Monday, July 21, 2008
short china post
i would go ahead and like to apologise once again for not keeping up with this thisng. i have been running accross the whole country of china. its hard time find time to stop and sit for a couple hours or so to write a full update. nonetheless i am goign to try to catch up right now. first the short version. i flew from bangkok to shenzen and my plane arrived late so we stayed in a hotel hat night. the next morning we woke up and went back to the airport to get a bus to guanzhou. the bus wasnt very long but i slep the whole way and upon arriving was stired by bill. from there we walked a long way to the far side of the city where there is a very small island with some youth hostels and other places to stay. we found a small place and i stayed the night there and was also able to book my train ticket for the next day. that night bill and I ate at a more local chinese restuarant and then simply explored the island. the rest of the night i spent reading in my top bunk dorm bed. when i woke up the next morning and bill took me to a bakery for breakfast that he had found the following day after i had gone to bed. we ate a semi late breakfast and from there decided to exit the island and explore some of the local ciy for a while before i was to get on my train. we explored the city and i got on my train to guilin. the train ride was a night train and i arrived the next morning. i got off the train and with my guide in hand walked to my hostel. i slept most of the day dince i had gotten no sleep on the train. when i woke up i went ahead and booked a train ticket for a next day and also a river boat tour. the next day i checked out early and put my things in a safe room. i went on the river tour which lasted a few hours. i got off the boat and had to take a bus back to guilin. from there i got my things and sat in the lobby of the hostel untill i had to wal kto the train station. i got on the train and again it was a night train but this time was worse because i had a....... no seat. no seat means you either stand or sit wherever there is room on the train. the ride was terrible but i got to wuhan safely. i got off the train in wuhan and was lost right from the start. 3 people pointed me in the wrng direction of where i wanted to go right as i got off the train. i luckily met some students who spoke english. they would have been helpful if they had actually lived in the city before but they were not natives to wuhan. so instead of doing the smart thing like calling a cab. a was paraded in a giant crcle around wuhan for the better part of 3 hours. we did end up find my hostel and from there i went to sleep. before i went to my room the studetns invited me to dinner and i promised i would meet them in the lobby later that night. i spent the rest of the day just resting and laying around doing absolutely nothing. i met the students for dinner and they took me accross the river of wuhan for a spicy food dinner and to visit an arcade. I got home late and immediately went to sleep. Day 2 wuhan. i met My teacher ms. carter and got to visit one of her classes. later that day the students took ms. carter and I out for dinner at a dumpling restuarant. after dinner ms. carter had to go work on something for class and the two students and i walked around the city for a while. we ended up going and playing kareoke and then going home. wuhan day 3 i met ms carter again to visit her classes which i did but also visited some of her coleagues classes. later that day the teachers taught the students how to play baseball. i helped with that and from there went back to the teachers hotel to visit with ms. carter and some of her friends since i would be leaving the next day. i left their hotel and got a taxi back to my hostel and stayed up late talking with the workers. they had taken very good care of me while i had been there and many of them let me have stuff for free since i had stayed so. also some of the workers were friends with the sudents i met so i had an in there too. from wuhan i would go to a city called wuxue. the students were from that city and they had invited me to go to their hometown. this town had a train station so i figured i visit for a few days then i can get n the train to xi'an. wuhan day 4. i woke up early and went to the bus station to get my ticket then came back to the hostel and rested until i went back to the bus station to get on the bus to wuxue. the bus trip was short.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Friday, July 11, 2008
trying to catch up
alright i left off in the hammock and im gonna jump right back into it from there.
