna loved it all though with the lights, the dancing and the music!

We felt a bit rough the next day so skipped the beach in the morning. By the afternoon it had clouded over which served us right for being lazy. The weather the following day wasn't much better either, but it is heading towards the wet season. We've both got a half decent tan, but I think by the time we land in Heathrow it will have vanished.

We then had to travel up to Bangkok for our flight to Dubai. This involved a 2 hour boat trip, a 4 hour wait at the station and then a 9 hour overnight train journey. Pretty tiring, but made do-able by the fact we were on a sleeper train with proper beds - they make such a difference.

We then had 17 hours to kill in Bangkok before our flight. This was spent eating, drinking, going on the internet. And then eating again, drinking some more and re-visiting the same websites again. We did get a couple of hours of sunshine in Bangkok and sat out in a park. But then it started to tip it down and so we headed for the cafes and internet shops once again!

Koh Phangnan (7/5/12- 13/5/12)

The journey from Chiang Mai, in the North of Thailand to Koh Phangnan, in the South of Thailand was probably the worst trip we have made in the six months we have been traveling. It took 36 hours in total. First, we left Chiang Mai at 8am in the morning and took a train to Bangkok, this took 14 hours. It should have taken 10. We then had to board another train to Surat Thani in the South East of the country. Luckily, the train from Bangkok to Surat Thani was delayed because otherwise we would have missed our connection, due to the earlier train being delayed. Are you following? Anyway, the train from Bangkok left around midnight in the end and we arrived at Surat Thani at 9am. We couldn't book a sleeper train as they were full so we had to do an overnight train in a seat. Needless to say we didn't get much sleep. We then had to get a bus to the port in order to get a boat over to the island. So, we arrived in at 9am but there wasn't a bus leaving to take us to the port until 12.30pm, even though there was a boat leaving at 10am and they could have got us there in time! Not a problem though the guy said, 'you can get the 2.30pm ferry across.' Okay, we thought we will just hang about for a few hours. We can do that, we are pro's at waiting around now! 

 We eventually left at 12.30pm, only for the bus to drive us 30 mins up the road and then drop us off in a petrol station! Some guy came around and said that we had to wait until 3pm for another bus the rest of the way to the port. 'But our boat goes at 2.30pm,' we said. 'Oh don't worry there is another one at 4.30pm,' explained the guy. By this point I actually wanted to cry and and nearly demanded that he carried me all the way to the port, with my bags, in a piggy back! We ended up getting to Koh Phangnan at 6pm. Needless to say I wasn't impressed. Just as I thought it couldn't get any worse though - it did! 

We jumped in one of the many minibuses, ready to finally take us to a hotel, paid our money and drove about 100m up the road! The female driver then got out and said that because there was only two of us, they wouldn't make enough money and therefore we needed to get out and get another one. Now, bearing in mind, there were loads of tuk tuks and minibuses to chose from when we got off the boat, and THEY had beckoned US over in the first place- James went mental! I think it was the stress of the whole journey that ended up coming out! Then the male driver got out and started to unpack our bags, well that sent James over the edge- he started to put the bags back in the minibus, I think he was trying to make a point! I thought for a second he might possibly headbutt the guy! ;) By this point I had just walked away about 10 paces as confrontation makes me nervous! I just slagged them off when I knew they couldn't hear me anymore instead!! It turned out okay in the end though, as they beckoned another tuktuk driver over and got us in and out the way as quickly as they could!

We stayed for 5 nights on Sunset beach at Neptune Villa. The whole area was dead because the half moon party's in May that we had originally planned to go to, way back in January - had been cancelled- don't worry we did know about this before but it was the only time we could get down in the end! It was a bit gutting not being there for it but we are just going to have to come back one year and do a full moon instead! Every cloud! 

 
Due to it being so quiet we pretty much had our own private swimming pool for the 5 days. We alternated between the beach and the pool trying to get as tanned as possible! On our second day we rented a moped each and drove to the North of the island to a beach called Ha Man. This was the first time on the trip that I had rented a scooter for myself- I normally just tag on the back of James's. We drove about 400 metes down the road to a petrol station and when I got off I nearly dropped it! It didn't bode well! It is so much fun, although the hills in Haat Rin were a bit scary! I wish the weather was better at home because I would definitely get one. I think James was relieved when we got back safe and sound though as I am sure he didn't think I was capable of driving one, to be honest at the beginning when I almost dropped it, I nearly proved him right!!


