... i am right now in pakse and almost on the way to the 4-thousand-islands - leaving tomorrow morning.

see ya,
christopher

... and that's the best description for vang vieng.

i spent there a day with zack (i could not get rid of the american ;-)) and enjoyed tubing. the town is really crazy and hard to stand and totally different to the rest of laos i have seen so far. tubing was good fun, but a day there was enough (even though i have heard that the area around should be really nice).

how does tubing work? you rent a truck tube. they give you a lift to the river about 4 ks from the final destination in town. you jump into the river and float along. that's the easy part! the hard part is that after 50 m there is every 50 m a bar to stop (they cast lines and try to catch you) and after the sun is hidden behind the surrounding hills it's freezing in the river. even though we skipped a couple of bars we had to pay tribute to the laolao shots, the beers and the bucket of whatever - after dinner we took a nap for an hour, but did not wake up till 1 am and thus decided not to go to another bar.

now i am on my own in vientiane, the capital of lao p.d.r. did some sightseeing today, will do the same tomorrow and then i am going to go to the south of laos.

take care,
christopher

... and looking forward to tubing.

tonight i am going to leave luang prabang to vang vieng to enjoy tubing and perhaps some rock climbing. yesterday i spent a nice day at one of the waterfalls around town and at night we had our farewell dinner, because our small traveling group will spread in different directions.

see ya,
christopher

... after spending days in a remote fishermen village.

what happened the last days? after the trekking tour i went east with the american (but not from the states) to mung kiao. we got to know an aussie guy and an english couple on the bus. after a 90 minute boat trip streamupwards along the river nam ou we all finally landed in the fishermen village (just reachable by boat) and were immediately caught by penny (believe me!) offering her guesthouse as the cheapest, even if it was not.

we spent there two days in the middle of nowhere enjoying our time without cars, mopeds, internet, ... but there were still a lot of things to do. the first day we joined two young lao guys on their fishing trip and tried our luck by casting the net. but unfortunately we were not as successful as the girls doing the same trip the next day. anyway we had a great day paddling upstream and due to the knowledge of the two guides we had a wonderful fish bbq on an island in the river. the journey back - floating back and listening to the guides singing - was relaxation pure!

the second day can be summarized by 3 hrs waiting for food (breakfast, lunch and dinner), exploring the village and the area around including a nice cave, wandering through rice fields and finally a rough night due to bad food for dinner.

on sunday zack, tommy and i took the boat back to mung kiao and further on the most luxury transport since arriving in asia - a chartered boat with seats! the journey to luang prabang took around 6 hrs. the landscape along the river was amazing. the arrival in luang prabang was a big shock - back in civilization and back to the tourist path!

the program for today was to visit the most important temples here. all of them would have been too much, because there are a lot due to the importance of luang prabang in the history of laotian buddhism history. now it is time to stroll around the night market for souvenir shopping (or better christmas shopping) and to get some dinner.

take care,
christopher

... back from the jungle!

i just came back from a fantastic trekking tour in nam tha national park. i got to know some guys from america, england, israel and the netherlands and joined them on a jungle camp trekking tour. it was great fun to hike through the jungle and to stay at huts in the middle of nowhere. phonsak, our tour guide, showed us how to survive in the jungle - including how to use bamboo and the nature for almost everything, for example bamboo-shotglasses for laolao (a rice whiskey), bamboo-cups for water or beer lao, bamboo-pots for cooking soup on the fire, bamboo-bowls for serving the food, banana-leaf-dish-runners to serve sticky rice with delicious food all eaten with the fingers, ...

unfortunately we could not spot any tigers and monkeys as the israelian girl wished. but we stopped at two tribe villages in the mountains and got some insights in their daily life - was a good experience and great fun to play soccer with the kids in their school break.

now i am on the way to a small fishermen village - sorry forgot the name again - and then back to the normal tourist route and luang prabang.

sorry for the long time without a new story, but there is no internet in the jungle!

see ya,
christopher

... welcome laos.

after a long farewell dinner it was time to say good-bye to mim, the spycy house and the other travellers who stayed there. i had a great time there!

after a couple of hours in a mini bus cruising trough the north of thailand and crossing the mekong river i am finally in laos. i have not seen a lot yet, but i am looking forward to exploring it. tomorrow i am going to take a bus to the north to luang namtha (almost at the border to china) to do some trekking.

take care,
christopher

p.s.: it is a little bit strange to travel alone again after great company last week!

... 'oh, my buddha'

tomorrow i am going to head north to laos. i am really excited to see something new after a perfect week here in chiang mai. tomorrow morning it is time to say good-bye to mim and the other travellers staying at spicy house.

a short review of my week here in north thailand:

• tuesday: a hard day of rock-climbing at crazy horse buttress and afterwards a lovely dinner (a mixture of bbq and fondue) at spicy house with mim and some thai people

• wednesday: another day of rock-climbing - a little bit frustrating due to the lack of my strength-endurance of my forearms - followed by the amazing 'yi peng loy krathong' festival

• thursday: a relaxing day and a little bit of sightseeing in chiang mai

• friday: hard work for non-early-birds, because we got up early to wat doi suthep to listen to the morning prayers of the monks and to see sunrise over chiang mai ... afterwards just relaxing and getting ready for the trip tomorrow

thai bbq


yi peng loy krathong


temple in chiang mai


monks at wat doi suthep

see you,
christopher

... after having a lot of fun.

i just came back to spicy house after two amazing days in the nature. getting ready yesterday morning was a little bit hard after the consumption of one or two drinks the night before, but we all made it on time. the first stop was at a small butterfly and orchid farm (we had no clue that it was included as well and wished it would not have been - it was just a waste of time), followed by the elephant ride, which was great fun. after a hard hike uphills we arrived at the village, where we had dinner and stayed overnight - a lovely place on top of the mountain with no electricity.

today we had to walk all the way down again and were shown how to make cups and shotguns out of bamboo. the rest of the day was just wet - first of all we stopped at a waterfall for a waterfall-massage and afterwards we did white water rafting (was good fun) and bamboo rafting (was relaxing and a little bit boring).

now i am just looking forward to a lovely dinner and a day of climbing at crazy horse tomorrow.

see ya,
christopher