we stayed two days on the island of don khone which was plenty of time to see everything that this small island had to offer. the island was so small in fact you could rent bycycles and peddle around the whole island in probably about 2-3 hours. after we had gotten our things set up at our little riverside hovel. we rented bycycles and peddled to the exact opposite side of the island. it really shouldnt have been that much of a feat but, the path we took was specified by a guide book we read to be "too bumpy for bycycles". we did it anyway.. it definitely was too bumby at places but we made it with no ill problems. from there we explored some ruins of a dock where french merchants pulled supplies out of the water to transport by train to the other side of the island. the boats couldnt simply just float around to the other side as it is blocked by rapids. after exploring that for a short while we began the bike ride back choosing a different path this time. the path back was much more relaxing and not nearly as bumpy. we passed over 3 simple bridges and rode through thick jugles of trees, underbrush, and bamboo. we got back to our riverside house and just sat and relaxed for a while. we ended up leaving the house and taking the bikes with us to cross back over to the first island of don det for dinner. we ate at a small little restuarant that had a high porch over looking the bridge and river. Bonus for me they had hammocks next to the tables. we ate our dinners which for me consisted of baguette and fried eggs and then went back to our shack. we read on the porch of our shack untill Bill and Chris went to bed. by this time there was storm moving in and i decided to stay out. in the storm there was no rain no lightning strikes. Lightning would flash across the sky every so often lighting up both sides of the river and making small details on both sides clearly visibly for a spliy second. at one point a praying mantis assumed a position on our porch. i watched it for a good 30 minutes flying back and forth eating the bugs that were drawn to our 1 porch light split between our rooms. the light finally went out when the family we had rented form turned it off. so i went to my room seeing the way by the flashes of lighting and and oil lamp they had provided for us. I slept with the door to my room open which was fine, the only plus was that it brought a cool breeze into the room. i woke up the next morning and it was still rather early so i went back to sleep for an hour or so then got up. taking a morning shower was miserable but necessary. Hot water was neither availible in the house or on the rest of the island for that matter. after the ice bath we went to breakfast at the same restuarant we had been to the day before. this time i ate a fruit saland and baguete with fried egg. not a whole lot of variation in my meals but it was very very good. all of us ate breakfast at our own pace and once we had all gotten back to the shack we decided it was time to go seek out a boat that wwe could charter to see the rare mekhong river dolphin. Bill had gotten up early that morning and had found a place that would take us for a fair price. To get there we walked to an opposite side of the island to a place called the beach. On the island there are many hand drawn maps for visitors. mostly these maps consist of a white backing and somone simply just using a sharpie to draw it on. everyone of the maps had the beach labeled. The walk to the bech wasnt long but it definitely wasnt short. When we got there it looked ..... Like a beach. The whole side of the island after coming through the trees was sand for what seemed like two soccer field lengths. there were fishing boats unused and pulled up high in the sand. and some were in the water tied off to trees or rocks. standing on the shore and looking out there were rapds with very large rocks that stood high out of the water. Bill found the man he had told us about this morning and we paid him and fromt here he walked us down to the water. he un hooked his boat and walked it closer to the shore where we wouldnt have to get wet to get in. we jumped in the boat and took a 15 minute journey to another island where he ushered us to get out. when we got there we realized that not olny could we see the dolphins out in the water we hadnt expected to see but, we were also illegally in cambodia. Those types of trips where foreiners are taken and brought back soon after must be normal, because a combodian soldier didnt even flinch when he saw us landing on his territory. He simply pushed us to a little shack with tables and chairs and asked us if there was somthing he could get us to drink. we were sitting under the shack drinking sodas and looking out over a wide body of water and about 50 meters out you could see the dolphins surfacing for air. it was absolutely amazing. after a short time they gave us our suvenir (i know i spelled that wrong) dolphin watching tickets that said. you have been to cambodia ... blah blah. somthing nice that said we had been to cambodia without getting stamped. from there we simply got back into our rickety boat that was now taking in water.... which was very discouraging. somehow we were able to make it back to the main island with our boatman driving and dumping buckets of water overboard at the same time. we thanked the boatman