We ended up having a really nice relaxing time on the island even though it wasn't really what we were expecting!

Hill Tribe Trek - Chiang Mai 3/5/12 - 6/5/12

Other than our stay with the elephants, the other big trip we wanted to do in Chiang Mai was to go on a hill tribe trek. We opted for a 2 day / 1 night trip which left the following day. We spent the remainder of that day having a look around Chiang Mai, including a visit to a very boring art & culture museum!


On the day of our trek, we were picked up by a car and driven into the hills to visit the long neck tribe. This tribe is infamous for the women who wear gold links around their necks. This results in their necks becoming longer! We spent an hour there learning about their tribe. Traditionally the women would wear these neck braces to protect them from tiger attacks when trekking through the jungle. Apparently the tiger would try to kill by strangulation and these chains would prevent that from happening. Whether or not this was true we don't know, but the women continue wearing these chains even today, although it's obviously showcased to attract tourists.

We then set off in our car to meet the rest of our group who had opted not to visit the long neck tribe. We met up with them and squeezed into an already cramped tuk-tuk to continue the journey into the hills. On our way we passed the elephant park we had stayed at the previous day - I had promised Jenna we would come back again one day, I didn't think it would be the following day! And then we stopped off at another elephant park. The reason for this visit was to allow us to sit on the back of an elephant and to trek a small distance. We weren't overly keen on this at all, having spent the previous two days learning about how elephants are abused until they are submissive enough to allow people to site on their backs. We did it though as we didn't really want to make a scene and spoil the walk for the others by making them feel guilty, but we felt pretty guilty ourselves and kept telling off the mahout when he hit or jabbed the elephant with his hooked stick.


After a quick lunch at the elephant park, we drove further into the hills and eventually left the tuk tuk behind. Our group consisted of 12 tourists and our local guide called Ronnie. We set off on our walk, aided by bamboo walking sticks, and over the next 3 hours walked up some pretty steep and challenging terrain. I think the guide said we walked about 5km uphill, but I'm not certain. It was hard work with the heat anyway! The jungle was beautiful and gave us some amazing views. Jenna struggled a bit towards the end and she vowed she must quit smoking! We all made it to the remote hilltop village at about 5pm. You could see the odd village in the distance and our guide said it would take a good 3 hours to walk there due to the gradient of the hills - we were pretty much as remote as you can get!

After everyone got showered, we spent the evening chatting to our group over a dinner cooked by our guide - although nobody saw him doing any cooking, so he probably got one of the tribe girls to do it! We had a great evening and our group was really good. Our guide Ronnie was hilarious. He disappeared for a couple of hours while everyone got washed up. When he returned he'd obviously been drinking as nobody could understand what he was on about - he was a real character with a crazy laugh that would surface for no apparent reason! We then figured he'd been drinking some locally brewed drink, we all tried some of it and it put hairs on your chest! He spent the next two hours working out which days we were born on and then telling us how that would affect our lives. We were all laughing though as we were pretty sure he was making half of it up as he went along, regardless of whether you were born on a Tuesday or a Sunday, we were all predicted to 'be a boss' in our work life! Then one of the lads who lived in this village turned up and sat around showing us some unbelievable tricks with matchsticks. He was on a different planet though, which was backed up when he told us he was an opium addict and 'it hurts' when he doesn't have it!


It tipped it down during the night and was still raining when we woke at 7am. The previous day had been beautiful, but it was clear from the clouds that the rain would continue for our entire second day! We got absolutely soaked as we made our descent back down the hills. It was really slippery and quite dangerous in places! We stopped off at a waterfall, but I didn't fancy jumping in! It was amazing to see the jungle in the rain though and it contrasted so much to the previous day. We found some lychee trees and ate their fruit, they were amazing. The last part of our trip involved some whitewater rafting which was fun and then some bamboo raFting which was a bit tame in comparison. Just as we were about to board our bamboo raft, one of the guides spotted that there was a 3 foot long snake on it! He managed to wrestle it off with a stick, but the damage was done and none of us felt overly comfortable on the raft!

