Right so; the very last few hours of Vietnam were spent on what I know “affectionately” call the Epic Bus Journey! As I said in my last blog we were on a 28 hour trip to get to Vang Vieng after we voted not to stay in Vientiane. And so on our last morning in Vietnam we were picked up bright and early by a bus that was bringing us to meet our sleeper bus. This bus drove us an hour out of Hue, we stopped just before a toll booth and met our bus...it was a LOT smaller than our other sleeper buses. So we all squeezed on and got our places. I ended up getting myself a seat down in the cave...which turned out to be a bad decision on my part. Unlike the other sleeper buses where in the cave the seats could be adjusted so that I could be sitting up these seats were stuck in an almost completely horizontal position...and even at that I had about 3 inches between my head and the ceiling above me!! So after, oh about 5 minutes there, I knew that I had just made the journey a lot more uncomfortable for myself than it had to be!! Anyway the bus got going...and drove us the exact same way back in to Hue, which was slightly frustrating, so the best thing to do was just plug myself in and listen to some music to distract myself! When we got to the Vietnam/Los border we managed to delay the bus by about 2 or 3 hours! On all these buses we are not the only people on it and I did feel kinda sorry for all the locals who just sailed through the border. There were 20 of us crossing the border and it wasn’t so easy for us! Firstly when the bus pulled up, all 40 or 50 people on it got off and queued up at the exit point window...where there was only one poor dude working. After a 15 minute wait they opened a couple more windows...but this was also where the locals tried to start skipping us! We all got slightly frustrated at this and bunched up and refused to let anyone push past us! There was words had with one or two people and then they realised that we were not to be messed with...that where we come from a queue means wait your turn, not figure out how many people you can get past in one try!! It took quite awhile for us all to get stamped out...and then we had to walk through a very hot no man’s land to the Laos border. The bus had been delayed somewhere along the way, so when we got to the Laos border everyone was on their lunch break! So we were waiting around for about half an hour or a little bit more till...yup you guessed it, ONE guy turned up to process 20 of us! At this point the guys who worked on the bus were coming over to us and gesturing wildly at us to ring the number on the window, to which we replied we had already been told they were on lunch and had to wait! When the guy did turn up he actually managed to process us all quickly enough...then we had to go to the next window and get stamped into the country and the thankfully we were in Laos!! When we got back on the bus no one looked too happy but we have reached the stage that we don’t really care if we are a nuisance to anyone!! And so I spent the rest of the journey reading, watching a movie or two, trying to sleep...and before I knew it the day part of the journey was over! It’s at this point it’s all supposed to get easier as my body should be naturally tired, twig the dark sky and sleep...but it seems it has some resistance to sleeping on sleeper buses..And so I tossed and turned (as much as my 2 foot of space would allow me to!!) and managed to get 15 minutes of sleep every now and then!! Despite our delay at the border we arrived at Vientiane at 4.30 in the morning (so we were all very relieved that we made the decision not to stay there and to have to wait around for our rooms to be ready at midday!!). So it was time to pile the bags off the bus, into tuk tuks to go and wait for the mini buses that were taking us to Vang Vieng. The mini buses were compact...especially with all our bags but I found it easier to sleep on it and managed to get a couple of hours of sleep in on the way to our next destination. When we arrived in Vang Vieng we sorted out our rooms with military precision and within minutes reception was clear and we were all ready to shower and sleep. Of course once a bed is available my body has a little giggle and says “screw you” and suddenly decides to be wide awake! So I faffed around for a bit on my laptop and the eventually sleep came! The rest of the first day in Vang Vieng was spent sleeping, getting some food and having a drink with the whole group before going to bed early in anticipation of tubing the next day!!