and headed back to our favorite restuarant on the river and since there really was nothing else to see on the small island we laid around eating at the restuarant and sleeping in the hammocks untill it was late at night. we got to our restuarant at around 1 and we didnt leave till 8. i slept in a hammock from about 3-5 and bill and chris read for that time. when we walked back accross the bride to the island with our riverside hut. would could see an uncountable amount of stars. the cloud looking formation that never moved from its place in the sky was the milky way galaxy and it could be made out very easily and without question. after taking a short while to stare at the celestial beauty we continued our walk to our hut. when we got there we spent no time ont the porch we simply went to sleep. i was awakend late that night by a great storm. the wind blew fiercely against our shack and the door slammed open and shut every few minutes. then the wind slowed and a steady rain began. when i awoke it was still raining and it was time to fun i boat off the island and back to the first village that had the bus station. the house the we were staying at convieniently had a price per person for boat and vip minibus back to the inland. i really cant remember the order of where we went from there but i know that we were able to cross back into thailand that day and we were close to making it back to khon kaen but we missed the last bus there by an hour. so we had to spend the night in a town which i cant for the life of me remember the name. the first bus to Khon Kaen in the morning was at 5 so we ended up going to a cheap hotel and sleeping for a short time before waking up at 4 and walking to the bus station. we left from that bus station and some hours later. we arrived in khon kaen. because we had left so early the day was still young. bill needed to get on the motor bike and take a trip north to see one of his friends before we left thailand completely. Chris ended up going back to the hotel and i had some errands to run in town if i was going to be ready to go on my own. i needed a watch that had an alarm and just some toher travel snacks. i ended up walking around for at least a couple hours trying to explain to street vendors that i wanted a watch with an alarm. i finally realized the easiest way to explain this was to say watch and then say "beep beep". they understood immidiately and were even able to show me how to set it. i stopped at the supermarket and got some simple crackers and snacks for our soon to be trip to bangkok. i went back to the apartment and Chris was there reading and from there we really didnt do much. The last few days in Khon kaen we simply visited interwater everyday, visited the annual student market on campus, walked around town, and went to a rotary meeing. Lek was basically our driver for the last few days we were there. she helped us whenever she could and took us out to eat alot. the student market is simply an annual convention that they have in this big building on KKU campus. students can get good deals on clothes, books, bags, computers, and anything else electronic. even though all of the things at the student sale were interesting/cool i didnt buy anything. Bill bought a pack so he could begin his backpacking again though. The last day we were in KHon kaen we spent the morning at interwater. Interwater not only specialized in water treatment but the also put in pools and so on. out in fron ton Interwater there is one of the pools and Lek let me swim in it for a little while. it wasnt heated but it felt amazing. When we finally left Khon kaen we were able to say our goodbyes to Lek but Chelumchai had left a few days earlier on business. we said our goodbyes and i promised Lek i would return one day to run in the Khon Kaen marathon. Not only does Lek work at interwater but once a year when the marathon happends she works with foreign runners to help get them registered. Back to our story. we Left inter water and headed down town to a rotary meeting that perfectly fit our schedule so that we could sit in on it then get on a bus to Bangkok. The rotary meeting was simple. consisting of a buffet and then sitting at a table with its few members and listening to a language we coulding understand. they asked Bill, Chris and I to stand up and simply speak about our experiences while we had been there and we had a translator to tell them what we were saying. the meeting went on for some time and we had to leave while it was still in session. we said our goodbyes and headed for the bus station which was just around the corner from where there meetings are held. we got to the bus station and got our tickets from there got directly on teh bus and took our 6 hours ride to Bangkok. when we got there we took a taxi to kaoson road which is the main place for tourists to stay. it has all the street bars and worthless t-shirts and just that fickle people think they need. the only stores that are worth anything on that street are the food vendors and the enlgish book stores. we stayed at the same place we had stayed at the last time we were in bangkok. we left our bags in the rooms and went to explore the street looking for one of my favorite food vendors. its a kind of pancake they cook in front of you and fruit on top of it and then add think condensed milk.... very