The Bridge Over the River Kwai

Kanchanaburi

Day One

We arrived fairly early in the day after our extremely inexpensive ride on Thailand's public bus system (did we mention that already?) Our first guesthouse of choice was Apple's Guesthouse, but unfortunately they were full. We made our way to Jollyfrogger's and they had lots of rooms. It isn't the nicest place that we've stayed but it was cheap so we decided to call it home for the next few days. Our first day was uneventful, just the way we like it. I got myself a new book, we walked around the town a bit and that's about it. It was nice to sit back and relax after almost two months of traveling. Our room has its own little patio area so we spent most of the day sitting and reading by the river Kwai - not bad.

Day Two

We decided to actually accomplish something on our second day in Kanchanaburi so we visited the Burma-Thailand museum and the cemetery that is right across the street from it. It is the final resting place to over 7000 POW's from the second world war who died building the railway that connected Thailand and Burma (it would eventually be named "The Death Railway") - in total approx. 20,000 POW's died and over 90,000 Asian workers. The museum was built in 2003 so the exhibits were in great condition and the information was plentiful. We spent over an hour wandering around the exhibits and learning about how the railway was constructed, how the workers were recruited/treated and of course the living conditions of the POW camps in the area. It was sad to see that so many people died for a railway that was only in operation for less then a year. But just like all the sad stories in the world, I think it was necessarily to learn about them. After leaving the museum we headed back to our guesthouse to sit by the river and read (again!!) We had one of the best meals we've ever had at Apple's Guesthouse that night. Our book recommended having the Massuman curry and oh my gosh was it amazing. We also ran into a Norwegian couple we had met over Christmas in Ayutthaya. We chatted for a bit and agreed to meet up for dinner the next night.

Day Three - Tour Day

We booked ourselves on a full day tour that would take us to Erawan waterfall, Hellfire Pass, a train ride on the death railway and to the river Kwai bridge. We were picked up at 8am and to our surprise the Norwegian couple (Maria and Nels) were on the mini-bus. Our first stop of the day was Hellfire Pass. This portion of the railway was dug out of solid rock over 10 meters deep. They made the POW's and Asian workers work right into the night. Light was provided by bamboo torches and the area was quickly nicknamed Hellfire pass by the workers because of the red flames and erie shadows of the workers' skeleton like bodies it cast on the rock wall - it looked just like hell. The only tools the workers had were hammers and picks. One man would hold the pick and the other would strike it with a hammer - once the hole was deep enough they would drop dynamite down the hole and blow it up. They would then have to move the pieces of rock and start all over again. The average work day was 18 hours not including the hike from the camp to the work area. Most of the workers died of malnutrition or disease (malaria or cholera), but many died while working (beaten by guards, falling debris etc.). The museum at Hellfire Pass was also very well done - it had tons of information and made use of videos to help elaborate on details.

After the sobering visit at Hellfire Pass we went to Erawan National Park, home to a beautiful 7-tier waterfall. The hike up to the top is about 2.2 km and takes over an hour. We didn't have enough time to hike to the top and swim so we opted with swimming. Once we reached the fourth tier we jumped in. The water was cold, but refreshing. It didn't take long to find out that the fish in the water were hungry and our toes made for a good buffet. Paul and I both slide down a rock that was just like a slide and got out of the fishes' home. We took lots of pictures of the first four tiers. We spent two hours at the park and we were off to our next destination.

After a 20 minute drive we ended up at a little train station 56 km outside of Kanchanaburi. This is where we boarded the train for our 30 minute trip along the death railway. We didn't take the train all the way to Kanchanaburi because it takes over 2 hours and after 30 minutes we were ready to get off. Our guide then drove us to the River Kwai Bridge so we could take our pictures and dropped us off at home.

We met up with Maria and Nels for dinner at Apple's Guesthouse (where we had the curry again - yummy). They were heading to Bangkok the next day so we said our goodbyes and headed to bed.

Day Four

We have decided to do nothing today - well except Internet. We both have new books and are itching for some sitting by the river time. The biggest decision I have to make today is to get a one hour massage or a two. Not bad eh? We will be staying in Kanchanaburi today and tomorrow and head back to Bangkok for the weekend. We hope to hit the famous weekend market to do the last of our shopping. On Monday we head for the beaches of Hua Hin. We already have a reservation at All Nations guesthouse, which happens to be owned by a Canadian couple. We have no plans for our time after that. I guess it depends on how much we are enjoying the beach. We will probably write again from Bangkok.

Until then....

Christmas in Thailand

Hello all! My goodness we have neglected our blog. I hope to catch it up in one entry - wish me luck :)

Ayutthaya for the Holidays

Day One

We got ourselves a room at U.P. Guesthouse (which is where we stayed the first time). The place was just as we remembered it - clean, cheap and with hot water (woo hoo). We did nothing at all except walk around the town in search of deodorant (we finally stumbled on a shopping centre) and hang around playing cards. For dinner we went back to Kwan's Cafe and had a kick-ass night. There was nobody around so Paul and I pretty much had the place to ourselves. Kwan remembered us from a month ago especially when Paul reminded her of the killer Mai Thai that she made me last time - they were just as killer this time. We ended up spending the night with Kwan and her family eating, drinking and listening the music of our choice. We had staring contests with her daughter and tried to brush up on our Thai (unfortunately the Chang and Mai Thais had kicked in at this point). We headed to bed after shutting the place down (sounds better then it was - we were asleep by midnight).

