'Trekking' in Laos

OUr two day 'trek' through a national protected area(NPA) down the south of Laos was quite an experience! Again we were blessed with the fortune of three great travelling companions who we got to know throughout the two days...
THe first day consisted mostly of scrambling DOWN DOWN DOWN through the rain, and some very dense rainforest to a tiny clearing near a waterfall where we were to camp for the night...It was like the rainforest experience that you imagine when you are little..moss growing all over the vines that wrap themselves around, and around, and around every tree that surrounds you...ahh I'm doing a crappy job of describing it so I'll just stop there...Basically it was VERY beautiful and the rain, though annoying at the start, only helped in adding to the beauty of it all...

That night we got an insight into what its like to REALLY live off the land with the local guides cooking sticky rice in bamboo poles, and creating quite a cool grill apparatus for the meat...They were exceptionally good at using our surroundings to prepare our meal and create a comfy camp sight in what first appeared a crazy spot to stop for the night...The fact that someone had forgotten to pack any tent flys provided for an interesting nights sleep but in the end it was all just part of the experience!

On the second day we climbed down a bit further to the stunning waterfall we had listened to raging through the night...The rain had thankfully stopped and it was really amazing to admire whilst knowing we were amongst only a handful of tourists who had seen that waterfall, and gone trekking in that area(we were the first group of tourists ever to officially do that specific trek...the path we had followed earlier was used only by the locals who lived in the village where we had started our trek)....From there it was a crazy hike back UP(via a different route) to the village ....At this point we knew we were well and truly 'off the beaten track' as there WAS no track for a good couple of K's....We relied entirely on the knowledge of the flip flop wearing, machette(spelling??)-happy local guides who, for a few hours, hacked away at everything in their way so to create a path for us through the towering grass, bamboo and trees...When it started to POUR with rain we were no longer just scrambling through a rainforest with no idea where we were....but scrambling through the mud....struggling to keep up with the guides...I truly struggle to think of any other time in my life when i have been more wet than i was on that second day...Even with a raincoat on i was soakedthrough....Whenever I stopped to look around and catch my breath i would just find myself laughing at the craziness of our situation...
But anyway....we did make it back to the village before dark(which at one stage i thought was seriously doubtful) and after peeling off the numerous leeches we climbed into the taxi, still dripping to head back to Pakse, where a warm set of clothes awaited.

Trek is not really the word I would use to describe what we did over those two days.,...I think bush-bashing, rock climbing or scrambling up a hill through mud are all more fitting descriptions however it was still a really great experience and something I'm glad we did.

update on the last few weeks...Nepal-Bangkok-Laos

So...this is to update you on what i have been doing in the last two weeks...
After the amazing trek, and an equally awesome three days rafting we headed bac kto Kathmandu to enjoy the luxuries of staying in a HOUSE with a friend, Cindy who mum met on her trip to Nepal...Was pretty excited to sit on a couch and cook a meal after three months!
We spent three days there(i think..i lose track of days!), one of which i went on a day trip up towards the tibetan border to do a bungy jump....At 160ms its ONE of the highest in the world...Bbut no1 could actually tell me where there is one that is higher...anyway it was pretty scary but very exhilirating too! Glad i did it...There was also this giant canyon swing that has a free fall of 8secs which was more frightening than the bungy jump....a mad adrenalin rush...

We then flew to Bangkok to spend a few days there organising our Laos visa's and transport to the border...IIt was strange being in such a large, developed city after being in poverty for so long...Felt a fair bit of culture shock in reverse....Realised how much stuff we cluster our lives with that just isn't necessary!
Did act like a bit of a tourist by going to the floating markets with a friend of Ell's who we bumped into...
WE then spent a crazy 24 hours making our way to the very south of Laos to the area known as the four thousand islands....A very beautiful place...Spent a few days there riding around on pushys and reading in our hammocks on the balcony of our $2 bungalow....Laos is crazy cheap! Even more so than India and Nepal..Which i found quite suprising....
From what we have seen so far its a very beautiful and laid back country! and no1 trys to rip you off which is nice!
Tomorrow we are going on a two day trek through an area that is famous for its coffee plantations...apparently Laos coffee is quite famous in the coffee world...so that will be cool to be trekking again, whilst enjoying some good coffee!
Will also check out some waterfalls before heading up to the capital, Vientiane to meet up with a friend...
The volunteering that we had planned in Laos has kinda fallen through so we are trying to find some other volunteering to do but had no luck as such....If we can't find anything here we may head into Vietnam and try our luck there!
Till next time xoxo

last days in india...

