PraBANG!!

It's been a while i know! But i've been busy!

After Da Lat i moved to Nha Trang, Vietnam's equivalent of Miami. I damaged my liver there for a few nights, made some good travel friends (Jack from Bath and Pete from Sidney), got raped by a prostitute and worked on my sexy tan. Good times.

Moved to Hoi An for a nights and enjoyed their Unesco World Heritage Old Quarter. Then spent the afternoon in Hue before taking the sleeper bus from hell to Hanoi, the northern capitol.

From there we organized a few trips. The first one was a 3 day trip to Ha Long Bay. The scenery is too incredible to describe so i'll let the pictures to the talking! We trekked up a mountain on Cat Ba island and enjoyed to best beach in Vietnam! The water in Ha Long is a lot more polluted than i thought it would be though...too many boats...way too many tourists...but well worth it.

Then we did a day trip to Tam Coc in the Ninh Binh province, a few hours drive from Hanoi. It is known as Ha Long Bay on land and it didn't disappoint! We took a two hour boat ride along a winding canal between and even through giant limestone cliffs.

Then came Sapa. Gorgeous Sapa. Neverending rolling hills and mountains, filled with rice fields. The locals over the centuries have carved the fields into the mountains themselves giving the impression of giant green and yellow staircases. Not the easiest thing to describe and sadly the pictures won't do it justice. But my 5 nights in Sapa were unforgetable. I will remember my two days of trekking, the great curry i had at our posh hotel, the little old local women, all dressed up in their colourful clothes, trying to sell me blankets, bracelets and opium.

From Sapa, we decided to use the newly opened border near Dien Bien Phu to cross into Laos. Although our initial local bus tried to screw us over big time ( we ended up getting off and walking down a mountain back to Sapa!), our second try went by without a hitch. Jack left Sapa to go to Thailand, but our international travelling trio was once again made whole when we met Jonathan(from Northern Ireland) on the bus to Muong Khoa, the Laos border town.

From there, we hitched a ride to Odomxay. We sat on rice sacs in the back of a bus for four hours. It was the best bus ride ever. Completely the opposite of the next bus ride where 42 people were crammed into a 19 person bus. All fully grown adults. There were people sitting on people who were sitting on me. All the while travelling on a crappy bus with smoking brakes, and smoking passengers, along a dangerous mountain road. Not cool.

Laos is incredible by the way. My favorite so far i think! Vietnam, after a month, got pretty annoying. It seems that the vietnamese have it engrained in their psyche from a very young age to take advantage and screw over foreigners every chance they get. Staying on your guard 24/7 gets tiring and Laos has been a great relief from that.

My first week was spent way up north in this tiny village called Muang Sing. We did a 2 day trek of the surrounding area and stayed in a village (11 houses, 75 people) on top of one of the mountains. The scene was straight from one of those world aid informercials. Chickens, pigs and water buffaloes walking around the houses, or rather straw shacks. Dirty children playing around, their bellies swollen from malnutrition. But these folks were happy none the less and everyone had a great time. (Leeches, blisters and sore muscles aside.)We even ate a snake that night that our guide caught on the way up to the village!! Surprisingly good, tastes a bit like fish.

We also rented a bicycle one day and made our way to the Chinese border, 10 km away. Officially, we weren't allowed in. But unofficially, just between us, we walked up a big hill a few hundreds meters from the border, and before we knew it, we were in China's Yunnan province. I walked a few steps in China. And you know what? It bared a striking resemblance to northern Laos.

That brings me here. Luang Prabang. Awesome. A lovely city, set along side the Mekong, filled with charming cafes and markets. Possibly the best street food town in the world. You can buy a HUGE sandwich, i'm talking huge here, with REAL chicken breast meat and filled with vegees for 1$. Subway would sell this sandwich for 24$, i kid you not. There's also this 50 cent fill your plate thing. It's vegetarian, but basically you fill your plate with as much food as you can, pyramid style, all for half a buck. Then there's a street filled with barbecued everything, all for less than a dollar. mmmmm...i'm getting hungry now.

Yesterday we visited a nice waterfall near town. There's a black bear shelter on the grounds and even a big tiger! I touched a tiger yesterday. I touched it through a fence, but still, i touched it. You didn't. So there.
They also have these mini falls there where you're allowed to swim. I have never before seen that shade of blue before. I was expecting murky brown water but no way. The water was bright turquoise aqua bluegreenish. I would have to consult my home depot color chart, but i think the color was "Heavenly lotus". Sounds nice doesn't it? It - was - crazy.

Tomorrow i'm heading to Vang Vien, party town. You do some tubeing and kayaking and drinking and for people whose ankles aren't shite, you can even rock-climb.