Laos

From SR we flew to Luang Prabang in Laos. I decided to stay at a hostel as Martina was soon leaving and I needed to make friends.  At the start I was slightly concerned about traveling on my own, however I made friends with an American girl, Christine, within 5 minutes and the golden girls duo was born.

The Golden Girls

There are no words to describe how pretty and tranquil luang prabang is. We spent the first evening exploring the night market and the good market where you can fill your bowl full of delicious fresh veggies for £2. We then met up with josh who we had met in hue and met some 'interesting' people at his hostel.

Night Market in Luang Prabang

The next day we visited the Kuan si waterfalls with a bunch of people from Josh's hostel.  I have never seen such crystal clear water, we trekked up the waterfall which was not easy in trainers let alone barefoot (one of the guys turned up with no shoes, bearing in mind he was smoking joints out of banana leaves the night before this was not surprising).

Kuan Si Waterfalls

After the waterfalls we hiked up the temple in town to watch the sunset.  The sunset was beautiful but yet again I find people ruin these events by spending the entire time with their cameras/ phones out, how about you enjoy it with your own eyes?!? Take a picture, sit down and live the experience!

Like the old grannies that we are Christine and I were back at our form and in bed by 11am, our room mates on the other hand came crashing in at 3am and spent an hour eating, talking and being generally annoying.  So a 630am when Christine and I woke up for yoga we made sure to be equally as inconsiderate (I know not very yogi of us!).  Yoga, cycle round town and a bus trip to vang vieng.  VV one of my favorite places in SE Asia, I've realized I love little towns where you bump into loads of other backpackers and there are lots of outdoorsy things to do.

Morning Yoga on the deck at Utopia overlooking the Mekong

We went for a morning stroll and ended up climbing, literally rock climbing, up a small mountain.  The guy at the bottom who took my entrance fee could have told me climbing up this rock is virtually impossible but 1 hour later and a mild panic attack and I was back at the bottom.

The realisation that flip flops were a terrible idea

Just before I ripped my favourite pair of trousers!

The summit!

Oddly Christine bumped into an American guy she had met in pai half way up this rock, that's what you have to love about traveling!  The afternoon was spent tubing, now a much more tame activity since they closed 26 of the 30 bars that used to line the river.  Essentially it's a pub crawl along the river, each bar has different activities from mud volleyball to wet basketball.

One of the Bars tubing in Vang Vieng

Post Tubing 

Left Christine and took a minivan down to Vientiane.  As usual the minivan is packed to the gills - not the safest mode of travel however I made friends with a group of Dutch guys and after about an hour chatting he promptly fell asleep on my shoulder ... the first time I have ever literally put someone to sleep with my chat.

We parted ways at the bus station as I had already booked a hostel, turns out people are right when they say there is absolutely NOTHING to do in Vientiane.  I was starting to despair at the thought of two days with no one to talk to (I traveled down to Vientiane to cross the border into Thailand and fly to Chiang Mai via a domestic flight - saving those pennies!) when I bumped into the Dutch guys at the bottom of my road.  They invited me along for the afternoon which was nice of them (or maybe I invited myself along ...either way at least I had something to do!).