We then made our way back into town on our tuk tuk. We were all soaked, Ronnie was hungover, but we had all had an amazing trip!

Elephant Nature Park- Chiang Mai (1/5/12 - 3/5/12)

I have always had a fascination with elephants. They have been my favourite animal since I can remember. I think my passion for them comes from my grandad - it was obviously catching! I have seen wild elephants in Kenya, and as spectacular as that was, I couldn't help wanting to run up to it and give it a big hug, although I am not sure they would have had quite the reaction I was hoping for! So, whilst we were in Chang Mai, we researched about finding somewhere where you can go and learn about them, help out for a few days and get up close and personal with them. It was also important to us that the elephants were looked after properly and were not just used as a money making scheme by the owners. We found The Elephant Nature Park, which is run by a passionate woman called Lec and is a home for ex-working elephants in Thailand. Although logging is now banned in Thailand, it left a lot of elephants without jobs which in turn meant they were abandoned by their owners as they no longer had a use for them. Altogether the park is home to 35 elephants, all female bar three, including two babies.

I was like a kid at Christmas the night before we went, I couldn't sleep because I was too excited! When we arrived, we were given a brief tour of the park. To be honest, I wasn't really paying much attention, I was just thinking: 'hurry up so we can go and see the elephants!'. The grounds were huge and very well thought out. All the buildings blended in to the environment which was nice to see. I think they said it was on 200 acres of land but they could have said any number, like I said I wasn't really listening! So the first elephants we met were at the medical centre - they had just received their daily treatment so it was feeding time. The elephants are fed fruit which includes: watermelon, banana, pumpkin and cucumber. The elephants are so tame and used to being around people that you can just walk up to the elephant and put a bit in its trunk.

 They are pretty fickle though and once you run out of food, they are no longer interested in you! I should just say that whilst the elephants are tame and you are encouraged to get near them, there are still precautions and safety measures  in place. Also, some of the elephants that are known to be a little temperamental are just left to be fed by their mahouts and you are encouraged to stay away from them. (Each elephant has a mahout, they are the carer for each individual elephant and they stay with the elephant all day. The elephant only really listens to this one person so they are vital for the safety of the visitors.) I never once felt threatened or scared, but then they don't really scare me- in fact I got told off a couple of times because I wasn't cautious enough! To be fair, you don't appreciate how big they are until you are stood right next to them and if they decided they wanted to hurt you then you would stand no chance.

Anyway, back to feeding the elephants. So like I said, you just put the food in the elephants trunk and they place it into their own mouth. There were a couple of elephants that would let you place the fruit directly into their mouths. That was pretty cool! Feeding time lasts for quite a while as the elephants eat so much! They also get fed again in the afternoon. Once we had fed the elephants, it was our lunch time. The food at the park was amazing. We had probably the best food there that we have eaten in the whole of Asia.

After our lunch, it was washing time. The elephants were directed into the river and then we were all allowed in to help bath them. However, we had a bit of drama before the elephants were directed to the water. There is a viewing platform at the park. which you are encouraged to watch the elephants from. We were all standing there waiting for the elephants when we heard this huge commotion. Suddenly we see one of the male elephants, Hope, charging through the field towards the other elephants, with his mahout running after him, trying to grab the rope hanging around his neck. It was a bit comical really but so dangerous. It was lucky we were not on the ground otherwise it could have been a lot worse.  The elephants that are a little temperamental wear ropes around their necks so you can distinguish a 'good' elephant from one you want to avoid. Straight away, the mothers, aunties and sisters all surrounded the baby elephants to protect them from the raging bull. It is so clever to see. It just shows how intelligent these animals are.

