Selling my soul (with my cigarettes)

Although neightbours, Vietnam is a far cry from the relaxed atmosphere found in Laos.
We flew into Hanoi and were greeted by 4 million motorcycles packing the tiny streets of the capital. The road system  runs on an 'organised chaos' regime. People basically drive where and how they want to until someone gets a poke in the eye. Crossing the roads was comparable to, dare I day it, the streets of Delhi. Deadly. The group had to maintain a 'flying V' formation just to make it to the other side. I could throw in a nifty 'Why did the chicken....' joke right now but I cant think of one.





So, a quick inital night in Hanoi was spent eating copius amounts of spring rolls before we drove out to Halong City and boarded our vessel to take us out to Halong Bay. Halong Bay is a collection of 1969 small, steep islands rising out of the harbour of Halong. Simply stunning, but a tourist haven. My new camera decided to shit itself so all my photos look crap. I threw a king kong sized wobbly, including beating my chest and grunting. The boat took us through a huge cave network and stopped in a harbour where Steve and I, the adventurous ones, decided to take to kayak and explore the more out of reach places. We sauntered through a small cave opening and ended up in a deserted lake, bordered by mountains on all sides, possibly with monkeys in them. I let off a monkey laugh that echoed around the hills for 10 minutes.













A night in the harbour was spent putting up with generators, rattling windows and a Rotorua smell permeating our cabin before we headed back to Hanoi for a couple of nights. Went to the Ho Chi Minh memorial where they still have their fearless leaders body preserved in a glass cabinet. Pretty gross stuff.
We capped it off with a visit to the 'Hanoi Hilton', an infamous prison used in the war and prior. That was exceptionally grim.
An overnight train (interesting) to Hue followed. It was here where we did one of the most incredible activities so far; tour by motorcycle. The streets of Hue became our playground as we were whisked at high speed through back alleys, dirt roads, and footpaths to visit various places around the city. The city was one of the main affected places in the war and the bike ride was like a fleeting visit to every single scene in all the Nam war movies you can think of. We went out through places resembling the sniper buildings of 'Full Metal Jacket', the back alleys of 'Deerhunter' and rice fields of 'Apocalypse Now'. Intense. It was everything you expected Vietnam to be (based on the films) in a days worth of bike riding.




















Right now, we have made the trip to Hoi An, and I have just paid too much for a tailored suit. Ha. Well, maybe not - I did go to the best quality shop. No point doing it by halves. We have a few days here before flying into Ho Chi Minh city and then onto Cambodia. Sin Lai

Thailand Photos Up

Wow, Vietnam cracks down on facebook!
Anyway, as the two of you out there that actually read this thing (you know who you are!!!!:) xoxoxoxox) are fizzing to see some pics, I have added some Thailand photos to the 'Indochina Stage 1' post.

Of course, this is only a small selection and if you want to see all my Thailand photos just click on the link to the right. You may have to work your way through a few older ones at the start. Our trip started in Chinag Mai (about 40 pics in).

Laos photos will be uploaded soon. Just stay tuned and scroll down to that blog as I prob wont advertise them.

As always, any comments / love is mucho appreicado

Quickly.....

.................. before I have to head out to dinner.

Luang Prabang was nice. The largest city in Laos, yet still quite small geographically wise. The urban sprawl was minimal. 

We went out to visit a waterfall and I made a stupid mistake of wanting to climb to the top of it to see the view. Sweat was pouring off me by the time I made it up, and when I got up there, the view was blocked by all the large leafed trees. Ha. Saw a monk up there though, just randomly. I said to Steve

"Wow, whats a monk doing up here???"

He was like "I dunno, I think the same as us"

The monk reaches into his orange robes and pulls out a Sony 8mp digital camera, whistles us over and asks us to take his pic.








We travelled by bus through the mountains of Laos, which were stunning, and landed up in a small town called Vang Viene. 'What is this town famous for?', you may ask to yourself with your inquisitive mind. Well, basically, it is where you go to get drunk. A river runs through this town, and that river is lined with bars on each side. You are handed a large tube tyre and told to float between bars. Various water activities also adorn the rivers edge, such as water slides, giant acrobat swings and flying foxes.
It was amazing. High mountain tops with rocky outcrops shelter the river from strong winds, people are playing beer pong with Beerlao (the beer of choice), and the whole atmosphere speaks surprisingly little of Laotian culture.
We drank late. Too late. We left only an hour to leave the last bar and get back to town before dark.
It was not long enough.