Day Two

We got ourselves up bright and early to call my family and wish them a Merry Christmas. They were all at my Oma's house so we managed to talk to everyone with one phone call. It was so nice to hear everyone's voices. Once again we spent the day doing NOTHING - it was brilliant. We booked a river cruise for the early evening and had the boat all to ourselves. We stopped at three temples and spent the rest of the two hours cruising around the river. It was really nice and peaceful. One of the temples we had visited during our first trip to Ayutthaya a month ago but the other two were new to us which was nice. One had the largest bronze Buddha we have seen yet (and that is saying a lot) and the other had a reclining Buddha which was cool.

We had dinner at our guesthouse. They put on a Christmas buffet for the guests and ate tons of curry, egg rolls and Paul had chicken wings (he was in heaven). Afterwards we called Paul's family and had a great chat with them (we're still sorry for waking you up). We also made a surprise call to Adam in Ottawa who was half way through his stocking. We called it an early night to prepare for our travels to Kanchanaburi.

Side Note:

We have to met some people for dinner so we will write about the past few days in Kanchanaburi tomorrow - keep you all in suspense!

Pee My

I had to spell Phimai like Peemai so I could remember how it was pronounced - I decided to share that little bit of scary insight into my brain through today's title.

Phimai

Day One

We went from one city with no tourists right into another. This one I really enjoyed though. You didn't get the same "outsider" feeling that you got in Udon Thani and there were a lot less people who decided to spend their free time staring at you. It was a nice, much needed, break. Our first day was pretty much spent on a number of buses. You cannot take a bus directly from Udon Thani to Phimai - instead you have to hit Khorat (also known as Nakhon Ratchasima) and take a bus from there to Phimai. All in all we spent over 7 hours in transit. Once we arrived in Phimai it was too late to really do anything (not to mention we didn't have any money and the banks were all closed).

Interesting side note...

This was the first city we've encountered where our handy Let's Go guide was not completely accurate in its descriptions. We decided that it must be because they haven't sent someone to Phimai in a while and things have changed. The first guesthouse we went to, which got a thumbs up in our book, was not that impressive. We decided to up our daily spending budget and get as nice room at Boonsiri Guesthouse. The owners were really nice and were actually willing to barter the price down 100 baht (probably because we were their only clients!).

We had exactly 140 baht in our pocket which was to buy us dinner and water. We found one of the only restaurants in town and spent exactly 135 baht - we had 5 baht to our name :) After dinner we called it an early night - we were pretty tired after a day of long traveling.

Day Two

We got up fairly early (for us) to find it raining outside. Since one of our sites was outdoors we were pretty bummed, but by the time we were showered and ready to go it had stopped. Although we stayed dry we were quite cold during the day. This seems to be a trend since leaving Laos - we haven't had a warm day in what seems like weeks. Our first stop was Phimai Historical Park which is made up of a bunch of Khmer style (same style as Ankor Wat in Cambodia) ruins. The park was beautiful and reminded us a lot of the ruins we saw in Sukhothai and Ayutthaya. Our favourite part was the large prang in the middle of the park which is now overrun with pidgeons (they were insane!!).

After the park we headed to Phimai National Museum which houses many of the original artifacts taken from the national park as well as a detailed history on the Issan people. Many of the carving and statues contained images of Hindu Gods (such as Ganesh, Vishnu and Shiva) and from as early as the 9th century. It was amazing to see the combination of Hindu and Buddhist religions - most of the time within the same temple. Unfortunately, as with most museums, we could not take any photos so you will have to take our word for it. :)

Our last stop of the day was to see Thailand's largest Banyan tree named Sai Ngam. We were not sure at all what to expect because neither of us knew what banyan tree was. Needless to say we were not disappointed. The book described the tree as "entering a J.R.R. Tolkien inspired netherworld" and they were not far off. We haven't been able to get our photos uploaded yet so here is a great website so you can see what we saw: http://www.bangkoksite.com/NakhonRatchasima/SaiNgam.htmThat night after a great dinner at this little place that was down an alley, we happened upon a soccer game. The night before we were kept up until fairly late by Thai pop music, an enthusiastic announcer and the occasional roar from an audience - we now knew where it was coming from. We stayed for about an hour and only left because we were both way too cold. They played on concrete and the ball was quite a bit harder then a traditional soccer ball and the nets were half the size of a hockey net There were six players on each side and from what Paul could tell the rules seemed to be the same as the soccer we are used to. It was a lot of fun to watch these guys and their fancy footwork (and don't forget - on concrete!).