Hope then ended up chasing one of the other elephants into the river, trumpeting and looking a bit aggressive. He then wouldn't move out of the water so they had to bring his 'girlfriend' down to the water to see if she could get him to move. In the end, with a lot of bananas and a metal chain around his foot, they managed to move him away.  It took about 40 minutes though. All the workers at the park say that Hope will soon need two mahouts to look after him as he is getting older and more mischievous. Jungle Boy, the oldest male in the park, is the only other elephant that has two mahouts.

Bathing the elephants was pretty surreal. We were given a bucket to chuck the water over each elephant. You could tell that they loved it.You have to be careful though, because if they decide to sit down in the water and you are in the wrong place at the wrong time, you will basically be squished to death! After bath time, they went and wallowed in the mud pool so they got all dirty again!!

Once we had bathed some of the elephants the family units then had their turn in the river. It was then time to go down and meet all the elephants, including the babies! It was so much fun. We could have our photos taken with the babies and touch them all. Their skin is so hairy and really prickly and their skin is very rough. They have very sensitive skin though, even though it is very thick. One of the elephants, liked you to tickle her behind her ears! One of the elephants gave kisses with her truck so that was nice and sticky!

 
The rest of the afternoon was taken up by watching a DVD about the park and elephant neglect in Thailand.  The DVD was really interesting. if not difficult to watch and told some of the stories of the different elephants at the park. Some of their stories were horrific so thank god they are now at the park. I won't bore you with loads of information but put it this way, elephants in Thailand need to be looked after a lot more than they have been in the past. It is so sad to see some of the ways the owners treated their elephants. They definitely do not deserve to be treated like that. Luckily projects and charities in Thailand like this one are trying to stop cruelty to elephants but it is going to take a lot of time and effort for it to be completely diminished. 

In the evening, we had dinner and then spent the night talking to Jane and Jkirsten, two Americans that were on the same trip as us. It took us ages to get to sleep though because all the dogs were howling. The park is home to over 200 hundred dogs too! Most were rescued from the Bangkok floods that happened in 2011.

The next day we were up by 6.30am. We had breakfast and then took a 2 hour walk around the park grounds. In the spare time, the elephants have a whole park to roam around so it is like they are in their natural habitat. We took some bananas with us so we could feed them as we walked around the park. I had to be told several times to watch my back. It is so strange how an animal of that size still manages to creep up on you! One of the baby elephants stole my basket. I tried to wrestle it back off him until I realised that I was wrestling and elephant and there was clearly only going to be one winner! Luckily the elephants mahout came running to my safety.

The routine after this was similar to the day before, but with some added little extras later on in the day. We bathed the elephants again and then fed them. We then met Lec, who is the founder of the organisation. It was really good to meet her and have a quick chat with her about the park and the elephants. The next part was really interesting but pretty gross. We went to watch the vet treat one of the elephants for an infected foot. We learnt all about the medication and how they clean it. We then watched the elephants get their foot cleaned. I just concentrated on patting the elephants trunk and feeding her bananas as I don't really cope well with goryness! To be honest she didn't really look like it hurt and they have this treatment everyday so they are probably used to it. Some of the elephants are treated everyday as previously they have stepped on landmines while logging. One of the elephants almost lost her foot and was then forced to carry on working for 4 years! Poor thing!

The next part was definitely the best part of the trip. We got to watch Lec with the elephants. She sings to one of the baby elephants and he falls asleep. This is when I got to sit underneath the baby elephant. Lec asked if anyone wanted to sit underneath him with her and I jumped at the chance. Plus, Jane said I should do it as I 'Love them so much'. I will always be grateful to Jane for letting me do it!! It was pretty amazing although I was worried that the mother was going to trample on me. Lec and the mahouts made sure I was safe though!

We then went to watch the elephants actually swimming in the river. This was unbelievable, obviously we weren't actually allowed to get in with them because they would probably just squish you, as elephants can't see behind its own massive head and body! They looked like they were having so much fun, filling their trunks with water and then spraying themselves! This part of the river is also very deep so they can fully submerge themselves. They actually look quite elegant in the water believe it or not! Well as elegant as a massive elephants can look!