So tubing what can I say only that it was an experience...and another best moment of the trip! We all got up early, went into the Irish bar next door to the hotel and ordered a proper Irish (or English depending on which country we were all from!!) breakfast! It was yum...with proper beans and all!! Then we all headed up town to go get ourselves some tubes (and a life vest for me!!) and a tuk tuk to the starting point. When we got there we got a little boat across the river to the first bar (Q Bar funnily enough!!) and got ourselves a drink. We found a can of spray paint and a star template and suddenly a lot of us were graffitied! When everyone was finished their drinks we decided to brave it and give the whole tubing thing a go, so we very gingerly lowered ourselves into our tubes and got someone to kick us off...then the current caught us and we were off!! For those of you who don’t know, tubing works by having an inflated inner tube from a tyre and floating downstream stopping off at different bars. Of course being in the middle of a river in only a tube makes it slightly difficult to just stop off at a particular bar...so the guys who work in the bars throw ropes with filled water bottles out into the middle of the river at people floating by, you grab a rope and they pull you in! My first attempt at this ended up with my flipping out of my tube, holding onto the rope and getting pulled in with my tube floating further on! When we all made it into the second bar we got another drink and found a mud pit so starting writing on each other and just generally flinging mud every now and then! After awhile there it was time to move on. Because I had lost my tube I had to walk to the next bar, with the hope that there would be more people at the next bar so I could rob someone else’s tube!! The next bar was great fun with a rope swing out into the river, a mud volleyball court and mud tug-of-war!! Everyone had great fun on the rope swing (I had fun watching everyone do it!!) and the volleyball was absolutely hilarious! When we were finished there we moved along and I was back in the water after “acquiring” (thanks for teaching me how to use that word in the McHugh way Dad!!!) myself a new tube! The next bar had a big inflatable landing pad, so everyone got into the swing of things straight away and starting jumping. The first few attempts didn’t work so then the guys who worked there showed us that the best way to do it was for one person to jump and position themselves at the end nearest the centre of the river and for two people to then jump at the other end and catapult the first person up into the air!! It was amusing to watch but a couple of times it didn’t work with the person who was sent flying ending up catapulting backwards towards the other people and them all ending up on a big tangle in the river!! Our final bar of the day was by far the most fun. It was on the opposite side of the river to all the other ones so we all paddled as fast as we could to get ourselves to the right side and grab the bottles. There were also people from the bar out in the river grabbing people and pushing them towards the bar. I missed the bottle so Rosie started shouting “Save that girl” and jumping around and pointing at me! So this little Laos dude came swimming out to me quicker than I have ever seen anyone swim, grabbed my ring and towed me into the shore! This whole episode had me in fits of laughter and I will forever have a mental picture of Rosie hopping around and waving her arms!! This bar had great music (there is a video which may make it on Facebook at some stage) which perfectly illustrates the madness that is tubing! It was also at this bar that we all covered ourselves in headbands and arms bands that said I Love Laos (if you have seen the pictures on Facebook you will know what I am talking about!!). It was getting late in the day at this stage and we had been warned not to be in the river in the dark so we all made to head home. Our group got separated at this point into little groups and although there was a bit sign at the start saying “Start Tubing Here” there was not big sign that said “Get the F*** Out of the River Now”!! or something to that affect! after awhile of floating down river and wondering where the heck we were going to get out we say a bank of stones and paddled for that and managed to get out of the river. It was at this point that I managed to get my only injury of the day! There was a couple of Spaniards floating along with me and Joe and they got out at the same point, when we got out of the water the wind took one of their tubes and I tried to catch up but ended up slipping on some mud and went down on my knee, arse and elbow!! All I can say is the life jacket saved me on more ways than one as it saved me getting an awful bruise on my back! As it turned out we picked the right place to get out as we just had to walk a couple of minutes to drop our tubes back and then we headed back home. Some of the guys were already in the Irish bar so we went in to let them know we were still alive then went to shower and change and then went back in for some food! We all had great plans to head out that night but tiredness and early drinking syndrome kicked in and after the food and a few games of pool it was time to rest my weary little head!!
