The first couple days after Georges arrival we stayed in Chiang Mai, ate good food at good restaurants, drank wine, shopped in the markets, went to a Mai Thai fight and rode elephants. Everyday we found ourselves entertained and keeping busy. We both enjoyed a rambungtious night out watching the Mai Thai fighting that I nearly killed myself trying to do in Pai. The fighters started off young, maybe 13 years old and slowly got older. There was even a girl fight. Mai Thai is different then other boxing in that it is done to drums and looks more like a dance when they are in the ring. As they dance around eachother they swing and kick and try to beat the other up. George and I sat front row and had a great view of the cometition and really enjoyed the different fighting.
Now I don't want to brag but we are offical maouts now! Well techniqually, officially unoffical mahouts. Mahouts are the people that ride and control the elephants when they are working to clear a forest or move logs and we did a training course all the next day. We went to an elephant farm where they teach you to ride the elephants, without the basket. You sit on their neck and learn to control them. For the whole morning we found ourselves playing with the elephants, getting picked up, sitting on them, turning them, going forwards and backwards. We took tons of photographs and discovered it was a little more difficult than we thought. After lunch we went for a jungle trek on our elephant and realized, our elephant really didn't like to listen and eventually gave up to let the real mahout walking with us get our slow poke going. After we got to play in the water with her and wash her where she sprayed us multiple times.
George and I enjoyed Chiang Mai but it was neccessary and we needed to move on so off we went in a mini van to the Lao border. On arrival we had to check out of Thai immigration, cross the river and check into Lao immigration. Half of our minivan followed us to the Lao side for the night the other half stayed on the Thai side. We found cheap accomadation and met up with our new friends. We got dinner and drank and had a fun night. In the morning we had to get up pack for the two day boat trip down the Mekong river.
The slow boat trip downt the river is two days of motoring with a night stop in a small town on the Mekong. The boat is very long and there were many tourists on board but the boat also made multiple stops to pick up and drop off locals on the way. The scenery was very beautiful as we floated through the valley. The boat itself had many wooden benches inside which were completely uncomfortable. Despite the views and beer and having eachother onboard the seats were awful and the slow boat slowly got boring. We both thought, two days of thsi???!!!! ahhh, we already been there done that. When we eventually arrived at the town we would stay for the night we were so happy to be getting off the hard seats. We wondered and stumbled on an amazing bungalow overlooking the river and got some Indian food, I know but we had a craving!
The next day again up early for a second day, except we got lucky. One of the first people to arrive we got to select the VIP seats which were new car seats with cushioning and were wonderful. The day started off fantastic. The boat was same same but different, no sore ass this time.
LP was the perfect place to relax and enjoy our time together but we eventually grew restless and needed a change so off we went to Vang Viene for some partying and tubing. We booked a minivan and off we went for our 5 hour drive twisty turny mountainous drive which was beautiful but not so good on the stomach. On our way up the mountian we turned a corner to an overturned beer truck. It was shock, disappointment and love at first sight. Shock because there was thousands of beers sitting in the road, disappointment because it was impassable, and love for the beer. No one was hurt which made the whole situation ok. After oranizing a clean up process to expedite our trip everyone banned together and helped to pick up the bottles and put them in crates on the side of the road. After the work was finished we were each granted permission to take a victory bottle. On we went.
Vang Viene is a small town with a very backpacker feel. It is a party town and though the mountains are beautiful there was not a whole lot to do beside tube down the river and drink. We enjoyed some good food here, especially the goat meat and cheese and had a good day tubing. For the tubing you rent a tub and they drive you to the start of river. The river here is lined with bars that have rope swings, trapeez, ziplines, and slides, plus buckets. Buckets of what you may ask, the answer is unclear but they are loaded with booze. Tubing and booze can be a dangerous activity but it was good fun and we had a great day, but had no need to do it again. The only way to describe it would be, spring break Cancun, except in Lao.
After we left Vang Viene we went to our final destination together, the Lao capital of Vientiane. Here we relaxed again, had nice dinners and enjoyed the celebrations they had along the river for their big festival that was going on. We lite off a candle floating lantern with the locals along the river and enjoyed the French food and architecture. While in Vientiane we went to a national soccer game, Lao vs. the Philippines, tie game where we drank wine and got a ride home in the back of a pickup truck full of drunk Loasians singing and playing drums. Here we also shopped our hearts out at the market and enjoyed our last days together and eventually said a tearful good, (for me at least).
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