We then had to leave which was a bit upsetting. I wanted to stay there for longer and volunteer for longer, hopefully one day I will get to go back and volunteer for a month or something. To be honest though, after speaking to some of the guys that were volunteering for a week they said it was such hard work. In the day you have to go and cut wild grass for the elephants and you come back scratched to death! I would still love to do it though and I think James would as well now. I think I have converted him to an elephant lover too!

We both had such a good time at the park, it is so special to be able to get that close to the elephants. We would definitely recommend it to anyone. It will be one of our favourite memories of the whole trip.

By the way, you have no idea how difficult it was to pick the best photos, we took over 300 altogether!

Chiang Rai (29/4/12 - 1/5/12)

This blog entry really shouldn't take long to write as we didn't really get up to much in Chiang Rai! Once we'd passed through the Thai customs, we took a tuk tuk the short distance to the bus station. From there we hoped to catch a bus to Chiang Rai. We didn't exactly have our hearts set on a stop there, it just so happened to be the only place we could get to before evening drew in and the transport system packed up for the night.

We completed the 3 hour journey on a local bus, rather than a tourist coach. It cost a lot less but was a lot bumpier! It was fun though as we got to spread out a lot more, it was like travelling on a poor man's Wilts & Dorset bus and we got to see some beautiful Thai countryside!

We made it to Chiang Rai by late afternoon and really struggled to find accommodation. Finally we found somewhere, but it was quite a walk out of town. Chiang Rai was a small town with nothing really to entice travellers there, other than the fact that it's the first sizable town you reach from the Laos boarder.

On our second night we wanted to watch the Manchester derby. Kick off was 2am and with Chiang Rai having very few bars, we struggled to find anywhere to watch it. In the end we found a 24 hour restaurant where all of the night market workers and tuk tuk drivers eat. We watched it there, but spent the entire 2nd half having to listen to some drunk 60 year old German tell us about his 'love affair' with Liverpool. In the end we just started ignoring him as he kept chatting rubbish and making us miss the football!

We didn't get in until nearly 5am and then managed to oversleep and very nearly miss the tuk tuk which we'd arranged to pick us up at the hotel at 10am! We got to the bus station and queued for tickets to Chiang Rai. But all of the buses were fully booked and the next available bus didn't leave until 4.30pm. So we spent the next 4 hours doing what we do best now, sitting and waiting!

And that was that! The fact that we only have one photograph from our two days there sums it up, and even that photo is of a bus! But Chiang Mai was a lot better and will take us a lot longer to write up when we get the chance!

Luang Prabang & Mekong River (24/4/12 - 29/4/12)

It's only really been in the last 20 years that Laos has been on the tourist map. This means that much of the country has not yet been developed for tourists and it feels like you're really travelling into the unknown. The major disadvantage though is that the infrastructure isn't really in place. The roads being a good example. They're so bumpy it's unbelievable. The 7 hour bus ride from Vang Vieng up to Luang Prabang was even bumpier than when we did the 4x4 jeep trip on Fraser Island, Australia. The bus shook so hard that bags constantly fell from above our heads and it felt as though we were in the middle of an earthquake!

Luang Prabang was definitely smaller than we had imagined and for some reason it took us ages to get our bearings. I think it was the third day by the time we'd located the main high street! The layout of the town just didn't make sense and the map in our guide book wasn't really much help. Our hotel was fine and we managed to get the young night porter to come to our room and show us which channel we could watch the Barcelona - Chelsea Champions League semi final on. Kick off was 2.30am our time but we stayed up for it anyway!

The only trip we did in Luang Prabang was a half day visit to a local waterfall. It was worth the journey, but the water was ice cold and therefore very few people were swimming! Even better than the waterfall though, was a bear park located in front of the waterfall. About a dozen brown bears lived in a large, open-air enclosure and they were incredible to watch. It was a bit random to see bears there, but they looked to be fairly well looked after. They kept wrestling with each other and their strength was scary.