good. especially with strawberry jelly. we couldnt find any but we decided we would come back to the street later. we went looking for dinner and found it at a small indian restuarant that was placed on the second floor of a suits made to fit in 18 hours. the food was amazing and was not very expensive. we left the small restuarant thanking the small family that owned itand from there Chris bought his bus ticket to the airport and went to sleep while Bill and i walked the main street again. after a while Bill went back to his room and i walked finally finding my pancake guy. I ended up eating 3. i banana and two strawberries. after that i explored the shops and by this time the road was begining to slow down so i went back to the rom to get some sleep. When i awoke Chris had already taken his bus to the airport. i felt bad that i had missed my opportunity to say goodbye but notheless what was done was done. Bill had gone to the airport and had said he would meet me in the lobby of the hotel at 10:30 so i spent my morning walking the streets examining the day shops and using the overpriced computers. i met bill in the lobby of my guest house at 10:30 and from there i went ahead and checked out. we left our bags in the lobby of the hotel simply because no one would mess with them. the hotel watches youth bags for a price but no one in that hotel would steal our stuff. we left to go explore the street and find some early luch. it was still early for kauson road to start back up but the vendors were out early trying to sell all the things you dont need to you. we ended up stopping for lunch at a little side vendor that looked like a shack with some cinderblocks as a stove and a few cement tables and chairs. the food was very good although the vendor itself looked a little out there. we walked around for a short time untill Bill took me to a place where we could buy a bus ticket to the airport. we got our tickets and from there we basically had 4 hours untill our bus would get there. we split up to explore the street by ourselves. i ended up just exploringthe shops trying to find some stuff that wsant completely overprices or worthless. i ended up just getting some country flag patches and a cheap cheap pair of knock off ray ban sun glasses. i went back to where we had bought our ticket and the i used their internet to update the blog and checked the email. i sat around for the longes tine before going out one last time to check the book store and go get a drink from 7/11. the book store held nothign that i thought i would be interested in and 7/11 consisted of a water. i went back to the building for the last time and simply wrote untill a man came and picked us up in the minibus to the airport.
we stayed two days on the island of don khone which was plenty of time to see everything that this small island had to offer. the island was so small in fact you could rent bycycles and peddle around the whole island in probably about 2-3 hours. after we had gotten our things set up at our little riverside hovel. we rented bycycles and peddled to the exact opposite side of the island. it really shouldnt have been that much of a feat but, the path we took was specified by a guide book we read to be "too bumpy for bycycles". we did it anyway.. it definitely was too bumby at places but we made it with no ill problems. from there we explored some ruins of a dock where french merchants pulled supplies out of the water to transport by train to the other side of the island. the boats couldnt simply just float around to the other side as it is blocked by rapids. after exploring that for a short while we began the bike ride back choosing a different path this time. the path back was much more relaxing and not nearly as bumpy. we passed over 3 simple bridges and rode through thick jugles of trees, underbrush, and bamboo. we got back to our riverside house and just sat and relaxed for a while. we ended up leaving the house and taking the bikes with us to cross back over to the first island of don det for dinner. we ate at a small little restuarant that had a high porch over looking the bridge and river. Bonus for me they had hammocks next to the tables. we ate our dinners which for me consisted of baguette and fried eggs and then went back to our shack. we read on the porch of our shack untill Bill and Chris went to bed. by this time there was storm moving in and i decided to stay out. in the storm there was no rain no lightning strikes. Lightning would flash across the sky every so often lighting up both sides of the river and making small details on both sides clearly visibly for a spliy second. at one point a praying mantis assumed a position on our porch. i watched it for a good 30 minutes flying back and forth eating the bugs that were drawn to our 1 porch light split between our rooms. the light finally went out when the family we had rented form turned it off. so i went to my room seeing the way by the flashes of lighting and and oil lamp they had provided for us. I slept with the door to my room open which was fine, the only plus was that it brought a cool breeze into the room. i woke up the next morning and it was still rather early so i went back to sleep for an hour or so then got up. taking a morning shower was miserable but necessary. Hot water was neither availible in the house or on the