The next day there was a few sore heads so some of us decided to take it easy and go to the Blue Lagoon. It was a tuk tuk ride away...on some of the dodgiest roads I have ever been on. To say the potholes were craters doesn’t even begin to cover it! When we got to the Lagoon there was hardly anyone else there so we grabbed ourselves a little hut and settled in for some relaxing with a nice cold coke. The Lagoon itself was really pretty and it had ropes to swing off into the lagoon. It was more of a greeny colour than blue, mostly due to the monsoon season...but I was just glad it wasn’t brown like the river the previous day! After a couple of hours there a convoy of jeeps pulled up with a load of day trippers so we decided to take leave and head back home. It was into Gary’s (Irish bar) again for some more amazing food and then the rest of the day was spent relaxing before packing to move on the following day.
The next leg of the journey took us to Luang Prabang. We had two mini buses to bring us up through the mountains....of course going through the mountains, pretty as they are, also means we had the obstacle of landslides...one of which was rather substantial! We were ticking along making nice time winding up and down on the sides of the mountains when we hit traffic jam...yes a traffic jam in the middle of the mountains. Our driver then informed us that there had been a landslide a couple of days previous and they were almost finished clearing it but not quite...so we would have a 3-5 hour wait! Of curiosity got the best of me and some of the others so we decided to walk up and have a look. This seemed like a great idea at first but then as we got closer to it, it got a lot muckier, with that red clay type muck which is just not good when it’s wet...and of course I was wearing flip flops! So by the time I reached the landslide I was practically sticking to the ground because of the thickness of the mud and my legs looked like I had been given a really bad spray tan!! The landslide was huge! We could see how much of the mountain had given way and it must have covered a couple of hundred feet of the road. Luckily for us the landslide itself had happened two days previous so they didn’t have much left to clear. Once I was satisfied with surveying the damage (because I’m such an expert on landslides of course!!!) I headed back up to the mini buses thanking my lucky stars that I had some baby wipes to clean off before I got back into the van. However it turned out I didn’t need the baby wipes as some ingenious person had fashioned a tap using the top of a bottle and finding a small spring that was coming down the side of the mountain, and they had put a bucket under it to gather some water. And so at the side of a random mountain in Laos I washed in a bucket!!! Flip flop and all I stuck my leg into the bucket and washed all the muck off and then did the exact same thing with my other leg! It was quite the experience but at least I was muck free for the most part!! To avoid another bucket wash I got back on the minivan and decided to stay put before I destroyed myself again! And much to our surprise about half an hour after that, the traffic started to move!! So in the end we were only waiting about for an hour or so before we were able to pass through the destruction. The traffic moved very gingerly across the path as, as good a job as the workers did, there was still a thick layer of mud and a sheer cliff edge to the right of us so the drivers were all taking it very easy! Once we had cleared it though the driver went back to his usual, well don’t want to use the word manic as that sounds a tad extreme, but slightly “unique” style of driving!! We did meet another landslide that day but luckily again the worst of it cleared so it was only a couple of minutes wait before we got through that one and then there was the odd mini landslide we came across. It took us about 8 hours in the end to make the journey which was slightly longer than expected but not as long as we had expected at the first landslide!!