On our waterfall trip, another couple said that they had woken up at 5.30am that morning to feed some monks. We didn't quite understand what they meant, until they showed us a video. Basically a load of monks walk from their residence to a temple at 6am each morning and tourists line the streets to present them with food for the day. Jenna insisted that we do it the following day, although I was quite happy to have a lie-in! So we got up at silly o'clock and headed for where we thought the monks were going to walk. We arrived there at 5.45am and bought some rice and bananas from women who line the streets. Gradually the monks walked past us in single file and the tourists sit on the pavement and place the food in each monk's individual food basket. I left Jenna to this and stood on the other side of the road to get some photos and to film it. I couldn't help but laugh to myself watching Jenna though. Most people would give each monk a banana or a small handfull of rice. Not Jenna though - she was too generous for her own good! She was dishing food out as if there was no tomorrow! 3 bananas here, 2 handfulls of rice there. She'd run out of food by about the twentieth monk and there were still another hundred or so to go!

After going back to bed for a couple of hours, we spent the rest of the day walking around some temples in more 40 degree heat. I don't know how many more temples we have left in us! When it had cooled down a bit, we walked up the highest point in the town to get a view of the sunset.

Although there was a lot more of Laos to see, few backpackers make it any further than Luang Prabang. Therefore our next stop was North Thailand. If you have time on your side, the best way to get from Laos to Thailand is by a 2 day slow boat along the Mekong River. It was a really beautiful journey as we floated slowly along the river at maybe 20 mph. We were on the boat for about 9 hours on each of the days, but it was comfortable enough. The path of the river took us past some really rural areas which are inaccessible by car, which meant we got to see how the Lao people live their lives on the river.

Vang Vieng (21/4/12 - 24/4/12)

Everybody who goes to Laos tends to spend a bit of time in Vang Vieng doing something called Tubing so naturally we decided to give it a go. In case you don't know what 'tubing' is, it basically involves sitting in a rubber ring and floating down a river. You are then pulled into different riverside bars which include slides, zip lines and swings. Something which I am sure would not be allowed in any part of the world apart from SE Asia! It has often made headlines across the world due to the amount of people who have been injured and even killed whilst tubing, usually due to taking the readily available choice of drugs and over doing it on alcohol.

We arrived in late afternoon so we just had a little look around and then got an early night ready for the day ahead. Vang Vieng was a funny place, it kind of weirdly reminded us of Franz Joseph in New Zealand, but a lot bigger. Also, every single bar or restaurant shows different episodes of Family Guy or Friends so it was nice to chill out and relax in the evening watching that.

Our actual day of Tubing was a cracking day even though we didn't really 'Tube' that much! We met a couple of Norwegian lads that had been on our bus from Vientiene and started the day off with them although we met a lot more people as the day went on. In all honesty, we probably had a little bit too much to drink, (especially when you are playing around in water), but our parents will be pleased to know that we didn't take any drugs, although I can't say the same for some of the people around us! During the dry season it doesn't get as busy as in the wet season so we only really spent our time in the first few bars jumping off zip lines, going down slides, skipping and also partaking in some limboing (I am not even sure if that is a real word). I also managed to get painted with a lot of purple stars, I later found out that the paint they use is car paint so this was a bit of a shock! We ended up having to get a tuk tuk back to the centre of town with out tubes as it got too dark to carry on, so we dropped off our tubes and then spent the night in one of the bars with a group of people that we had met during the day. Some of the people that we met were doing five or six days tubing, but I am pretty positive that by the end of the six days, their body would have been completely broken!

We spent the whole of the next day in bed although I did wake up rather early in the morning thinking it would be a good idea to go and do it again, until I then woke up a few hours later to discover that I didn't feel quite as peachy as I thought I had! Bit of a waste of a day really, although we did make it to one of the bars to sit through a couple of episodes of Friends. That was about as active as we got!

This was the lower part of the river so the water looks pretty horrid but further upstream it was actually a lot cleaner! Unfortunately we do not have any photos of us actually tubing as we didn't want to take our camera with us! 

Vang Vieng itself was a really nice place, so long as you don't go there expecting traditional Lao culture!