Back to Bangkok

Today we were up at 4:30 a.m. and started what proved to be a very very long day of traveling. Again, there was no direct transportation from Phimai (which might be why no one goes there - a shame really because the historical park was great) so we had to bus our buts back to Khorat. The bus ride was freezing and for the first time we wished that we had brought warmer clothing. Once arriving there we made our way to the train station. We had hoped on saving a few baht on the train and in that regard we were pleasantly surprised. It took us five hours in a third class train but we almost made it to Bangkok. I say almost because it didn't actually go all the way to the train station in the city. If we wanted a direct train we would have had to wait over two hours and pay five times more (it was a second class train with "air con" and trust me we didn't need it).

Once arriving at the Bang Sue station we thought it would be nice and simple - just buy a ticket to Bangkok. Only one catch - the train didn't leave for another hour and it was already 2pm. We knew if we waited around we risked not being able to find a guesthouse to stay for the night. The nice lady at the ticket booth told us to try the subway. Now a month ago we would have been terrified at the prospect of wandering around a city we didn't have a map for to try and find a subway station, nevermind actually use the subway system. Paul actually said "I don't even like the subway in Toronto" but we decided to brave it anyway. I must say, I am so glad that we did. The subway system was cheap, simple to use and extremely modern. It got us to Bangkok in under 30 minutes.

We found ourselves a decent place to stay for the next two nights. We are staying right in the heart of Khosan road this time. Our first place (Shanti Lodge) was a bit removed from the hustle and bustle of this backpacking scene so we thought we'd mix up our experiences a bit. Now I can honestly say I've never seen so many white people in Thailand then we are experiencing right now. There seems to be about 5 farang to every Thai person - talk about opposite experience from Eastern Thailand. We are planning to leave on the 24th and make our way back up to Ayutthaya again to spend Christmas. We thought it would be nice to chill there for a few days and maybe take a river cruise on Christmas eve. That's it for now. We will probably write again when we reach Ayutthaya. Until then...

MERRY CHRISTMAS (and Yule) and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Miss Udorn Sunshine

Udon Thani

Day One

Well our time in Udon Thani came and went. We arrived early in the afternoon and decided to take it easy. We spent the afternoon wandering around the city. We didn't realize how much we took for granted seeing other tourists because we saw NO ONE in this city. The eastern side of Thailand doesn't really get much in the way of tourism and Udon Thani gets pretty much none of it. One thing we did see a lot of was expats (thanks Dara for my new word) - these would be ex-patriots (people who are citizens of another country - usually the U.S. and live in a foreign country, in this case Thailand). The way to tell an expat from a tourist was pretty simple - they were usually married or "with" a Thai woman (and not in the prostitute sense). Due to the lack of tourism there were no guesthouses either. We stayed in our second hotel of this trip and for the price we were pretty impressed (300 baht for airconditioning and hot water). Our walk around the city lasted about an hour because there wasn't much to see. We went back to the guesthouse to get changed for dinner (it gets cold at night).

Our book recommended this restaurant and it caught my eye with the words "seven scoop sundae" - WOO HOO. So far neither Paul or I have been too impressed with the food in this region of Thailand (known as Issan food). There were no vegetarian options which made matters difficult for me and the taste just wasn't what we were used to from the rest of our trip. This meal was luckily probably the best we have had since arriving back in Thailand and the desert certainly helped.

Day Two

Our plan for the day was to visit Udorn Sunshine Orchid Farm - which was our only reason for coming to Udon Thani. The walk was long and didn't have much in the way of scenery, but it helped to work off that ice cream. We finally found the farm (which wasn't easy because none of the signs were in English) and were immediately impressed by how beautiful the plants were. We realized right away that this was in no way and "all day" affair and that we probably could have done it on day one and only stayed one night, but that's why they say hindsight is 20/20. There were over 15 different breeds of orchid and that's just what we could identify with our very limited knowledge of orchids (let's be honest - no knowledge). The owner of the farm is famous for breeding his own special flower which he calls Miss Udorn Sunshine (apparently the flower is even registered - who knew you could register flowers??) He is also known for the healing properties of his plants and the energy was apparent the moment you were near them. After a frustrating walk to the farm all of our troubles seemed to melt away once we were surrounded by his orchids. He has also taught plants to respond to the human voice or music. There was this one section of plants that moved when you talked - it was amazing. His wife called them the dancing plants.

On the way out of the farm there was a section where you could purchase perfume (which he has cleverly named Miss Udorn Sunshine) and tea made from the dancing plants. I picked up some tea for myself and a bag for a friend of mine (that's you Christy) and we were on our way. On the walk back we decided to take some time to enjoy the city's reservoir which was quite beautiful. Calm water surrounded by park benches and trees almost made you forget that you were the only tourists in the city :) And that was all she wrote on Udon Thani.