The next day we were all up at 5 in the morning...no that’s not a typo you read it right!! Luang Prabang is famous for the morning offerings procession that the Buddhist Monks take part in every morning. The monks only have one meal a day so to supplement their diet at 6 every morning the monks leave the monasteries with their offerings bowl and Buddhists line the streets with offerings of food, usually a hand full of sticky rice and in return for this the monks bless the people. So at 5am we all, well I won’t say hopped out of bed, but removed ourselves from bed and went down to the main street to watch the procession. It was amazing to see all the monks in a line that seemed to go on forever. I was also amazed to see the range of ages of the monks. There were a couple of dudes who were well in their 70s and then some kids who must have only been about 7 or 8! We watched the whole thing for about half an hour and then headed back to bed! Rhona and Rachel though spotted something they didn’t expect to see while they were walking back. When the monks turned off the main street they all relaxed as the formality of the occasion was over. Rhona and Rach spotted two teenager monks having a bit of laugh as one of them chucked his bucket of rice over his mates head! Not something I would have expected to have heard about but it sounded like fun and good to know they do get to have some fun and it’s not all seriousness all the time!! The following day we got to experience some local culture in Luang Prabang. Every year at the end of the rainy season Luang Prabang holds a boat race and the whole town goes into festival mode. So the day of the race we headed out to go see what all the excitement was about! It felt a bit like Paddy’s Day!! I could hardly walk down the street with the amount of people walking around. And EVERYONE had umbrellas with them. Asians don’t like to get tanned or have dark skin so most of them walk around on a daily basis with an umbrella...now everyone knows that this can be a problem at home with hair getting caught in the spokes every now and then. Now imagine being in Asia where everyone is little...and the problem doesn’t so much involve trying to make sure you don’t end up with a bald patch as trying to ensure you come home with sight out of both eyes at the end of the day!!! The other thing I noticed as we were walking down to the river was the sound of shuffling; they just do not lift their feet at all!!! Even above the sound of people talking and music coming from stalls and bars and restaurants I could still hear the shuffling! And of course once I noticed it I couldn’t ignore it!! When we got down to the river we had to try find ourselves somewhere to watch the racing from and luckily we found a little riverside cafe that had one empty table in it with one stool...so about 8 or 9 of us piled in and suddenly stools and chairs appeared out of thin air so we all got seated and waited for the excitement to start. I’m afraid if you’re curious about who won the race that is not information I can give you, partly because I gave up watching after couple of hours in, and partly because I just didn’t bloody understand it!! When we arrived we could see there was about 10 different boats (each with a spectacular 45-50 people in each boat!!). We thought the race would start, they would all row to bejaysus and then we would have a winner. Oh no no no no no, not in Laos! In Laos they had two boats race against each other...so I presumed it was heats and the winner would go on and the loser say goodbye. Oh no no no no no, not in Laos!!! In Laos it’s not just the first person across the line; the boats are also give points for technique, how the team looks and a million other things that I can’t remember!! Some of the races were not so close with one or two of the teams speeding ahead of their opponents, while other races were really even and right beside each other the whole way up the river. I have to say, even though I didn’t understand what the heck was going on I still enjoyed watching it. Watching roughly 50 people in perfect synchronisation rowing a boat at the speed they were rowing at was truly admirable, not something I could do and they obviously practice a lot to get so in synch. However as admirable as it was, after watching for a couple of hours I got slightly bored so decided to go and explore a little and left the riverside to walk back up through all the stalls....cue shuffling and unsafe umbrella usage! It was a good day though and nice to see something completely random and see how into it the locals were; one of the teams must have had a fan club because on the opposite side of the river to where we were and a couple of hundred meters down we could hear them screaming from the moment the boat started until it crossed the finish line!
The following day we left lovely Laos to head back into Thailand. We had a sleeper bus that night which was a nightmare! Gone were the recliner bed thingies and instead we were on a normal size coach with normal chairs...and if this wasn’t uncomfortable enough we then saw the people who worked on the bus bring plastic garden chairs on and stuff them in the very narrow isle down the middle of the bus! It was crazy there was people everywhere and right beside my seat I had a woman get on with 3 kids, a 12 year old, a toddler of about 3 and a baby only a couple of months old. I couldn’t believe that they were going to travel on a bus overnight, but they seemed to be used to it as they slept the whole way while I didn’t get a wink of sleep! Whenever the bus stopped for a pee break or a food stop getting off was a nightmare, having to climb over chairs and wake sleeping people and children! Thankfully the nightmare finally ended and when we got to the bus station we were transferred from there into mini vans that were going to bring us to the border. The border we crossed was the most unique border so far as when we stamped out of Laos we then got in BOATS which took us across a river (the Mekong I think) and when we got out of the boat on the other side we were in Thailand! It was pretty cool really. Once we were all allowed back into Thailand we were into tuk tuks to bring us to a hotel to wait for mini buses that were going to bring us to Chiang Mai.
