This post has to be quick because i have 4 min! internet in vang vieng, laos is really expensive!
This place is BEAUTIFUL! I know now why people say they came for 1 or 2 days and stayed for 3-4 weeks! There is a great mix of very friendly laos people, animals everywhere...all surrounded by giant limestone mountains and meadows. awesome. it almost doesnt even feel like a different country because every food place serves burgers and fries and plays the simpsons, friends or family guy and there are movies every night. there is actually an island here of only bars that is like a crazy rave island with trippy lights and music and whiskey, redbull and soda buckets for 10,000 kip and they pour you free shots of lao whiskey as you walk by. the big thing here is tubing.....renting a tube, floating down the river while at the same time crawling the bars riverside! i meet the guys from nelson, BC yesterday I met on the sleeper train from bangkok to chiang mai at one of the bars the other night....they have been here for 11 days, tubing everyday...
i am staying in a little thatched bungalow across a super sketchy footbridge over the nam river that is home to kittens, a heard of wild-esk cows, roosters and goats. i have a little patio with a hammock that i chill out in every night around dusk and watch the sunsets....they are incredible.
Rented a moutain bike yesterday and cruised the countryside with a guy from Cali named Zach...the roads were full of chickens, cows, goats; women were washing thier clothes in ponds by the river while naked kids can around; it smelled like a mix of meadows, livestock, fires cooking food outside.... The roads are all unpaved and crazy rocky and there are all these little crazy footbridges made of holey boards and twisted nails. Zach and I biked to the most sacred cave in laos that has a bronze buddah reclining in it, we stopped to swim in a turquoise blue lagoon and napped under a bungalow in the shade. Great day!
i am a little nervous because the bank machines here are all broken and the bank seems to be out of money until monday. i have enough to be comfortable until i leave but its an uneasy feeling to know the town you are staying at is out of money!
Going tubing today, rock climbing tomorrow, then i head to vientianne then to bangkok and down south.... have a tonne of pictures to post..will figure it out in thailand :)
miss you guys xoxox
anna