rest of the island for that matter. after the ice bath we went to breakfast at the same restuarant we had been to the day before. this time i ate a fruit saland and baguete with fried egg. not a whole lot of variation in my meals but it was very very good. all of us ate breakfast at our own pace and once we had all gotten back to the shack we decided it was time to go seek out a boat that wwe could charter to see the rare mekhong river dolphin. Bill had gotten up early that morning and had found a place that would take us for a fair price. To get there we walked to an opposite side of the island to a place called the beach. On the island there are many hand drawn maps for visitors. mostly these maps consist of a white backing and somone simply just using a sharpie to draw it on. everyone of the maps had the beach labeled. The walk to the bech wasnt long but it definitely wasnt short. When we got there it looked ..... Like a beach. The whole side of the island after coming through the trees was sand for what seemed like two soccer field lengths. there were fishing boats unused and pulled up high in the sand. and some were in the water tied off to trees or rocks. standing on the shore and looking out there were rapds with very large rocks that stood high out of the water. Bill found the man he had told us about this morning and we paid him and fromt here he walked us down to the water. he un hooked his boat and walked it closer to the shore where we wouldnt have to get wet to get in. we jumped in the boat and took a 15 minute journey to another island where he ushered us to get out. when we got there we realized that not olny could we see the dolphins out in the water we hadnt expected to see but, we were also illegally in cambodia. Those types of trips where foreiners are taken and brought back soon after must be normal, because a combodian soldier didnt even flinch when he saw us landing on his territory. He simply pushed us to a little shack with tables and chairs and asked us if there was somthing he could get us to drink. we were sitting under the shack drinking sodas and looking out over a wide body of water and about 50 meters out you could see the dolphins surfacing for air. it was absolutely amazing. after a short time they gave us our suvenir (i know i spelled that wrong) dolphin watching tickets that said. you have been to cambodia ... blah blah. somthing nice that said we had been to cambodia without getting stamped. from there we simply got back into our rickety boat that was now taking in water.... which was very discouraging. somehow we were able to make it back to the main island with our boatman driving and dumping buckets of water overboard at the same time. we thanked the boatman and headed back to our favorite restuarant on the river and since there really was nothing else to see on the small island we laid around eating at the restuarant and sleeping in the hammocks untill it was late at night. we got to our restuarant at around 1 and we didnt leave till 8. i slept in a hammock from about 3-5 and bill and chris read for that time. when we walked back accross the bride to the island with our riverside hut. would could see an uncountable amount of stars. the cloud looking formation that never moved from its place in the sky was the milky way galaxy and it could be made out very easily and without question. after taking a short while to stare at the celestial beauty we continued our walk to our hut. when we got there we spent no time ont the porch we simply went to sleep. i was awakend late that night by a great storm. the wind blew fiercely against our shack and the door slammed open and shut every few minutes. then the wind slowed and a steady rain began. when i awoke it was still raining and it was time to fun i boat off the island and back to the first village that had the bus station. the house the we were staying at convieniently had a price per person for boat and vip minibus back to the inland. i really cant remember the order of where we went from there but i know that we were able to cross back into thailand that day and we were close to making it back to khon kaen but we missed the last bus there by an hour. so we had to spend the night in a town which i cant for the life of me remember the name. the first bus to Khon Kaen in the morning was at 5 so we ended up going to a cheap hotel and sleeping for a short time before waking up at 4 and walking to the bus station. we left from that bus station and some hours later. we arrived in khon kaen. because we had left so early the day was still young. bill needed to get on the motor bike and take a trip north to see one of his friends before we left thailand completely. Chris ended up going back to the hotel and i had some errands to run in town if i was going to be ready to go on my own. i needed a watch that had an alarm and just some toher travel snacks. i ended up walking around for at least a couple hours trying to explain to street vendors that i wanted a watch with an alarm. i finally realized the easiest way to explain this was to say watch and then say "beep beep". they understood immidiately and were even able to show me how to set it. i stopped at the supermarket and got some simple crackers and snacks for our soon to be trip to bangkok. i went back to the apartment and Chris was there reading and