Chiang Mai is a fairly busy place and very popular on the tourist route. UKtoOz don’t usually go there but because of the China disruption our new route brought us to it. I spent the first day or two just relaxing and managed to fit the cinema in (Final Destination!). One evening some of the guys went to traditional Muay Thai Boxing but I wasn’t that interested in it....so went to the night market instead!! I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again but if I was on a different type of trip and not living out on one bag with limited space I would have spent a small fortune!! They had so many amazing things there and I wanted so much of it. When we first arrived at the market it looked like quite a small one with stalls lining the pathways, but as we walked it seemed to just explode! We reached a large intersection and every road we looked down had stalls for as far as we could see, and then the basement of all the office buildings around us also had stalls in them that seemed to go on forever! Needless to say we didn’t even get to explore a small portion of the mall...I think if I had gone there everything for a week I wouldn’t have seen even half of it!! The main activity I did in Chiang Mai though was go zip lining in the jungle which was absolutely amazing! When we got there we were all harnessed up and got our helmets (complete with dodgy blue dinner lady hair nets!!) and then we were giving a safety talk. There was a little to remember but mostly it was “don’t touch the zip line as it will chop of your fingers”, so it was fairly easy to remember that one! And then we started on our way! The course was amazing with around 20 platforms as high as 40 feet up a tree with zip wires between the trees. The guys with us would clip us on and then we just had to let go and we’d zip through the air to the next tree where another guy would catch us and stop us from ending up like a pancake against the tree truck! We also abseiled a couple of times, with the last one being a 40 foot drop which was quite the experience! The whole day was brilliant and we managed to finish up just before the rain started so it was good timing! No one sustained any huge injuries although there were a couple of dodgy landings and the guy who was catching us almost got flattened a time or two and got the odd kick in the shin! It was definitely worth doing it though...and not every day you get to say you swung through the Thai jungle!
The following day we were leaving Chiang Mai on a night bus so the day was spent going to the cinema (Fright Night!) and then wandering around Chiang Mai a little bit...honestly didn’t find anything too interesting but I will admit I probably didn’t look as hard a s I could of if I had been properly interested! The night bus was....ok!!! I actually managed to sleep for a couple of hours...though I did almost kill an American! We got on the bus at 7pm, I was sitting down at the back of the bus one row from the back...and in the back row there was an American guy. He found a friend somewhere else on the back row and until 1am he did not stop talking! The bus driver turned off all the lights everyone was asleep or trying to sleep or reading or doing a quiet activity and this gombeen was talking at the top of his voice. I experimented and put my IPod up to its highest...and I could still hear the fecker!! Some of the other guys were up at the front of the bus and when I told them about him they all said they thought it was a radio playing because it was nonstop! I wouldn’t have minded it so much if he was actually saying something interesting but he was talking complete and utter crap. He was talking to an Eastern European girl and ended up insulting her after saying something about the war, he was complaining that when he was in Bangkok Khosan Road was full or Irish and English people and he didn’t find a single American, and then I also heard all about how the Americans are brilliant and although the rest of the world wasn’t happy with the war on Iraq he was absolutely sure that there was WMD somewhere in the country. But his gem of the night had to be when he started talking about his “mystery illness”. He told this poor girl that there was something wrong with him but the doctors didn’t know what. He kept getting pains in his head, and the doctors sent him for all kinds of tests and couldn’t figure it out, and when he worked out he was always short of breath. My theory was that he was short of breath cause he probably didn’t shut up talking while he was on the treadmill and the pain in his head was him having to listen to himself and never being able to bloody escape it!!! The bus stopped of r a break at 1am and I hoped beyond hope that when we all got back on he would be quiet....alas it was not to be and he talked for the first half hour and then low and behold there was sweet sweet silence and so there was sleep for me!!