Vientiane (Laos) 18/4/12 - 21/4/12

This was the trip we had been dreading! The bus ride from Northern Vietnam to Laos. Most internet forums advise against it and label it 'the journey from hell'! The reason being? 24-30 hours on some extremely bumpy roads. Even the tour agent we booked it with told us that it would be a nightmare and 'not to get our hopes up about the bus'! If we could have afforded to fly we would have, but we went for the cheaper sleeper bus instead. We got picked up from our hotel at 4pm and didn't leave the bus station until 4 hours later, which put us in a good mood with a minimum 24 hour journey ahead of us! Amazingly we made it there in 19 hours, although we didn't get much sleep at all. We don't know what the scenery was like as we had the top bunks at the back of the bus which don't have a window to look out of!


Our first stop in Laos was the capital, Vientiane. The hot weather continued and the temperature shown on TV was 39 degrees.  According to Jenna it was 'too hot' to walk around and she demanded a moped! I'd been happy to rent them on the quieter streets of the Thai beaches, but was a bit unsure as Vientiane was a bit busier. I offered a compromise of renting a bicycle for the day, but that was met with a lukewarm response to say the least, so off we set on a moped! Whizzing around the Laos version of the Arc de Triomph was a stressful experience, but we returned the moped at the end of the day in one piece! We drove a short distance out of town to visit the most famous temples in Laos.

The one thing we had to do in Vientiane was to get our Thai visa, so we drove to the Thai consulate. As with anything official in Asia, it wasn't anywhere near as simple as it should have been! First we obtained a numbered ticket from one desk. Then we obtained an application form from another. The we queued to have a photocopy of our passport taken. Then we waited with the ticket, photocopy of passport and application form at another desk. Then we submitted the entire application. Then we queued at another desk to pay. That makes it sound quite simple, but it really wasn't! 

The funniest experience of the process though was when we were queuing to handover the application. It was all a bit tense as we had to hand it in before the 12.30pm deadline. The day was Thursday and if we didn't meet the deadline then we wouldn't be issued with the visa until the Monday and we really didn't fancy sticking around in Vientiane longer than we had to! So we finally got to the front and handed over our applications to the Thai, female official. Our application had to include 2 passport photos so we handed these over as well. She practically threw them back to us and shoved a prit stick in my direction. Apparently the photos had to be glued to the application. Silly us and obviously there was no way she could do it, so she waved us to one side to get gluing! But then she pointed at Jenna's passport photo and started frowning. In broken English she started ranting and raving about it not looking 'polite' and it being 'offensive' or something. Now Jenna would be the first to admit it wasn't the most flattering of photos, travelling has taken it's toll on both of us, but surely it was a bit harsh to say that she her photo was offensive! After much confusion, it turns out the official was offended by the fact that the passport photo made it look like Jenna was naked! She had been wearing a strapless top when the photo was taken and so the top 3 or 4 inches of her shoulders were on show, without any straps or sleeves. The official said her boss was very strict and may not allow it. She said go outside and get a new photo or risk the visa being rejected! But it was about 12.28pm at this point and I thought the official would love it if we went outside to get a photo and then missed the deadline! Pfff we weren't happy but we knew losing our rag in the Thai consulate probably wasn't the best idea. I saw a pair of scissors on the table where apparently all of the prit sticks were and thought I'd do a crafty one. So as the official continued with some other applications, I got to work. I snipped the bottom 5 millimeters of Jenna's photo leaving just the face and neck! Surely the official wouldn't have a problem and may even congratulate me for my artistic creativity while under pressure? Nope! Her voice got louder and her eyes grew narrower. She said she would submit it but that it would probably be rejected! Ridiculous! So off we set back to the hotel on our moped, via the Arc de Triomph, unsure as to whether we would be staying the weekend in Vientiane after all!!!

The next day we rented a tuk tuk driver for the morning and set off about 20 miles out of town to the Buddah Park. The park was really peaceful and full of beautiful buddah statues and temples. We walked around the park for about 45 minutes and then decided that 40 degrees was too hot for walking and so got the tuk tuk back to our air conditioned room for the remainder of the day!

On the Friday we headed back to the Thai consulate to learn our fate. We queued for it to open, then queued for a numbered ticket, then queued inside....etc. Finally we got to the front of the queue and I feared the worst when I saw the same female official! But we needn't have worried as we both received visa approvals, although Jenna did check hers several times to make sure the official hadn't played any nasty tricks on us!