from there we really didnt do much. The last few days in Khon kaen we simply visited interwater everyday, visited the annual student market on campus, walked around town, and went to a rotary meeing. Lek was basically our driver for the last few days we were there. she helped us whenever she could and took us out to eat alot. the student market is simply an annual convention that they have in this big building on KKU campus. students can get good deals on clothes, books, bags, computers, and anything else electronic. even though all of the things at the student sale were interesting/cool i didnt buy anything. Bill bought a pack so he could begin his backpacking again though. The last day we were in KHon kaen we spent the morning at interwater. Interwater not only specialized in water treatment but the also put in pools and so on. out in fron ton Interwater there is one of the pools and Lek let me swim in it for a little while. it wasnt heated but it felt amazing. When we finally left Khon kaen we were able to say our goodbyes to Lek but Chelumchai had left a few days earlier on business. we said our goodbyes and i promised Lek i would return one day to run in the Khon Kaen marathon. Not only does Lek work at interwater but once a year when the marathon happends she works with foreign runners to help get them registered. Back to our story. we Left inter water and headed down town to a rotary meeting that perfectly fit our schedule so that we could sit in on it then get on a bus to Bangkok. The rotary meeting was simple. consisting of a buffet and then sitting at a table with its few members and listening to a language we coulding understand. they asked Bill, Chris and I to stand up and simply speak about our experiences while we had been there and we had a translator to tell them what we were saying. the meeting went on for some time and we had to leave while it was still in session. we said our goodbyes and headed for the bus station which was just around the corner from where there meetings are held. we got to the bus station and got our tickets from there got directly on teh bus and took our 6 hours ride to Bangkok. when we got there we took a taxi to kaoson road which is the main place for tourists to stay. it has all the street bars and worthless t-shirts and just that fickle people think they need. the only stores that are worth anything on that street are the food vendors and the enlgish book stores. we stayed at the same place we had stayed at the last time we were in bangkok. we left our bags in the rooms and went to explore the street looking for one of my favorite food vendors. its a kind of pancake they cook in front of you and fruit on top of it and then add think condensed milk.... very good. especially with strawberry jelly. we couldnt find any but we decided we would come back to the street later. we went looking for dinner and found it at a small indian restuarant that was placed on the second floor of a suits made to fit in 18 hours. the food was amazing and was not very expensive. we left the small restuarant thanking the small family that owned itand from there Chris bought his bus ticket to the airport and went to sleep while Bill and i walked the main street again. after a while Bill went back to his room and i walked finally finding my pancake guy. I ended up eating 3. i banana and two strawberries. after that i explored the shops and by this time the road was begining to slow down so i went back to the rom to get some sleep. When i awoke Chris had already taken his bus to the airport. i felt bad that i had missed my opportunity to say goodbye but notheless what was done was done. Bill had gone to the airport and had said he would meet me in the lobby of the hotel at 10:30 so i spent my morning walking the streets examining the day shops and using the overpriced computers. i met bill in the lobby of my guest house at 10:30 and from there i went ahead and checked out. we left our bags in the lobby of the hotel simply because no one would mess with them. the hotel watches youth bags for a price but no one in that hotel would steal our stuff. we left to go explore the street and find some early luch. it was still early for kauson road to start back up but the vendors were out early trying to sell all the things you dont need to you. we ended up stopping for lunch at a little side vendor that looked like a shack with some cinderblocks as a stove and a few cement tables and chairs. the food was very good although the vendor itself looked a little out there. we walked around for a short time untill Bill took me to a place where we could buy a bus ticket to the airport. we got our tickets and from there we basically had 4 hours untill our bus would get there. we split up to explore the street by ourselves. i ended up just exploringthe shops trying to find some stuff that wsant completely overprices or worthless. i ended up just getting some country flag patches and a cheap cheap pair of knock off ray ban sun glasses. i went back to where we had bought our ticket and the i used their internet to update the blog and checked the email. i sat around for the longes tine before going out one last time to check the book store and go get a drink from 7/11. the book store held nothign that i thought i would be interested in and 7/11 consisted of a water. i went back to the building for the last time and simply wrote untill a man came and picked us up in the minibus to the airport.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
