See What Tim Is Doing: laos

Friday, 2 September 2011

Vang Veing – Successfully shaving 10 years of people lives (August 22-25)

We left Luang Prabang excited for the 6 hour mini bus ride to Vang Veing, know for its tubing antics that involves getting an inner tube from car or truck wheel, jumping in a river that has a strong current, floating down the river and stopping off at bars along the way to drink, dance and do rope swings and crazy slides, sounds safe? We didn’t even make it there before we were risking our lives.

A few hours from Luang Prabang, and we hit a stop in the road with a long line of traffic and we were told there had been a landslide, which for this time of year was normal, and we had passed several that had been cleared, so we weren’t too worried, until Jonny and I decided to go to see the extent of the slide. A 20 minute walk along the line of stationary traffic and we faced the landlside, which literally looked like half of the mountain was missing. An area about 25meters high and about 100meters long had slid from the rain and had taken out a large section of the road, along with some electricity poles and any hope of getting across in our van.

We waited around for several hours waiting to hear what was going on, and we heard mixed reports; three hours, by 5pm and then that the slide had actually happened several days ago, and days later we had clarification that the slide had actually happened several days before we got there.

Frustrated, extremely hot and ready to go insane, we had to do something, and along with the other 100 backpackers in the same situation, we decided to get our bags from our van, and follow in the footsteps of some people we saw scaling up the side of the slide and walking along the top to get to the other side.

Loaded with close to 30kgs of luggage, and some rain drops starting to fall, it was looking grim, but we had no choice, so we gathered a crew and scaled the muddy, slippery path up, sweating like mad, which made our feet even slipperier and made it to the top without anyone falling or getting lost along the way, then the rest was easier, although still felt slightly unsafe, walking across the top of a land slide and seeing the tractors below working to clear it all and seeing how big it really was, but we made it! Next problem was now finding someway to get to Vang Veing from the middle of nowhere!

Groups of backpackers were huddled all over the road trying to figure out what to do next, and we managed to find someone who was willing to take us there, for a price of course, which we managed to bargain down a bit to approximately £5 for a 2 hours ride, the catch, it was in the back of a little tipper style truck. So 14 of us piled our bags and bodies into the back of the truck, and were on our way.

Sounds pretty average, but in the end was a lot of fun. Jonny had a bottle of whisky so that got passed around the back of the truck, everyone was in high spirits and having a laugh and getting to know each other. Then we made a stop along the way and loaded up with some Beerlaos and snacks and were back on the road, up and down winding mountain roads and witnessing some of the most amazing scenery I have ever seen in my life! It was so mountainous, green, and just beautiful, and taking it in from the back of the truck was even better as there was nothing to disturb the view.

A couple of bumpy hours later and we finally made it to Vang Veing, found a guesthouse, showered and washed the caked on mud off our bodies and went for a bite. Within two steps of the front of our guesthouse we were met by a girl with a tray of shots, handing them out for free, so we indulged and went in, got some dinner and beers and met some more randoms and chilled for a few hours. The girls left and Jonny and I decided to go for a wander and see what else was going on, and ended up in one of the clubs for a few hours partying and dancing the night away.

First day tubing and we were pumped! All ready with our waterproof bags and money for the day, we hired our tubes and got a ride to the river, ready for a day or carnage. First bar kicked off with some casual beers, then quickly moved to beer pong and a bucket. Then next bar more buckets and dancing and the first of the rope swings. Swimming from the balcony of the bar into the water, brilliant fun. Next bar, the first slide which was fun but a little tame, still more buckets again of course and at this point everyone is well and truly merry! And I forgot to mention the way you get to these bars is you sit in your tube, float down the river and then guys in the bars throw bottles with ropes on them to you, you catch them and they pull you in to the bar.

The highlight of the day came from one of the later bars, that has a slide, funny enough called ‘The Death Slide’ which is a tiled slide, about 25meters long and at the end it shoot up like a ski jump, and is amazing fun! So we brought a bucket, got our stamp to let us use the slide, drank the bucket and climbed the stairs to the top, and from the top it looked even bigger. Girls and guys were all sliding down it, so we jumped on and had a go and it was soooo sweet! We were controlled at the start just sliding down like normal, but after gaining some more courage, head first sliding was happening, and then final slide for the day I decided to try a flip off the slide and luckily for me it worked out just as planned and got cheers and claps from all the spectators on the dock watching. So I left on a high note before I ended up hurting myself.

