Caving, Rock Climbing, Tubing, Kayakying Love Lao
Trip Start
Mar 21, 2006
1
47
55
Trip End
Oct 05, 2008
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Vientiane,
Lao Peoples Dem Rep
Monday, September 1, 2008
As the title of this blog states I have been quite busy the last week with outdoors adventures and seeing a more local side of Vientiane (Capitol of Lao) through connecting with Australian Volunteers working here.
Before arriving to Vientiane two days ago, I spent four days in Vang Vieng a town just north of here. Vang Vieng is famous for its buzzing backpacker party scene, which I was not interested in, so it was nice to arrive and have a familiar face. I spent the first two days there hanging out with Ian (fellow PCV from the Philippines) that is cycling around Southeast Asia. It was so nice to talk with someone of a similar perspective for a few days, compare the Philippines with Lao, and share meals with a friend. We also explored some beautiful caves together, which was a blast!
Vang Vieng is a funny little town, filled with road side restaurants and bars that have really comfortable couches, to lie on while eating and becoming a bit of zombie watching the never ending episodes of FRIEDNS playing on the TV's. I am not kidding, FRIENDS is shown everywhere in the town, it is really strange and many a backpacker ends up lying for hours watching FRIENDS, recovering from their drunken days tubing down the river. I was really glad the town offered many outdoors activities beyond FRIENDS. It is a beautiful town surrounded by massive limestone Karsts Mountains and amazing wall faces to climb.
I spent one afternoon rock climbing with a really good guiding company called Green Discovery and four British guys traveling together. It was quite a climb to get up to the wall faces; but well worth the effort, the views from the top were incredible! We did two climbs and both were challenging, in fact, only one in our group made it to the top of the second climb but it was a great afternoon spent on the cliff enjoying the views and hard work of rock climbing!
I met a really nice German gal named Sophia on my first day in Vang Vieng and we have been enjoying each other's company ever since. While there are times it is nice to travel alone, it is a good change to have someone to enjoy a meal with and talk with about all that we are seeing. While the drunken party scenes of tubing down the river are not my style, you really cannot go to Vang Vieng without tubing at least once. So, our last day there Sophia, Kelly (another traveler we met), and the 100's of other backpackers in town spent a fantastic day on the river tubing and enjoying the bungee swings at all the bars. There are bars lining the entire river and massive bungee swings and/or zip lines at nearly every bend. While I was too scared to try the massive swings into the water, I mustered up the courage for the zip line and once you take that first step it is really fun to zip down into the murky water of the Nam Song!
The next day Sophia and I joined an Austrian couple and kayaked south down the Nam Lik River to Vientiane. There were three rapids when we first got in the water, which made for a fun morning of flipping in our kayaks and hard work paddling through strong waves. The rest of the day was quite relaxing, goofing around with our guides swimming in the water and enjoying a delicious chicken kabob lunch on the side of the river courtesy of our guides. I much preferred to be on the peaceful river then in a hot bus for the entire drive south.
Thanks to Ash (Aussie volunteer in the Philippines) I was able to connect with Fred, an Aussie Volunteer here in Vientiane working with the UN Development Project. He has been a wonderful host to both Sophia and I, and it has been so nice to see a more local side of this very clean capitol city. Everyone here gets around on motor bikes so after giving Sophia a crash course in driving, we have been scooting around town on a red bike or riding on the back of Fred's massive black off road bike. With all of us riding around on bikes it makes me feel like we are in a motorcycle gang, very Grease 2 style.
On Saturday we went to a really fun traditional Lao festival in the 'forest' called Lamvang. It happens twice a month during Buddhist Lent, which is now, between the full moon and new moon cycles. (Buddhist countries are on the lunar calendar). We spent the day soaking in the water, surrounded by black volcanic rock formations, eating very spicy papaya salad (so good) and then danced the afternoon away to traditional Lao music that included a saxophone (modern addition). Laos has a wonderful easy going pace of life and this was clear in the big smiles of the women and men dancing, kicking back enjoying the national past time of drinking Beer Lao and getting a kick out of our group, the only falangs (foreigners) at the party dancing right with them!
Tomorrow I fly to Siem Riep in Cambodia and look forward to connecting with more volunteers there and touring the ancient Temples of Angkor the following days.
I have really enjoyed my time here in Lao and feel quite strongly that at some point I will return to this beautiful, laidback country. There is a lot of good that needs to be done here, especially with ensuring rural populations have access to education, heath care ect. I think it will always be hard for American's to have a hand in the development of this country given our past history, however I feel quite a connection to this place. Especially, after meeting some very impassioned locals and foreign volunteers that really want to be apart of helping Lao move forward and progress. Just the fact that there are no Western chains anywhere makes me want to stay longer. If you can believe it no McDonalds, Pizza Hut or anything of the sort anywhere in Lao!
Hope all is well next entry from Cambodia.
All my love and peace,
Sherry