Our destination after the night bus was Kanchanaburi, famous for the Bridge over the River Kwai. When we arrived we were greeted with little wooden huts out over a tributary of the river. The rooms were lovely, and I was slightly amused to see that the water from my shower went straight through the plughole and down into the river! The following day myself and Joe went on an organised day trip to see what Kanchanaburi had to offer. We were only there for one full day so we had to see as much as we could in that day...and we saw a lot! We were collected at 8am and our first stop was the Erawan Waterfalls. The waterfall was beautiful and on 7 different levels. So instead of there just being one big long waterfall there was little ones in a forest at the side of the mountain. We walked up to the 4th level and each different stage was gorgeous. The sun was beaming that day and it made the surroundings amazing. I tried to paddle my feet at one of the levels but there was lots of little fish in it and they nibbled on my feet when I put them on which freaked me out so I pulled them straight back out...needless to say I now know I will never be able to have one of those fish pedicures!!! When we were finished at the waterfalls we were brought to the Hellfire Pass. The Hellfire Pass is possibly the most famous section of the Thailand-Burma Railway that was built by Prisoners of War and Asian labourers during World War 2. The railway was 415km long and was built in less than a year and the Hellfire Pass itself was built after 12 weeks of round the clock work by POWs and Asian labourers. The Hellfire Pass is attributed to the nightmarish scene that was played out there every night during the most frantic stage of building. The prisoners were extremely emaciated and still working round the clock. At night the pass was lit us with flaming torches so they could see what they were doing and people observed that it looked like a scene from hell. I can only imagine that for the prisoners themselves, it felt like hell as they were working under extreme conditions in searing heat and all the work was done by hand. So in order to blast out the rock through the mountains to allow the train tracks to be laid they had to manually drive a drill into the rock. They did this by one prisoner holding the drill bit and another hitting it with a hammer. When the bit was in far enough they would remove it (as long as it didn’t get stuck which often happened) and then drop dynamite down the whole. One the dynamite went off and the rock cracked and crumbled, they would then have to manually clear the rock away by putting the smaller bits of rock in steel carts that were on a small track to be brought to the bottom of the mountain and then bigger rocks were rolled over the side of the mountain. We learned all this information in the museum and then walked down to the pass itself and it suddenly became blatantly clear what the prisoners had gone through. The rock walls on either side of where the track used to lie must have been about 50 or 60 feet high and 1 good couple of hundred of metres long. All along the rock we could see marks left from where the drill holes and blast cracks were and once or twice we spotted drill bits that had got lodged in the rock and were still there. It was amazing to see it and to understand how hard it all must have been. When we were finished at the Hellfire Pass we were brought to the Krasae Cave and the last remaining wooden bridge on the railway line (all the rest have been replaced with stronger structures if they are still in use). The cave was just one massive chamber and is now a Buddhist Shrine but during the war and the building of the track it was used as a hospital, which standing in it is kind of hard to comprehend. The wooden bridge winds around the side of the mountain and the guide told us that it is surveyed at least once a year to check for any weak struts and anything that doesn’t pass the test is replaced, but replaced with wood. I unfortunately couldn’t find out how much of the bridge is still original but I still liked that they were keeping it as wood. After walking on the track for a bit we then waited at the station for the train to come. We were on the train for about half an hour and then it was back onto our mini bus to go to the last stop on our trip, the River Kwai Bridge. I have a vague memory of watching the movie Bridge over the River Kwai when I was a kid but I can’t remember the full story. If memory serves me correctly it was about POWs plotting to destroy the bridge they were being forced to build. This makes sense as we were told that the POWs often sabotaged the building works of the railway as they knew it was being used to transport arms and supplies to aid in the war. They had to be very careful that the sabotage was not obvious as if they had been caught they would have been punished so they used different methods like using weak wood pieces or not reporting dodgy bolts and things like that. I think in the movie they just planned to bomb it. Again I could be totally wrong with this...I’m sure someone with a better recollection will correct me (and I would greatly appreciate it too!!). The bridge itself is slightly underwhelming for all the fuss that is made about it! But it was still cool to see it and to know some of the history behind it and the railway in general.