The final bar for the day, had another rope swing and probably the most dangerous thing I had seen that day, a big blow up rectangle that one person sat on the end and other people jumped on the other end and launched the person into the air and into the water. One of the girls we met got on the end and three of us decided to launch here, so we jumped and launched her but all smashed ourselves, knees jolted, hitting ribs and jaws, wasn’t really worth it, so that was the last of that activity. So we moved onto the rope swing and that soon claimed another one of us as a victim. Em swung off the swing all fine but when getting out of the water stepped on a tree stump it pierced her foot causing a mean wound on her foot and toe. So we decided we’d call it a day for the tubing and go home, wash up and get ready for partying that night. The night got pretty messy and to sum it up, we ate, drank, danced and woke up pretty dusty the next day, but decided to back it up and go tubing again.

A little dusty to start, but as soon as you get off the raft to the first bar, your head is tipped back and some shots are thrown straight down your throat, which I think actually sorted me out for the start of day two. Tubing also was much the same; drinking, dancing, rope swings and slides into the river, floating around getting hammered. I randomly ran into Becky and Ky who I met in Xi’an and hung out and partied with them a fair bit, which was good fun! It was another highly enjoyable day, but the main difference was the tube home.

We decided to tube the whole way back to town that many people do, and was told it was easy and took about 40 minutes. As we all enjoyed floating in our tubes, we decided this sounds like a delightful thing to do, so we had about 6 of us, floating down the river (it was also dark by now) and we were laughing having a merry old time until we ran into some people who were not as chilled as us. They were hammered drunk, sharing a tube and freaking about where we were going. Luckily they didn’t rub off on us too much, and when we adopted a couple of other people tubing back to town, we had a nice posse floating back to town signing some tunes, not worrying about what creatures could be below the murky waters or in the dark river banks, and in the end we ended up exactly where we wanted, although at times we thought the drunk Australian’s that were panicking were going to die, but the crew made it to town safe and sound.

Our last night was nothing massive but was a fun night. We had dinner in a chilled little roadside kitchen where the menu was very limited but the food was amazing! Then moved onto a shisha bar from some shisha, a few buckets and a game of 8’s that really got everyone sauced right back up. We then moved onto another bar just to sit back and chill, ordered a few more drinks and chatted with Ky and Becky who popped by and then as we were leaving, we saw a separate hand written menu that sold all kind of interesting treats like happy garlic bread, opium pancakes, bags of mushrooms and opium and then just in case you have a chronic smoking habit, they also sold 1kg bags of weed. We thought against it and headed back home for a semi decent nights sleep. As the next 30+ hours was going to be spent on buses to Cambodia…not fun! And with the track record with buses in Laos it doesn’t look good!

The landslide

Landslide

Muddy feet after the trek over the slide

View from the back of the truck

Cow

Night out at Oh La La

Frisbee game at Bar One

Muddy lad

In the back of the truck on our way to Vang Vieng

The tubing river

Day one on the river

Me, Jonny, Aiden and Ally

Beer pong

Buckets

Bar Two

Horrid scenery

Tubing

Q Bar

Mud wrestling

Twilight tubing

Me, Jonny and Em in the back of the truck

Wednesday, 31 August 2011

The first taste of Laos – Luang Prabang (19 – 22 August)

My first thoughts after crossing the Mekong River on a tiny wooden boat was that Laos seems kind of backwards, but not in a bad way. The houses, wooden huts, elevated a meter or two from the ground stilts, majority of roofs made from straw, a few from tin, chickens running freely in the yard, some even have a cow or two keeping the chickens company and all the people I saw, smiling.

Although their way of life looks extremely basic and possibly poor to some, they look happier then people I see driving Lambos and Porches with all the money in the world. I have been to some pretty poor places that are depressing and heart-breaking, this is definitely not one of them. Poor, yes. Depressing, no.

Not only did the people seem beautiful but the scenery was simply amazing too! The mountains are like nowhere I have ever seen before. So green with so many mountains stretching right out to the horizon and valleys and gorges in between. So this was making the bus trip easy, until it got dark and there was nothing to see, and then in literally the middle of nowhere, our bus breaks down. Never fear though, they have a spare fan belt and its changed and we are back up on the road in half an hour. Smooth sailing for about 20 minutes and then, bus pulls over again, this time in the middle of no where (more so then the last break down) and the news is bad, our bus isn’t going anywhere.

Different people gave us different reports, but they all seemed to lead to the same conclusion, we had to wait hours to get a new bus, at 1130pm, in the middle of nowhere. Luckily the bus was full of English speaking people including a couple of crazy Spanish guys who entertained the bus during this dark time, and not to mention the sky was filled with more stars then I have ever seen before, it was pretty amazing!