Hello Nong Khai

Day One

First and foremost, I was greatly impressed by the ease of which we crossed the Friendship Bridge and passed the border into Thailand. For 30 baht each (less than two dollars) we had an air conditioned bus take us from Vientiane to the bridge - with a stop at the Laos departure area to get our stamp - across the bridge, to Thailand immigration and right into the heart of Nong Khai. The whole journey took about 2 hours and was completely flawless. We tuk-tuked it to Mut Mee guesthouse (which got a glowing review in our Let's Go guide) only to discover it was closed. The owner, who is very nice and gave us a free map of Nong Khai, recommended another guesthouse that was close by (which also happened to be in our book). Less then 10 minutes later we were set up with a very nice (and clean room) at Ruan Thai Guesthouse. We spent the afternoon wandering the streets of Nong Khai. We had our very first taste of mangos and sticky rice (so good), visited the Village Weaver Handicrafts store (www.villageweaver.net) and looked through the Indochina Market. This market reminded me of chinatown in Victoria. The same plastic toys, paper fans and strange looking candies which I thought I left behind in B.C. were right in front of me again. Although it was nice to laugh about the similarities, it didn't make for the best shopping :)

For dinner we had planned to go back to Mut Mee guesthouse - their restaurant was supposed to be amazing. When we got there we were surrounded by mosquitoes - the guesthouse is right on the Mekong. The bugs were so bad that we had to leave and find dinner in town away from the bugs. We had good eats none the less.

Day Two

Today we rented bicycles and made the 5 km ride out to Salakeawkoo, an amazing sculpture park just south of the city. It was completely worth the ride out and the sore butts afterwards! It was made in 1976 by a shaman named Luang Poo Boun Leua Sourirat. He created one near Vientiane as well, but in '74 he fled to Thailand where he built his second wonder. I have never seen anything like it in my entire life - probably one of my favourite places so far on this trip. It was a strange mixture of Indian and Buddhist mythology and imagery. Check out this website for tons of information on it and some great pictures (just in case Paul didn't get our even better pictures uploaded in time :) http://www.mutmee.net/030010_sculpture_park.htm

We went inside the temple which was covered in pictures of this one person. At the time we didn't know who it was and became especially curious when we reached the third floor. At the back there was what appeared to be a dead body in a bubble like object. We now know this to be Sourirat who died in 1996 - they have housed his mummified body there since then.

In my opinion, his best work was The Wheel of Life which was at the back of the sculpture park. It was Sourirat's view of the cycles and influences that enter into ones life from the moment of conception to death. It was absolutely stunning in its honesty and beauty. I could have stayed there all day.

We finally left the park and rode our bikes to Wat Po Chai which is considered to be Nong Khai's "main temple" which says a lot because there are A LOT of wats in this city. The temple itself looked pretty new, but it was the Buddha inside that has an interesting story. While it was being transported from Laos to Nong Khai, lightening struck the raft it was being carried on and it sunk to the bottom of the Mekong. Twenty five years later the Buddha miraculously resurfaced. It was considered to be a miracle and who am I to argue??

We've decided to leave Nong Khai tomorrow and travel to Udon Thani. We should have more to report from there.

Goodbye Vientiane

After spending only one full day in Vientiane we decided to cross the border back into Thailand and make our way to Nong Khai. But before I get to far ahead of myself I will tell you about our time in Laos' nation capital.

Vientiane

While we were in Vang Vieng we heard rumours that Vientiane could be traveled and enjoyed in a day, two max. We decided to reserve judgment for the city until we actually saw it ourselves. Turns out that the rumours were pretty much true. Although we could have stayed longer we were both itching to get back to Thailand.

Day One

After settling into our guesthouse we decided to walk around the city and familiarize ourselves with the good places to eat, bookstores, Internet cafes etc. The city itself is much larger than either place we had been to in Laos so far (Luang Prabang and Vang Vieng were both pretty small), but thankfully was nothing like Bangkok (Thailand's capital city). After spending a few hours walking around we took a bit of a rest to plan our next day. We decided that we would not leave Vientiane until we had both seen everything that was on our "must do" lists. With our action plan completed we headed out for dinner.

Although we ran into Dara (our Florida friend) on our way to the bus station in Vang Vieng we were separated once we arrived there. We had purchased tickets to Vientiane the day prior and supposed to be on the 10:00 am bus. When Dara showed up at the bus station she was told that the 10:00 was sold out and not wanting to risk being stranded to Vang Vieng for another day she hopped on a mini bus (which left a full hour before our bus did).

Side note: Turns out, of course, that our bus was not sold out and actually left half an hour late because the bus driver sat around waiting (and hoping) that they would sell more tickets for the bus.

We had been in Vientiane most of the day and hadn't run into Dara yet. As we were waiting for our dinner order, none other than Dara (who had our friends from Ottawa - Nashib and Maria in tow) walked by us. Nashib and Maria could stay long - they were headed out on the overnight bus to Paxae (sp??) - but Dara joined us for the evening. Dara was also debating about staying one more day or two. After an ice cream cone (woo hoo for me) we parted ways and agreed to meet up for dinner the next day.

Day Two

We woke up nice and early (for us) and started our wat walking tour. Our Lonely Planet guide book suggested a 2 hour walking tour of the city which stopped at most of the best temples - with a few of our own choices added.

By 11:30 am we had finished up most of our tour and were wandering around city wondering how to spend the next few hours (the other two temples we wanted to see were closed between the hours of 11 am and 1 pm so we had some time to kill). As we were wandering we ran into (none other) than Dara. After chatting we decided to meet up at 2:30 to visit the cities most sacred stupa - That Luang.

