Laos-Thai Border

June 21

8:17am Laos time
Summer Solstice

I think Zara and I slept from 11:30pm all the way through 4:30am. Pretty good night! In the morning when we woke up it was definitely cooler. Even with all the windows (autocorrected to dimwits?) and doors boarded up.

I woke up at 4:25am to Laura saying, "oh, I hear a zipper!" It was Zara and then we were all awake. I don't think Laura slept very much. She said she thinks she overheated in the middle of the night as well. We laid there for maybe 10 minutes listening to the roosters and then we got up.

We gathered our stuff and walked out of the house. Matt had warned us to have torches because it would be pitch black and none of us really believed him. Well, it was pretty much pitch black haha.

We made out way down the hill and due to the rain, it became a pretty hazardous adventure. Both Laura and Zara fell on their butts at one point. We weren't even sure we were going down the correct way but then we saw other head lamps following us so we continued down. Just go down haha. So we finally came out to the point where we entered and it was good. Aside from needing to descend the baby rock and dirt mountain. It didn't seem as bad or as long in the dark haha. At the bottom Zara took a photo of me with my hand in the air with the hill and village in the back. We came, we saw, we conquered!

Back to the boat! Everyone was on time and we left. Most people are sleeping. We had fried eggs and bread for breakfast.

One thing I have noticed is that in England they apparently don't have Mosquitos. Well, "mossies" as they call them. They all spray bug spray in the room and when there is wind and in places that if I would have sprayed it with my parents I would have gotten my ass kicked. I am constantly sneezing because the smell is drifting back and up my nose.

I'm hoping I will catch up on my blog today. I don't know if I will though. That's a long time to sit and type. Not that there will be that much else to do because I think most people will probably sleep most of the day.

Next day Thai time (same as Laos time)

Well, I didn't catch up on my blog. I did however sleep for 3 or 4 hours on the boat. I felt so drowsy and not in control of my sleepiness that the thought of cyanide poisoning kicking in ran through my mind. Fortunately, I woke up.

The boat ride was pretty uneventful. We left at 5am and arrived around 4:30pm.

Although the boat ride was pretty uneventful, the docking experience was probably the most eventful thing we saw that day. We pulled up to the river side... which you pretty much couldn't see because there were already so many boats crammed into the space. Then, the family on the boat began to push boats on either side of us apart. The man pressed the gas and we literally were squeezing in between 2 other boats. But that also meant all the other boats on either side of that boat had to move over as well. It was crazy. The boat was grazing the sides of the boats on both sides. There weren't even horns this time to warn we were coming! Asia! Make up your mind! There were wooden poles on all the boats that maybe served as bumpers? But we knocked 1 completely off one of the boats next to us. It looked like a stressful job.

We finally "docked" and were able to get off. Of course, since we're on the Mekong, there a ridiculous hill/small mountain we had to climb with all our baggage. We actually got out at a part that was on grass and weeds and we had to walk over to the staircase. I was a mess haha. My water bottle had wrapped around the back of me and while walking the top came off and I bent down to pick it up again but with all my bags on it took me a bit to figure out how to stand up again. So that was fun.

We then had to load all our bags into a Tsung Tao and ride for 10 minutes maybe to the immigration point for Laos. Weight to exchange our kip and get out stamps as well as hand in our departure card. We had to pay 10,000 kip or $1 for processing.

After that we walked down a hill and got into a long motor boat to go cross the Mekong and head to the Thai border. Once we were there we filled out our arrival card and got stamps into the country. The man stamped over my UK stamp that you can barely see and even the UK thought I had been in the country illegally. I was kinda annoyed but then Matt made a comment about how it will save space in my passport which I guess is very true.

We then got in another Tsung Tao (which I don't think is still called that since we were now in Thailand) and headed to our hotel. Our bags just rested on the floor of the open back part. Not strapped in it anything.

Throughout this whole process we had to take our bags off and put them back on so many times. It was stupid. It takes so much energy to situate all my other bags and then get my big bag on. Oh my Buddha! I was over that. It also felt like my bag grew a baby and was heavier than normal but I couldn't figure out why. I realized I had bought water at the hotel in luang Prabang because it was so cheap. So really I had a water baby.

I think I may have forgotten to mention that in Laos they drive on the right side of the road as well. And that the village we stayed in had no cars or motorbikes. I also think Home said they believe in animism at the village we were in but like I said, he was really difficult to understand.

When we got to the hotel we had 2 hours and we went straight to the swimming pool. It was so nice to feel the grime and sweat from the past 2 days just wash off. Taking a shower was even better. Feeling clean is so nice!

A lot of the people in the village went to the river to bathe. The Mekong is pretty gross. It is full of trash and the water is very brown. I don't think it is as gross as the Ganges but it was up there. Even Home bathed in it.

I had asked Matt if there was a significance to the color orange for the monks and he said no. That is just the popular color in China. But, there is a significance to the way the robes are worn. One shoulder is Theravada Buddhism and 2 shoulders is Mahayana. The Theravada is the older one they practice in China, Nepal and India.

After swimming we met for dinner. Melissa stayed in the room. We got to ride in the back of a pick up truck to dinner. For most people that was their first time and they loved it. It's definitely fun. And would absolutely never be allowed at home.

For dinner I had a coconut milk curry with chicken and rice. It was really good. I also split spring rolls with Kat and again those were very good. We're back to fried spring rolls which I think I like better than the leafy green ones in Vietnam.

There was a guy playing guitar and singing there and Matt convinced Cara to do the same for us. She didn't want to but she was amazing. She sang and played Adele's "Make You Feel My Love". Her voice is beautiful and as we all know Adele is pretty hard to perform well.

We all stopped at the 7eleven on the way back to get some snacks and breakfast (not included at this hotel or in Chiang Mai) and exchange money.

When I got back to the Melissa was asleep. I felt bad because I didn't know she was going to sleep (it was 9:30pm) and I had to get in my bag and do a bunch of stuff. I don't think I woke her up but I'm not totally sure. She did end up waking up around 11:30pm to ask what time we were meeting in the morning. I had a really difficult time sleeping actually. I think I was awake until at least 1am. I think it's because we did nothing all day.

We have also figured out that Robyn, Courtney, Cara, and Sarah all have sort of bed bug bites. So that really sucks. I'm pretty glad it wasn't me though...

On to Chiang Mai tomorrow! I'm hoping I will be able to see Chrissy if she is still there but I don't know for sure.