23 January 2015

Travelling Gypsy Life Entry 37

Just over a week ago I came to Melbourne and finished my south east Asian trip with Liz. Laos was the last stop and we only spent a week there. We had plans to visit all of the country, even though we weren't entirely sure what Laos had to offer us, but after a week there, which was the seventh week of our trip, we were done. As much as I love traveling, places like south east Asia really take it out of you so we packed up all of our shit and left. However, the week we did spend there was really good, and this is what we got up to...




We started off in the tubing capital of Vang Vieng. Tubing isn't what it used to be there, as a few years ago it was easier to get drugs than lunch, there were bars all along the river and tons of tree swings to jump off. However, this resulted in a lot of injuries and deaths. I read that on average, one person died each month, so the government sorted their shit out and banned a lot of stuff. So now there are four bars, no drugs and no tree swings, but it can still get pretty messy as I discovered. We rented our tubes in the morning (basically rubber rings) and started at our first bar along the river, where we were met by a bunch of British guys dressed in drag playing beer pong at 11am. These guys were workers for the first bar and tried to get us involved in beer pong, but 11am seemed too dangerous to play that. We had a drink then moved along in our tube.


Overall, we only made it to three bars. We met up with some Finnish people we met earlier in the trip and played volleyball. Then at the final bar (well three out of four bars) there were a ton of people. So lots of drinks, warmish weather and beach volleyball. You're supposed to return your tube by 6pm to get your deposit back, which seemed like loads of time but looking at my phone at 5:30pm and nowhere near the end we desperately tried to paddle back in our tubes.


To cut a long story short, I remember leaving the last bar, but don't remember how I got back or even taking my tube back. I remember being in my room and I'd somehow managed to pick up my laundry on the way. Liz was a lot later back than me, half of her stuff got water damaged and that was our messy tubing experience. Then I discovered my ipod got damaged and on the same day an ATM ate my card... Apart from drunken river tubing, we also went to a kind of lagoon and cave which was really beautiful.


Then we headed to Luang Prabang, but as soon as we got there it was raining and pretty cold. I'm really glad I brought a sleeping bag because it was too cold at night without it. There wasn't a great deal to do in Luang Prabang with crappy weather as a lot of the tours include trekking, kayaking or going to elephant and bear sanctuaries. We researched the weather and realised it was pretty rainy all over the country so we decided to pack our backpacks and head to Australia.


A good trip in Laos overall, but just way too tired towards the end. I'll visit again one day to see the 4000 Islands but that's about it.

Peace out for now x

2 comments:

  1. Majorly things needs to be goodly managed and also maid of the mist boat tour is the thing that keeps it all in a manner. //

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    Replies
    1. I'm annoyed I missed the 1000 islands, but I'd love to go back and tick them off the list!

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