We spent the next few hours wandering through Wat Phra Kaew and Wat Sisaket. Both sites were beautiful and both had been converted into museums. Wat Sisaket was lined with alcoved walls - in each alcove was two small Buddha figurines. There must have thousands of them. Wat Phra Kaew used to house the Emerald Buddha (now in Bangkok), but in 1788 the Thais took the Buddha for themselves. We met up with Dara at 2:30 and started the long walk to That Luang. Although the road we also had the pleasure of passing by the Anousavari Monument - Laos own triumphal arch - built in the 1960's for the people of Laos who died in wars defending the country. It was pretty cool to see. We finally made it up to That Luang and it was an impressive site. It was unlike any stupa we have ever seen for two reasons - it was shaped differently and it was completely gold. Most of the temples we have visited used gold leaf - the maintenance must have been horrible because the stuff was always peeling off. They must have used gold paint on this one because it was perfect. We walked back to our guesthouse (after stopping for some margaritas) and had some much needed time off our feet and a shower. We met up with Dara for one last dinner (for sure this time because after she's not going back to Thailand) and had some great red curry and fried tofu (yum yum). We headed out for drinks by the Mekong River after dinner and said our goodbyes.

Tubular

Hello all!

Day Four

I know it's been a few days but there really wasn't much to report. We spent Monday floating down a river in Vang Vieng in big inner tubes. We woke up bright and early (for us), smothered ourselves in sunscreen, had a bite to eat and headed down to Vang Vieng Tubing Group where we met up with Dara and Meghan (a woman from California that Dara met on the bus to Vang Vieng). These tubing guys have a pretty lucrative business going. They provide tubes and transportation up the river for $3.50 USD (each). The river provides the rest of the entertainment. The journey down the river is covered in beautiful scenery (lush green mountains) and the occasional bar (where you can get off the tube and partake in a Beer Lao if that is your cup of tea.... well beer). It was a great day. You had no choice but to sit back and be at peace with nature - my kind of fun. Turns out we also went at the perfect time of day as well because all the drunk people hadn't gotten out of bed yet (ha ha). The river still had enough people on it to socialize, but you could float all by yourself if you wanted to. By the time we finished it was still nice and warm out, but you could see people with poles stationed all along the river, who, for a modest fee, will fish you out and bring you back to town if you get too cold (or drunk).

We finished the day with a late lunch, some laundry and book reading (Paul finished The Da Vinici Code - woo hoo!). That night we found ourselves a quiet little restaurant that played movies and watched The Incredibles (for the 2nd time since arriving in Southeast Asia). Good fun.

Day Five

On Tuesday we decided that we would once again brave cave exploring. On our map (very generously provided by our guesthouse) there was a cave a mere 2 km from town called Lusi Cave. We crossed the river (after paying the toll for the rickity bridge) and started to walk. At first the trek was through fields that someone had mowed a path through. As we got further along the mowed path turned to a forest. We walked for what seemed like forever and we didn't see a single person along the way (except what I will assume was a Lao farmer who had a rather large knife with him). I started to get a bit nervous - we all know how paranoid I get. After about 45 minutes of walking we arrived at the cave. The other two caves we visited had ticket booths and employees. This cave had four drunk (and I think a little high too) Lao men who wrote on a piece of wood...

Trip to Cave - 5000 kip

Trip to Lagoon - 10 000 kip

MUST HAVE GUIDE

Once again entering the cave involved climbing up a steep cliff. I didn't exactly have too much confidence in the men that were to be our "guides". I looked over at Paul I could see that he felt the same way. We turned our butts around and made the 45 minute walk back without ever seeing Lusi Cave. But heck, we're alive to tell the tale :) We got back to the room, showered and headed out for an afternoon/evening of Friends watching.

Vientiane

We have now arrived in Vientiane and I must proclaim that I DID NOT get sick on this bus. Thank you to the makers of Gravol. We did have some entertainment on the bus though (thankfully not provided by me). About 2 hours into the 3.5 hour trip we blew a tire. I thought for sure this would take forever to get fixed, but this very handy man changed the tire in record time and we were back on the road again.

Our guesthouse is quite nice - off the main road, clean and relatively cheap for Vientiane (which is an expensive place compared to Vang Vieng). We have a shared bath this time, but it's nice and clean. We have prepaid for two nights and at this point we're not sure if we will stay longer. Our Visa expires on Sunday, but I think we will probably head to Nong Khai on Saturday. We'll keep you all posted.

Just a Note About Christmas:

For those family members who are expecting phone calls on Christmas - rest assured that we will do our very best to call on the actual day. We expect that the phones will be quite busy that day and there are only so many international phones to go around. If you do not hear from us it is not because we fell off the Earth :) - we will try and call the next day. We look forward to talking to you.

Love Correne

Just a spoon full of sugar...