Pretty quickly, the night came upon us and we found ourselves getting more and more lost. Here we were, in the middle of nowhere, in the pitch black, drunk and freaking out. I lost Renee. One minute she was there, then the next she was around half a kilometre down the river behind me. The rapids were picking up, and the water was getting cold...... Oh man, oh man.

Some Laotian boy hauled me out of the river and I spent ages calling Renees name. She was safe however, having bartered her way into a tuk tuk with her smile. It was freaky stuff but well worth the day.
So there is a warning:
LEAVE AT LEAST 2 HOURS (AROUND 4PM) TO HEAD OFF FROM THE LAST BAR!!!!:)

Right. Phew.

We have now travelled into the Capital of Laos and it is OK. Just did the most manic bike ride I have ever done in the rush hour of an Asian city. Who needs helmets, lights, or road rules?

Laos does.

Nam tomorrow. 

Indochina Stage 1

Allllloooooooooooo!!!!!

and welcome to the first of my Indochina blogs. Bangtidy.

I am amazed at what we have done so far in such short a time. Our flight over from London was fine. No tears there at all. We landed in Bangkok and hung around the airport for 5 hours before boarding our Air Asia flight to Chiang Mai.





Due to timing, we arrived in Chiang Mai a day prior to our Intrepid tour kicking off. To fill in time we made our way out into the wilderness and visited a tiger sanctuary. We decided to pay a little extra and get into the pen of the 1-2 month old tigers, although you could get in with the full grown adults if you so wished to have your face clawed off. These little guys were soooo .................... I'm not going to say cute.... just sooooo........ little.
Pebbles was way bigger than them.
Pebbles would have kicked their ass.















They were just learning to walk and open their eyes. We played with them for a good quarter of an hour before walking around the rest of the sanctuary. It all seemed fairly well kept and they were really well looked after so I was happy. Usually I don't like these sorts of places due to the treatment of the animals.









After that we drove out to the old town of Chiang Mai and ate Pad Thai while watching the scooters pass by.



Our tour started the day after and were taken straight to a Thai cooking class where I loaded up my soup with enough chili's to kill a small Asian army. We made a heap of dishes and knocked them all back effortlessly. Our group consists of Kiwis, Aussies, Canadians and Americans, 9 in total and ranging from 22-60 years old. A good size.








The following day we were taken out to an elephant conservation area and rode elephants through the Thai jungle. It was epic. They took us through deep rivers and over steep outcrops, all with the finesse of a cat. Not like Pebbles.























Afterwards we were taken to an elephant hospital and were shocked to see the elephants with limbs missing due to land mine explosions.





We visited a temple at dusk which overlooked the city of Chinag Mai. I started hitting my strides with the new camera.














Fortunately for us, at the time we were in Chiang Mai, a huge festival was in procession. Fireworks and fire lanterns filled the skies and we sat in an open beer garden and drank to the occasion. We ate a few silk worms, which tasted worse than shit, and lit a lantern of our own to send into the sky. Lovely.
The partying continued on through the night and trying to sleep was akin to being left in the middle of Afghanistan during war time. From what I gather. The fireworks were more like bombs.













We made a river crossing across the border into Laos the next day and nearly died from Salmonella poisoning whilst sampling their idea of a BBQ. No sizzlers there!







A boat awaited us on the harbour the next day which took us for two days down the mighty Mekong delta. I stood at the helm like Rambo, guarding the crew with my guile and hand gestures. Tight-fist-to-point means that 'Charlie is in the trees'. The trip down the river, in a longboat, was extremely pleasant and we visited really small tribal villages along the way where we could interact with the locals and talk with the small children. So different to Europe.





















Right now, I am in Luang Prabang, a great little city. We are visiting a waterfall tomorrow which is also home to Asian black bears. This trip is like an Asian safari.
Stay tuned.