8 October 2007 - Thailand / Laos

Day 4 - We left Chiang Mai in the morning to travel to the border town of Chiang Khong ready to cross over to Laos. On the way we stopped at a cashew nut shop and tried a variety of nuts in many flavours including chocolate! Lunch was in a restaurant in Chiang Rai called "Cabbages & Condoms" (this is a Thai intiative to introduce safe sex to the locals). We didn't eat any cabbage though! We got to the border town late in the evening in very heavy rain. To cheer ourselves up we ended up in a restaurant drinking until 2am! Ricky joined in with the locals playing the guitar by singing Wonderwall!

Day 5 - After a short sleep (we were up at 6am), we crossed the border into Laos over the Mekong river. We then took a slow boat down the river which takes about 12 hours in total. We stopped overnight in Pat Bang and our first meal in Laos was actually an Indian!

Day 6 - Back on the boat for the remaining 6 hours of the trip. We had a stop at a local village on the way to see how they live. The accommodation is very basic but they do have satellite TV! The local kids are SO cute - we wanted to take one home! Our next stop was the Ou Caves which are filled with Buddhas donated by local people - over 40,000 in total. We finally arrived in Luang Prabang (where we are now) in the pouring rain and after a slippery walk in the mud with our backbacks we made it safely to our hotel. We had a great meal of buffalo sausages followed by a yummy chocolate dessert.

Day 7 - The morning excursion was a trip to the Royal Palace Museum. Not the most riveting of mornings but it was good to learn a bit about the history of the country. In the afternoon we visited the Kuang Xi Waterfalls - a massive cascade of multiple waterfalls which you could swim in and jump from (not that we did!). Our evening meal was at a BBQ restaurant where we cooked our own food in the centre of the table over hot coals. The diet is currently not working!

Day 8 - (today) we visited an Elephant Park where we rode on another elephant through the jungle and fed a baby elephant bananas. Following a nervous boat ride we visited another waterfall and then enjoyed a lunch with local foods. Tonight we're off to another restaurant for some more indulgence!