We have discovered Laos' version of Pai! Vang Vieng is a very hard city to leave as well. We don't have to be out of Laos until the 18th of December (when our Visa runs out) so we thought we'd spend some extra time doing nothing here. It is nice to feel settled in a city for a few days without having to worry which bus I'm going to be sick on next :)

Day Three

We decided to rent bicycles yesterday and take the 7 km journey to Poukham Cave. It is the most popular cave to visit among us farang so we decided to give it a try. We really enjoyed our visit to Chang Cave (which was the one we saw the day before) and were excited to see what people were describing as a "beautiful site." Most of the bicycle places rented old-school styled bikes (like the one you'd picture Mary Poppins riding). We rented two of those and at the time didn't really think anything of it. About 5 minutes into our trip we realized we should have had mountain bikes.

The road (if you could call it that) was mostly dirt and rocks (big ones). We were having a tough time just trying not to fall off the bikes! Every time we reached a hill we had to get off the bikes and walk them up. Along the 7 km route were these rickety old wooden bridges built by the villagers in the area. In order to use the bridge you had to pay a toll (or if you were cheap like one guy we saw you could take off your shoes and attempt to walk the river!). By the time we reached the cave we were hot, sweaty, very very dirty and tired (it was 32 degrees yesterday). We chained up our bikes and paid the entrance fee to the cave. We couldn't really see a clear entrance way so we asked one of the employees where the stairs were. He pointed to what looked like a wall and then pointed straight up. We walked toward the wall and saw that there were no stairs and that you had to climb this mountain wall to get to the cave. Now all of you who know Paul and I well know that we aren't exactly in peak physical condition (ha ha) and we were already exhausted from the bike ride. But this trip has brought out the adventurous side in us both so we decided to scale the mountain to reach the cave. Not once during the 20 minutes that it took to get to the top did I feel safe. The whole time I kept thinking "how the hell am I going to get down this thing!!" There were a few times where we both almost slipped, but by some miracle we reached the top and found the cave.

Although the cave was nice (as far as caves go) it was not worth the Mary Poppins bikes, the crazy road, the rickety bridges and the mountain climbing to get there. We spent lots of time exploring the cave and taking pictures (we actually got quite a few nice ones) - we did try to make the best of a very tiring situation. Once we gathered our courage and energy we started the climb down.

Paul took a picture of our route. He joked that we needed photographic evidence of our cause of death. I can laugh now, but at the time I thought the picture may come in handy!! We took it nice and slow and made it down safe and sound in about half an hour. We were glad to be out of the cave and heading back the 7km we came. A nice cold shower sounded fantastic.

Now we all know that things don't always work out as we plan. About 1km into our ride back to the guesthouse Paul's tire went flat. We both just about lost it. We didn't say much on our 6km walk back - I think we were both afraid that we might snap and kill each other (even though we knew the situation was not the fault of either of us). We returned our bikes and thankfully they didn't try and make us pay for a new tire. We made it back to our guesthouse and we both took the longest showers in history.

That night met up with a couple from Ottawa for dinner and had a great time. We had Indian food and talked until they shut the place down. We're planning on meeting them again tonight. Today we've spent lots of time doing nothing. Paul is reading the Da Vinci Code (which I just finished) and he can't put it down. I've never seen him read so much in my entire life! It's great. We might take a walk down to the market and look into buying a bus ticket to our next stop (Vientiane). We'll probably leave tomorrow unless we decide to go tubing down the river. We'll keep you posted.

Rain Rain Go Away

Luang Prabang

We only ended up staying in Luang Prabang for two full days as the rain would not let up. The town is pretty cool though, as each street is lined with places to eat, visit, and drink some Beer Lao. It is said to be the best beer in all of South East Asia, and I would have to agree. At 10,000 kip (roughly 50 cents) for a large bottle, it is hard to go wrong. There were some waterfalls to see outside of the city, but to be honest, it was just too damn cold. Now I know all of you at home are in the dead of Winter, but when you have been in the hot sun for 31 days, a rainy cool day can feel like Winter (especially when you didn't pack any warm clothes). However, we did see some nice things in Luang Prabang, and it was nice to not take any day trips for once.

Day One

We saw a really neat temple with an amazing Tree of Life mosaic. It seems that temples in Lao are much different then the temples in Thailand. That being said, when you walk into one, they also have a different type of feel and energy. Temples in Thailand are much more grandiose, whereas temples in Laos are simple and less ornate. Correne felt that the temples in Laos were much more spiritual because they are less distracting.

That night we had an authentic Laos dinner, and I must say, it was probably one of the best meals I have had so far. Mmmm...spicy. Correne says her lips are still burning.

Day Two

We went to the museum in the Grand Palace, and this museum was really neat. It contained a lot of Laos history including a tablet with the first Laos scripture. This was also the home of the King and Queen up until 1975. The building itself had a strange feel. The structure was quite old, but with each new King came renovations. It was a mixture of very old and very new in one building. It's too bad that we couldn't get pictures because some of the mosaic walls were breathtaking (they didn't allow photography in the palace).

After that we went up the over 300 steps to a temple on the hill. The temple itself was nothing spectacular, but the view was worth the climb. It wasn't until that moment that we realized just how big Luang Prabang really is. We tended to stick to the tourist areas, so it was really cool to see the residential side of the city.