An hour had gone, and we were hungry, and thirsty, and with nothing in sight, not even a street lamp. Myself and Jonny, an English guy who I met on the boat to the Laos border, decided to go for a walk as there was word of some food and drinks place nearby. A little further then the 200m we were told, but eventually we found a place with literally a fridge with a few drinks, including beer that went down a treat, but they had nothing at all to eat. A building across the road though showed some hope, so we went over and it looked like a garage with a few tables in it, but they had more then finished for the night, but one of the Laos lads on the bus managed to sweet talk the lady into making a huge plate of fried rice and vegies for the 20+ people that now filled their garage looking restaurant. We ate and drank and decided to venture back to the bus and wait there, and on route to the bus the new bus drove past, so we loaded up the bus, got on and was back on our way over three hours later. There was one small problem; there was not enough seats on the bus, so some people had to sit on the floor for the next 10 hours.

We arrived to Luang Prabang though and found a nice little guesthouse and settled in, and I decided to go see what the town was all about. First impression: chilled, slow paced, beautiful. The Mekong River is right there, green hills in the background and no sign of a high rise!

I met back up with Jonny and Emma, the couple I had met on the boat to the border and were also on the eventful bus ride to Luang Prabang, and went for a wander in the night markets as I had heard they were pretty cool, and that they were. Paintings, home wares, slippers, shirts, books and loads of other cool things that you would actually consider buying unlike many of the other markets I have seen. We stumbled across a small alley that looked inviting and we headed down. Instantly we saw and smelt a wild array of foods, and at the end, we hit the jackpot, the BBQ meats and salad section. Full chickens or fish on skewers, ribs, chicken breast and legs, slabs of pork and just about anything you can BBQ. I ended up with a plate of all different kinds of salad, a full BBQ fish stuff with lemon grass and a big BeerLaos for roughly £3 and it was all amazing.

We ran into an Irish guy, Kevin, we met on the bus as well and decided to join him for a drink at Utopia, a bar consisting of shesha pipes, chilled out couch and sitting areas, a beach feel and of course what every good bar needs, a full sized beach volleyball court. Few beers later and the 1130pm curfew kicked in and we were being ushered out with only one place left to go, bowling.

Bowling was epic! 100+ people there, everyone pretty toasted and still drinking, laughing and bowling barefoot which I am sure is really not safe. We joined a lane with a few Australians, English and Dutch and played a game with them, drank, partied and had a sweet time! We finished off the night sitting by the river, drinking some more and just chatting and chilling. Good night, but not the best next day.

Awoke at 2pm thanks to the shutters that made my room pitch black, and really spent the day not doing much. Organised my next days activities and tried to sort my next moves for my trip. And then at night, headed again to the food market as the food was worth another visit!

My last full day in Luang Prabang and I had signed myself up to an Elephant course where you learn how to ride an elephant, wash them, feed them and general care and information about them. Doing all this was cool enough, but then when we arrived the location was purely stunning and just added to what was going to be an amazing day.

Within 30 minutes of being there, we had learnt a few basic commands and how to get up on the elephants. And then once we had a basic understanding of that, we were up and onto the elephants all by ourselves. We rode them around, got used to them and then got on a boat and went to ride some other elephants through the jungle. This time we got on the chairs on the back of the elephants, but within 10 minutes I was down on the neck riding my elephant through thick mud, heavy trees and water deeper then I am tall. It was wicked!

Then lunch time and after lunch we crossed back over the river to my favourite part of the day, bath time. We got down to our swimwear and got on our elephants and they trudged into the water with the mahouts and us on their backs. Elephants love the water! Going right under, spraying water, splashing around, all while we were on their backs. We scrubbed them and washed them and it was a really cool thing to do, and they were liked dogs in a way, you find a spot they love (my elephant loved getting behind his ears washed) and they are powerless and hypnotised. I want a pet elephant!

Bath time done and was the last part of the day trip, down to a waterfall, 15 minutes boat ride away. We arrived and the waterfall was mental. Not tall like previous ones I had seen, but wide and raging! Laos has had a lot of rainfall and this had caused the waterfall to be flowing over where is normally dry, and flowing at a angry pace. The bars had water gushing past where you would normally stand to order, walkways over the river were under water and the cement tables and chairs were just about underwater. I think this made it more impressive in the end as it just seemed angry and a bit out of control!

I decided to cap off my day with of course, another trip to the night market for some dinner. Although I got there a little later then wanting to as the guy at the guesthouse insisted I have a beer or two with him before I go, there was still plenty of fish to go around and I had my way with a huge serving of salad and BBQ fish and washed it down with a tasty BeerLao and retired home, ready for our minivan to Vang Vieng the next day, which could be an interesting trip due to all the recent landslides…We’ll see how it goes.