The next day we were moving on again and heading to Ko Samui. We first had to get back to Bangkok to meet our night bus and this is where things got slightly messy! Our bus driver was not happy with taking 10 of us in his van because his piece of paper said he had only to take 9; there are 20 of us in the group so 10 in each van made sense to everyone except him! After a few phone calls and him seeing our refusal to move out of his van, he eventually started driving. We could tell he was in rather a bad mood with the whole situation and instead of dropping us to the travel office in Bangkok he got us to Khosan Road and told us to get out. So we did...however the other mini bus driver did what he was supposed to do and so we had a situation where none of us knew where we were supposed to be or where to find any of the others! Some of us went scouting to see if we could spot the other van but in the end it was the wonders of Facebook and wireless internet that allowed us to make contact with Rachel and figure out where we were supposed to be! It was all a bit exciting really and made our short stop in Bangkok slightly more amusing than it would have been otherwise! The night bus was rather uneventful (no annoying Americans thankfully!!) and when we arrived at our stop we had a couple of hours wait for the next bus that was going to bring us to the ferry port. Then it was another bit of a wait till the ferry was due to leave and after a little less than 2 hours on the ferry we docked at Ko Samui. The last leg of the journey was tuk tuks to bring us to the accommodation where we all pretty much grabbed something small to eat and then crashed out in our little beach huts! When I woke up I went for a little walk to explore...and ended up walking nearly 3km and finding a massive Tesco store!! Now at home I would not be in the slightest bit excited about Tesco, however here it is a different kettleofish as Tesco meant the possibility of being able to get (ahem) underwear in non-Asian sizes and bras with actual sizes!! After a little exploration (and a purchased or two) I wandered the 3km back...to find everyone getting ready to go out for dinner so I dropped my bags and walked half the way back again to head into town for something to eat! After dinner I headed home after wiping myself out with all the walking!!
The following day was great fun! 9 of us decided to head out on mopeds for the day and to explore Ko Samui. In the morning I had to make the decision to get one on my own or to ride with someone. After having a go on Kev and Brian’s bikes I decided to share with Rachel so once we were all sorted and everyone was ready we headed off. We didn’t have a map so didn’t really know where we were going...but it’s an island so we couldn’t get too lost really!! We headed up north first to find the Big Buddha...he wasn’t hard to find he was absolutely massive! While we were there we sponsored a tile for their new temple so when the temple is built next year there is a roof tile going on it with a drawing of our truck on it and 9 of our signatures! While we were there we stopped for a cold drink in a local cafe which turned out to be owned by an English couple. We got talking to them and the lady very kindly offered to show us to some local temples. So she hopped on her bike and we followed her down to a complex that had about 6 or 7 different temples in it. After that we headed back down towards the south of the island, but on the coast road this time and so we were able to take in the fabulous beaches and the amazing blue water. We then decided that instead of stopping at Lamai, where we were staying, on our way back down we would drive though and try to find the waterfall. At this point Brian very kindly let me have a go on his bike on my own and I had loads of fun on it...although typically as soon as I decided to try it on my own the road turned into potholed, flooded dirt tracks! We made it back onto the main road and started going up the mountain. We stopped at a little waterfall along the way which was more of a water trickle and then I got back on the bike with Rachel to head further up the mountain. Unfortunately we didn’t find the waterfall and instead ended up in the hell that is a durian plantation! Durian is a fruit that they are crazy about over here but they smell like a mixture of puke and shit so landing in a forest full of them was not something I would like to ever repeat again!! We made our way back down to the main road then and relaxed for the rest of the evening. The following day was Rugby World Cup Day and also Bui’s birthday celebrations. So we started off the day with a KFC lunch and then headed back to the beach huts to watch the rugby. Unfortunately due to the US Open being delayed they had changed around the TV schedule so the restaurant in the beach huts couldn’t actually show the match. So it was a quick dash back into the town to go to the Aussie