Later that night we hit the night market and had a great dinner. The market proved to be quite different than any Thai market we've seen so far. The art was different, the selection was different, and the bartering was different. Since we saw some stuff we haven't seen before, we decided to pick up a few things for Xmas. It was later that night we decided that this would be our last night in Luang Prabang. In the morning we would get up early, and board the overpriced bus to Vang Vieng. Good thing, because that morning it was still raining, and still freezing cold.

Vang Vieng

I know that Correne wrote before about her, shall we say, upset stomach on the bus from Pai to Chiang Mai. Well, this bus ride made that trip look like a walk in the park. On this six hour ride, you could not drive for more than five seconds without taking a hairpin turn in either direction. To put it in perspective. Vang Vieng is only 160 Km's from Luang Prabang, but it still takes six hours. We were only an hour in to the ride when things got ugly...I promised Correne I wouldn't go into too many details, but lets just say it was not pretty.

Day One

We arrived around two in the afternoon, and found ourselves a really clean guesthouse at the cheapest price yet. Correne took a three hour (much needed) nap, while I explored the city. For some reason every restaurant has a T.V., and they all seem to be playing back to back Friends episodes all day and night. We have heard that theme song about 50 times already. We took the rest of the night easy, and waited to do anything adventurous the next day.

Day Two

There are several caves on the outskirts of town, and one was only one km away, so we walked there thu really nice countryside. The caves were amazing, and the view inside and out was really something. For some reason, we were the only people in the cave, and the silence when we both were quiet was erie. It seemed the cave began to pulse in your ear it was so quiet. Tomorrow we will rent bikes, and check out the caves that were a little farther out of town.

That's it for now. We are going to get a couple of fruit shakes, and watch some Friends episodes...hey, why not?

Lates

Paul

Rolling on the River

Pardon my typing this morning - I as still suffering from insulin shock from my breakfast! We had crepes with bananas and chocolate (and not cheap chocolate either - high quality stuff) this morning and man was it good. Probably our best breakfast yet :)

Chiang Khong

We woke up bright and early on Sunday morning, got ourselves a packed lunch from one of the guesthouses and headed to Thailand immigration. We got our exit stamp and piled onto a ferry to cross the Mekong River (which took all of 5 minutes). Once on the other side we were officially in Houie Xay in Laos. We took care of the Visa stuff (ended up costing 3100 baht instead of 3000 because it was a Sunday) and got into a truck and headed to the boat pier.

The Boat

I must admit, when we saw the boat I wasn't surprised. The seat were hard wooden benches. What I was surprised about was how many people the crammed into the thing. When all the benches were full they started to pull out plastic chairs. When all the chairs were full they sat people in the floor. Finally, after cramming about 150 people onto this boat, we set sail along the Mekong. The ride was beautiful, but you became distracted by the discomfort pretty early on. After about two hours your ass was officially numb and although you would think that being numb was a good thing - for some reason it still hurt. After a seven hour day we stayed in Pak Beng for the night. Here is where the story gets good.

Pak Beng

All I can say about this city is that I'm glad that I will never have to see it again. We decided to book our accommodations prior to getting on the boat so we could avoid the headache of trying to find a place to stay at 6pm along with the other 148 people on our boat. This proved to be a big mistake. We paid 300 baht for a double room with bath which would normally be a fairly reasonable price. When we saw the room I almost cried. We didn't even take a picture because frankly I don't want the memory of it. The bed was dirty, the hot water shower didn't work and there was writing on the wall from previous travelers. It went something like this...

"Over priced, vermin infested..."

"Don't stay, run with your lives..."

And this folks, was our first impression. We dropped off our bags and went and had dinner. As we were leaving the room Paul was offered various types of illegal narcotics. We thought this was odd until it happened every five minutes. I guess the people of Pak Beng are bored.

We called it an early night and hit the sack. We of course pulled out of sleep sacks and pillow cases for the evening. Around 11pm they turned the generators off which meant the fan went off as well. The room got very uncomfortable very quickly. I hadn't slept a wink of sleep and Paul maybe got an hour. I started to have a panic attack (I mean... why not??) which caused me to stay up for most of the night (and consequently Paul as well). Just as we were about to fall asleep the roosters started. Silly me, I thought roosters did their thing at dawn and not 3 in the morning. But man am I glad they woke us up because if we had been asleep we would have missed the best part of all... the rats. That's right... you heard me... RATS. At first Paul thought I was being paranoid. He said the noises that I heard were outside the room, but I of course knew better. At this point both of us were wide awake and knew that sleep was not in our future for that night. Paul decided that he would try to find the lighter (which was our only source of light - why we don't have a flashlight is beyond me) to see if he could see anything under the bed. He is such a brave man. Anyway, he finds the lighter and checks under the bed to find nothing. I felt a little better so we decided to try and fall asleep. This next part I didn't hear about until the morning...

I fell asleep almost right away but Paul had some more trouble. As he was just about to pass out he heard something crawl up his backpack and approach his head. As he lifted his head he heard something drop and hit the ground with a thud. This was all the proof he needed - we did indeed have rats. Being the nice guy he is, he decided not to wake me and tell me this. In total, we probably got about 2-3 hours sleep.