better late than never
im sure all of you are on the edge of your seat waiting for me to put up another update. it ahs been over a week to my count and during that week in a broad description, I have travelled to laos and back, layed in a hammock for at least 10 hours, traveled the length of thailand, and numerous other random things that made my overall trip fantastical. since i havent told the laos trip i will go ahead and start with we woke up the morning of and i began to wash some clothes so that i would have some extra clean one when i get back. after i was done with that i finished packing my bag and left to follow chris and bill who had started the walk down the road to the train station. it was a little nerve racking runiing after them only because they were a good distance down the road. i caught them and we continued our walk to a main road when we would get a truck/bus into town and from there walk to the train station. we got to the bus station and bought our tickets sitting in the outdoor staion waiting for our train to arrive. It ended up arriving 40 minutes late. the train was very cramped and no seats were availible when we got on. i sat on the steps next to the entrance door to the traina nd read the rough guide to china which bill had bgiven me to help plan the second half of my trip. the ride would take us a few hours to a town that bordered laos. when we got of the train we immidiately walked to teh border checkpoint and crossed into laos. upon arriving we got our visas and took a bus into the border town of vientiane in laos. the town itself is a very quiet comfortable place the has a very simple offereing to the many tourists who use it as a midway going deeper into the country. we got off the bus and began walking into the town with Bill in the lead. he had been to vientiane before so he lead us to where we could get a guest house. the first two we tried were a little pricy and from there we moved two streets over and found the cheapest room possible. the room cost $5 and since chris and i split it for a double it was all of about $2.50 for us to stay there. we left our things in the room and left out in search of some foodwe managed to find a small indian restuarant and got some pretty good eats. the meal in comparison to the price of the room was much more expensive. after dinner we stopped at a little side shop and bought some fruit shakes that were blended up on the spot. i ended up consuming two large shakes and from there waddled back to the guest house. When i got back to the room i simply laid in my bed writing in my journal and listening to my ipod. chris and Bill left the guest house to explore the city since it was still rather early and the simple guest hosue offered no amusement whatsoever. i stayed in the guesthouse and sinply did the same things until they had returned. our plan from this town was to take the earliest bus possible to some of the more southern islands in laos and from there try and attept to see the rare mekhong river dolphi. i dont know if i spelled mekhong right but i know that when chris and bill returned they had changed our plans to catch a late night bus out tomorrow and explore the town the rest of the day. after Chris, Bill, and I had discussed the next day plans for a short while it was time to turn in and get some rest. I remember waking up before Chris and not wanting to make too much noise and wake him. i rolled over and was able to go back to sleep for a short while before waking up and going to get a shower. Chris was up by this time and after we had gotten ourselves washed and ready we set out to explore the city with Bill. on the Laos money there is a giant temple which is of great size. the building is located just outside the city and when we left the guesthouse we immidiately started walking for it. the journey to the building was probably a little less than an hour but definitely well worh it. the bulding was foursided and at each corner there were large spires standing high. in the center of the large square was the larges spire which stopd much higher than all the rest. the structure was panted in a magnificent bright gold color than shined brightly in the 100 degree weather. normally you can go inside the outer wal of the structure but we had arrived too early. we walked around the large external wall and explored a small temple with some young monks walking around. the small temple was help up by simple pillars but the roof and the one wall it had were painted with bright and sharp mural type images that showed budha doing many different activities. by the time we left the small temple the large structure was open to the public. we paid the entrance fee and explored inside the walls of the structure. you could walk up onto a second level of the structure and after removing our shoes we did so. we left the large structure and walked through the tourist market stopping only get a cold drink. with nothing else to see we walked the long walk back to the main part of town and stopped at our favorite street vendor who sold us the shakes. pinaple wasvery good in the hot veater and after consuming two more {which cost only 50 cents a piece} we walked two