bar. We made it back down just in time for the end of the opening ceremony and the start of the match. Once the match was over it was time to get ourselves ready for the UKtoOz race night! All my years of working in Floods paid off when I became bookie for the night, and in true UKtoOz style the bets were placed in drinks! Needless to say I set a few rules...mainly no each way betting as I was sure after the first couple of races I wouldn’t be able to calculate, even with the aid of a calculator, what a half, never mind what a quarter of anything was!! We had a great night! Our “horses” were windup toy chickens. We had a list of names that kept with the chicken them such as “Poultry in Motion”, “Rooster Red Rum”, Secret Recipe”, “Atilla the Hen”, “An Oeuf is and Ouef” and “Quick Chick”. We had a “race course” that was about a foot long as the chickens tended to change course or die half way but in every race we landed ourselves a winner. We even managed a couple of photo finishes and at one stage a dead heat!! You’d think there was actual money involved on the night with the amount of cheering that was going on! And to truly make the event authentic, everyone had to wear a hat. We had a great collection, some people collected flowers from the garden and made hats, we had a top hat that was about 3 foot high, there were fan hats, big gaudy coloured hats and a couple of hats that could pass as normal ones that would be acceptable to wear in normal everyday life! I ended up with a purple theme without knowing it as I had a purple hat, purple top and when I took out my fan it was point out to me that that too was purple! So to make myself truly heinous due to the clash of shades of purple I went and put on a pair of purple trousers and my purple scarf. Overall I would say I managed to end up with about 10 different shades of purple on me in one outfit...not something I would normally strive to achieve but it gave us all a laugh and managed to prove that yes, purple IS my favourite colour!!! The night was a great success and everyone went to bed with at least one win under their belts...and a number of drinks in their bellies!
The following morning was a very slow, tender start to the morning for me on account of the night before! I do remember ending up in a ridiculous situation in the middle of the night where I had to get up to go to the loo. In our huts there were big mosquito nets over the beds so it wasn’t an easy task to get in and out of bed in a full state of sobriety. So you can imagine that after a few drinks it was a lot more difficult and when I tried to get out I kind of managed to bounce myself into the net forgetting it was there, and got slightly tangled up in it...think fish caught in a net and you will get an idea of my situation! I eventually managed to free myself and also managed to get back into the bed with too much difficulty where I returned to a glorious slumber! I managed to make it down the town for one of the rugby matches the next day but other than that I took it very easy! The following day though was the Irish match and I was so nervous! We went to an Irish bar to watch it and there was a good crowd in. The only disappointment was dinner! Kev ordered the beef Sunday Roast and when that came out we all suddenly decided we were hungry! A couple of others ordered only to be told there was no beef left...so they had to make do with the roast chicken instead. That too looked and smelt amazing. I wasn’t hungry so decided to wait a bit to order...and when I did I was told that they had just sold the last dinner!! So no Sunday Roast for me! Luckily I had perused the menu and found chicken balls, chips and curry sauce...so I got those and felt like I was eating a Hanks (local Chinese take away in Clondalkin for those of you who are unfortunate enough not to have experienced a Hanks!!!). The Irish match was great to watch but my nerves were shot to pieces watching it and seeing them mess up!! And that marked our last day in Ko Samui and our last day in Thailand!
The couple of weeks in Laos and Thailand absolutely flew in. I was amazed by Laos. When we drove in I didn’t expect it to be so mountainous after how flat Vietnam was. The tubing was an amazing experience, both because it was something completely different and also because it was a breathtaking setting to be in in the first place. It was also great to see more of Thailand after falling in love with Bangkok. Chiang Mai was a nice place to relax and take some time out and Ko Samui gave us a great chill out place but we managed to fit in some adventure at the same time with our scooter day. And I loved seeing Kanchanaburi and learning some of the history of the famous railway and the town itself. Once again some amazing countries and places to visit and more memories to have!! Next stop is Malaysia, country number 18 out of the 21...scary to be so close to the end but also very exciting!!!