so just to quickly give u a bit of an idea...after leaving leh and having our crazybus ride we spent afew daysresting and partying with other bus survivors in manali...wasn't much to do there but go for walks around the surrounding hills. which were quite impressive...The only other thing manali is known for is its marijuana...it can be seen growing EVERYWHERE on the side of the roads...nowi realise where it got the name weed from!
we then scooted west to the town of mcleod ganj which is the official residence of the dalai lama..so it was a very peacefulplaceas expected. and ltos of tibetan refugees there...went for a walk one day to this waterfall and got stranded in the cafe up the top fortwo hours because it wasbucketing down....also did two cooking classes..one indian and one learning how to make tibetan mo mo's...which are SO hard for anyone who knows what they are! mine were terrible...
it rained like teh whole time we were there so also saw a few moremovies....ang again the bollywood movie wasset in australia! crazy..had no idea again. was set in sydney and was THE MOST cheesy movie i have ever seen...had to go buy a few bollywood movies to bring home cosill miss them!
then it was back onto a bus(this onewas much safer!) back to delhi so wecould fly out to nepal!

Leh

So again I'm going back in time but I wanted to write about Leh as it was the city I enjoyed most in India.....Strangly so, or prehaps reflective of my tastes it was the most 'un-indian- city' we went to.....Don't get me wrong...I LOVED India and so many of the places that we went....But Leh was just so amazing!

Two days bus travel north from Shrinigar, and another two back south to manali it is settled right in the heart of the rocky himalayas in an area known as the Ladakhi region. Its a true hikers hang out and we often felt a little intimidated by their flashy gear and muscular bodies...THe one day hike that we did over the mountains to a nearby village left us exhausted and with the realisation that we need to do A LOT to increase our fitness before annapurna.

There was a festival on in Leh whilst we were there so they had all these crazy things on that we went to see like a real life polo match(where we nearly got trampled alive! so THATS why noone was sitting in those seats so close to the ground....) as well as a dance show and a local comedy and rock concert..the comedy and rock concert was all in Indian so we were the ONLY westeners cramped into this tiny town hall but it was so worth it. The highlight was the lighting effects which consisted of turning on and off the flurescent hall lights for like 2 horus straight. crazy indians. was a good laugh though..the music was hurrendous!

Also went for a few half day walks up the surrounding hills to some buddhist gompa's and stupa's (ie. temples) which provided some amazing views down onto Leh and across the mountaions...

I learnt a lot here about globalisation and the effects we as westerners are having on their traditional culture...which was traditionally living a life off the land, entirely self sufficient with no access to money etc. Sadly now that has changed a lot in the area because of our influence...

the most epic bus journey of my life....

so this may be a very long posting...and it will put things out of order cos i do want to write about Leh and shrinigar and other previous happenings but this is just so humerous that i have to write about it first....

A couple of days ago we boarded a bus in Leh for a two day ride through the himalayas to manali..little did we know how crazy the trip was going to be! I'll have to dot point it to make it readible...in order this is what happened:

*Firstly....we had to stand in the cold at 4.30 in the morning cos our bus didn't show..typical india
*Later we were delayed another 3 hours just before the worlds second highest motor pass because of a snow storm(in one week we came from 45degree desert heat to a snow storm!! india has it all!) .....after three hours they finally cleared the road and we passed through, slightly in a rush now to get to our destination before dark.
*a few hours later our conductor guy got up to demand that we all pay him 50rupees each to cross the border....the equivalent of about $1.50 its not much for us but for them its a fair bit...but anyway everyone on the bus knew that this was total bollucks as there were many tourists that had passed over the border before and never had to pay...so we all kicked up a storm, refusing to pay...when we did get to the border someone complained to the police and then the conductor got a very stern talking to. it was quite humerous. *i should put in now that this was THE MOST SCARY BUS RIDE I HAVE EVER BEEN ON. i will never again complain about vline because though they must be frustrating i have never feared for my life like i did on this bus! we climbed up through the mountains on unsealed roads in the dark....its was petrifying! Not to mention the fact that our bus was too large to fit around most corners so we constantly found ourselves reversing back around a corner for a second attempt at getting around the hair pin turns...on one occassion we couldn't make it around the corner without all passengers piling out, making the bus light enough to reverse back up the mountain...pretty scary stuff!!!
*arriving only a few hours late at our crappy, overpriced tent accomodation(in the snow!) that we had no choice about staying at, to find out that my bag was SATURATED...and i mean saturated....
*attempting to leave at 7 the next morning only to be delayed an hour because or motor wouldn't start(so THAT was why he didn't stop the engine while we were delayed in the snow for three hours. GREAT).. after numerous attempts to push a 30seater bus along the flat ground to roll start it the driver realised we needed to take some other action. Even i could have told him that it was NEVER going to work. After half hour we hailed down the first truck that came past and they set to work doing something else to try and get us on the road again....We got fed up with standing around watching nothing happening though so we went for a walk to the paddock over the road that had a small spot of sunshine....it was here that we witnessed the billowing smoke coming from our engine as they tried to start it and suddenly....a ball of flame in the drivers cabin area of the bus....thinking something had gone terribly wrong and all our bags were about to go up in smoke we started sprinting back to find that it was infact the conductor guy using a ball of flame to heat the air going into the engine so that it would start. crazy indians...
*4 hours later we somehow ran into the back of a jeep....but in the scheme of things this was NOTHING....a few words were exchanged between drivers but as the car was still road worthy we drove on!
* At this stage we had started a competition with the other tourists as to what could go wrong next....Probably jinxed ourselvs as barely a half hour later we got a punture and had to stop on the side of the mountain to fix it
*after waiting an hour, rejoicing in the fact that they fixed the tyre and climbing back on the bus we were then told that there were infact THREE more bad tyres and it was going to be another THREE hours until we could leave again....We therefore decided to walk the 7 k's to the nearest town to get some food where 4 hours later we were picked up by our bus and on the road again...

Thankfully we arrived that night in one piece in Manali, despite being a good 6 hours late....but such is life really! Though it may not sound as impressive in writing, it was a pretty epic journey..We did make some good friends along the way though. And it was the very first time in over a month that we had run into any other aussies...so it was good to hang out and enjoy the good aussie humour even though it was more often than not whilst waiting for our bus to get fixed!

more and more kites

So yes, it has only been one day since i last 'blogged' but it becomes just so intensly hot in the desert afternoons that it is to hard to contemplate doing anything but find sanctuary in an air conditioned internet shop.
When i wrote yesterday about the kites in the sky over the city it was nothing compared to what the horizon looked like today. The public holiday of 'brothers and sisters day'(Ell and I have decided to adopt this tradition into our own family) meant that there was no school and alas, many hours of kite flying to be had. We hiked up to the fort above the city and the view was truly amazing. With no back yards their small roof tops are clearly the place to hang out, play music and fly kites! Quite a sight.(I'll try add some photos another day)
sorry this is a bit short and a little dull but i suddenly have to go!

indian movies

i wanted to write about indian movies cos they are just SO DAMN COOL. we saw another one about a week ago. this one was not bollywood but was still quite entertaining. and it was in a cinema that looks like a big pavlova. its very famous in india. this movie was about the indian womens hockey team going to the world championships. And guess where the chamionships were...in melbourne!!!!!!! crazy. so some of it was filmed in melb but we had no idea until we saw it. This is where i should mention that the indian people LOVE going to the cinema. they totally get into it like its a concert. clapping and cheering. hence, during this movie the audience errupted in applause at every goal the indian team scored. which was A LOT.(their movies go for 3hours!) the first game they played in australia though was against australia and they lost 7-0. alas we were the only ones in the cinema cheering:) however, in true patriotic-indian style they played us again in the grandfinal, beating us. im pretty sure if australia had have won, we three aussies may not have left the cinema alive.
fingers crossed we will see another bollywood movie soon. the main male characters are just so spunky:)