blocks to a museum. the museum was simpole, holding many different artifacts throughout many ages. the most interesting being the war areas. tthe museum was very small and after exiting we went back to our guest house to rest. we got to the guest house and told them we needed sleeper bus tickets to paksi which would be ibky a transit point to the island of don khong. in a guide book we had read , it sai dyou could take a boat from paksi down the river to don khong. the guest hosue supplied us our tickets and we still ahd a couple hours to kill before a minibus came and picked us up to go to the sleeper bed bus that would take us to paksi. we left our things in the lobby of our guest house and walked to a nearby market to buy whatever food supplies we would need on the bus. we returned back to the house dropped our granola bars and headed out in search of a last meal before geting on the bus. after dinner we waited another hour at the guest house and were picked up by a what was called a minibus but was simply a truck with seats in the bed and a cover to keep rain off of us. the drive to the bus station was short, Chris and Bill sat up at teh front of the bus and i was crammedinto the back along with the other 10 backpackers plus their bags. upon arriving at the bus station we suffered little confusion before entering our sleeper bus. the beds were not large but not too small and when we bought our tivkets we were under the impresion that each bed was assigned to one person..........that wasnt the case. Chris and Bill ended up sharing a top bunk very close to me and I........ well i got stuck in the fame bunk with an overweight chinese guy. yeah i know go ahead and laugh it up get it out of your system. I took flack from Chris and Bill the whole 40 minutes before the bus started even moving. the bus trip from vientiane is an 11 hr trip which is why we took the sleeper. the guy who i was sharing a bunk with took the inside of the bed facing the aisle and i was left with te spce between him and the window. for the first part of the trip i watched james bond on the bus tvs. and then when all the lights were out and i was forced to try to sleep I pushed myself as close to that glass as mny body would allow and sat for what seemed like hours. i know i did not get much more than 5 hrs sleep because i listened to my ipod for way to long trying to sleep. but darkness finally reached my senses and when i awoke it was light shining into the window i had been pressed so close to and people were filing out of the bus. we got out of the bus and walked a short distance trying to stay as far away from the hustlers trying to sell you and over priced ride into town. we walked a short way and found a fair price tuktuk and from there told the man we wanted to to go the boat dock for the boat to don khong. after much confusion and two translators we found out that the boat to our original destination was no more. so we walked walked away from the hustlers who were now trying to sell overpriced boat rides on friends boats to don khong. we walked a short distance when a small travelers agency caught our eye and they were offering a good price bus and boat to an island called don det which was close to don khong but smaller and "more scenic". the small island was also connected to a larger island called don khone. so we payed the company and took our vip mniibus to a small river village. the bus trip to the viallge was no more than 3 hours and after stepping off the bus we immidiately stepped onto a boat and crossed to don det. we stepped on the boat to the island of don det and took a seat at a open air cafe type place tourists would stop at. the island had no paved roads, no air conditioning, no cars, and pretty much had no lighting to speak of either. all in all it was a pretty majextic paradise. we walked from the dock of don det to the botoom of the island where it was connected to don khone. don khone was much larger than don det and after paying the island entry fee...? we were able to find two small rooms that would suit us for the two nights we spent there. the rooms had no lights, no door handles, and the bathroom door looked more like a shower curtain. nothing that would really cause us any problems but would have been nice to have i suppose. what our riverside hovels did have however. the porch to our shacks was out over the edge of the water and on the porch were two of the most comfortable hammocks ever. alright i will let you guys dream on that for a little while but i am going to make my alst exploration of bangkok in the two hours i have before my bus leaves for the airport. i hope everyone who reads is doing well and had a fun fourth of july.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
full laos accounts
i must say that i am sorry it has been a few days since i put up a post. We took a few day trip to Laos and upon returning i was more exhausted than i had been this entire trip. since the long delay of post has happend i am having trouble remembering all the full details of the start of the journey so i will edit this post later when i have my journal in front of me and can give a true update. i will begin it later tonight which will be morning for you all and you should be able to enjoy it by tomorrow.
Friday, July 4, 2008
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