On the boat again

Yesterday we got up bright and early in hopes of getting a bench seat on the boat. We got down there about 8am and luckily there were still lots of spots. And the best part - these benches had cushions!! This made day two on the slow boat much more comfortable. I spent most of the day reading - I actually finished a whole book (Dead Even I think it was called) and Paul relaxed and took tons of pictures (which is just finished uploading so take a look). After 8 hours of boat riding we landed in Luang Prabang.

Luang Prabang

We arrived in Luang Prabang around 6 o'clock last night. Finding a guesthouse proved to be a little difficult, but we expected that. We paid way more then we wanted to spend for the night, but at least it was clean and the hot shower worked. We had a great dinner, toured around the fantastic night market and once again retired for an early evening. Bright and early this morning we went hunting for a new place to stay. We found a room just like the one we stayed in last night, but half the price. SCORE!

That's it for now. We should be in Luang Prabang for a few more days and then we're heading south.

One Pai and Three Chiangs in Two Days!

Well hello, hello everyone!

My oh my do I have a tale to weave for you all, so hold onto your butts :)

Pai (still)

This is a very very hard place to leave. We actually ended up staying five nights in total in Pai. The last two days were spent doing absolutely nothing (which is just what the doctor ordered). I finally got my first Thai massage and it was pretty cool. To be honest I also got my second Thai massage in Pai as well and it was much better then the first. During the day we explored the town a bit, but mostly we say by the river at our guesthouse and read (or slept). I bought and have already completed the DaVinci Code and Paul finished the 5th Harry Potter. We're on the hunt for new books at some point today. Side Note: There are tons of used book stores in Thailand where you can exchange books by selling your old and picking up a new one - makes traveling light a lot easier.

While in Pai Dara (in all of her brilliance) suggested an alternative route into Laos. You see we were planning on backtracking down to take the train up to Nong Khai and crossing the border there. We would then travel north to Luang Prabang and travel back down the south to leave Laos. That's right - we were going to be backtracking twice. Now that I think about it to didn't really make a lot of sense for us because we still have quite a bit of time before our Thailand visa expires (it expires Dec. 8th). So here is what we decided to do instead. Take the bus from Pai to Chiang Mai, from Chiang Mai to Chiang Rai (stay the night there) and then travel to Chiang Khong where we will cross the border into Laos. From Houie Xay (which is in Laos) we take a slow boat (which takes two days) along the Mekong River to Luang Prabang. We can then travel south to Viang Vieng (sp??) and Vientiane.

I will continue with my tale now...

Yesterday (Dec. 2nd) we hopped back on the bus from Pai to Chiang Mai. This ended up being the worst day on this trip so far (for me). I haven't been feeling the greatest (a bit of a cold/flu thing) so I decided to start taking the general antibiotics that were prescribed to me a few days ago. I don't know if that is what caused my demise, but the very nauseating ride to Chiang Mai didn't help. Let's just say I now get to add "threw up in a plastic bag on a old bus in Thailand" to my resume. So I arrived in our first Chiang feeling like crap.




Chiang Mai

We didn't stay long in Chiang Mai. Just long enough to get some food (and gravol) and hop onto a bus heading to Chiang Rai. At the bus station we met this very nice woman named Ann from Belgium. She heard of our plan to continue onto Chiang Rai and decided to join us. So just as a reminder - we now have Correne, Paul, Dara (from Florida) and Ann on this adventure! Fortunately for me this ride was much better and got me to our destination feeling right as rain (I've always wanted to say that!)

Chiang Rai

We arrived in Chiang Rai to get into the second guesthouse of our choice. It wasn't perfect, but since we were only spending one night we decided it was just fine. The four of us heading out into town and have a look around and eventually hunt down some dinner. Chiang Rai also boasts a night market worth checking out. We made our way there and had a GREAT dinner at the food stalls. For practically no money (100 baht) we had fried rice, pad Thai, spring rolls and fruit shakes for desert. We spent the night looking around the night market. There were quite a few things that we hadn't seen anywhere else before. It was also nice that the market was only open to pedestrian traffic so we didn't have to worry about crazy drivers running us over while we shopped! We called it an early evening and headed to bed.

In the morning we exchanged money, had breakfast and caught the bus to Chiang Khong.

Chiang Khong

This makes up our third Chiang in the past two days! We arrived at 1pm this afternoon and found ourselves a place to spend the night. The bamboo bungalows are quite nice and apparently our guesthouse has great Mexican food (although we've been warned that it takes so long that you might actually believe it's coming straight from Mexico!) Chiang Khong is a typical border town. Lots of places to buy slow boat tickets, a few places to eat and that's about it. Just by chance they hold a night market every Saturday night so it looks like we have plans for the evening. We have already purchased our slow boat tickets for tomorrow. At 9am we head to Thailand immigration for an exit stamp. We then take the ferry across the Mekong River to Houie Xay where we will obtain our 15 day Laos visa and get on the slow boat to Luang Prabang.

Well that's it. Since we will be traveling by boat for the next two days we won't be updating, but we hope to write in our blog once we arrive in Luang Prabang. Keep reading and check out the photos - Paul got a really fast internet connection and has uploaded almost every photo we have.

Until then...