thelongmosey

We arrived the next day in Hanoi, where we would then get a bus up to Ha Giang the next day or the day after that. We booked another shitty room in the Old Town, and had a little look around but nothing to detailed, we knew we’d be back. We instead readied ourself for Ha Giang and booked our bus, another shit show, this time with twin hobbit seats, but with screened windows. Still. It got us there. Ha Giang is a little city in the North of Vietnam. Ha Giang Province borders China. It was here we had decided to hire a motor bike and do a day loop. We didn’t see much of Ha giang, it actually seemed to stretch quite a ways beyond the two streets we experienced of it as we got off at the bus station, found a hotel across the road, and the place where we hired the bikes from was 200 metres away. QT motorbikes I would highly recommend. The guys took us through a map and told us where we should stay, some we did, some we didn’t but it was nice to have an idea. We went the night before, and sorted everything out. I test drove a bike (the guy was amazed that someone could actually start it, I dread to think of who normally hires these things) and then we would head back the next morning.

Admittedly they were a bit slow as the chap in the office had an issue with a bike on rent he had to resolve, and they didn’t actually give me the same bike as I had ridden the day before (clutch was sticky on this second one) but I thought hey ho and we carried on. The first stretch was to Quan Ba. The ride there was ace, if a little wet at one point. Windy roads, mountain passes. The gears were pissing me off a little but no worries. The views are stunning, particularly when you hit the crest of a mountain. Conny is it transpires a bit scared of going above 60Km/h which does lead to a somewhat less exciting trip but still awesome none the less. That said, she does have cause for worry, given that anyone driving a van or a truck basically thinks that no matter what part or how much of the road they are taking up, so long as they sound their horn, their job is done, it is for you to get out of their way. On one such moment I was actually off the road and Conny was a couple of inches off losing a leg to a truck…but it’s ok, he honked, so he was absolved of any blame had a limb been removed. We arrived at the town of our first nights stop. On the corner in the centre of town is a little place that serves proper coffee and some decent food, so we ate dinner and breakfast there before heading on.

Day two would see us drive up to the very tip of the country and a town called Dong Van. The ride up was equally as spectacular, and again a bit wet…actually, quite wet, but it didn’t matter. The further you get into the mountains the better it gets. The mountains, and the agriculture in them is immense. The hillsides are carved into full scale contour lines of an OS map. The roads wind up into the pine forests and the air changes to that most wonderful scent. At one point we had to stop and queue where the road had slipped away and there were folk just rebuilding it, but rebuild it they did and we were able to mosey on.

We arrived at Dong Van and booked in to a hostel, not the one they recommended but instead the one next door. We headed out and went for dinner. En route, we did see a cooked dog’s head on a table, with the cooked and butchered dog laid out behind it in pieces, which was to say the least a shock, but really, they eat dog here so I shouldn’t be too surprised, plus what makes a cow less worthy of our sympathy than a dog or a horse, personally I see little difference.

The restaurant (the Green Karst) however was excellent. They genuinely understood vegetarian, they had excellent meaty options however for those not of the vege styles, they even asked what music we would like. Better still, the owners take time to teach local kids English for free. I always find it good to try and support such folk so it was nice to do that and have delicious belly-fulls to boot. We ate there again the next morning, their breakfast menu is a winner, I was even given some fruit, that I can’t for the life of me remember what it is, but is the greatest fruit in the entire history of great fruit. Then we headed toward the North Pole. No, not that one, but at the tip of Ha Giang province is a flag pole atop a hill that looks out to China. We climbed it and looked to China. I spoke to a local chap. He was a Mong, the local village were Lolo. These are two very different ethnicities who do not integrate. He was telling me how his village is small and they are only Mong but the next village is also Lolo, this means for him the dating pool is low. He asked me my age and I told him 36, he asked Conny’s, I told him 29, he looked relieved. He checked that she was my girlfriend and when I said yes he told me he is 21, and that his girlfriend is 14. I honestly had no idea what to say.

We headed down the road and onwards towards our next destination Du, but first we had to negotiate the town of Mia Xu. Upon trying to do so, our bike finally gave in. Lucky it was in town to be fair, but full credit to QT bikes, I found a garage and handed the mechanic who spoke no English the card of QT and they organised that he fix the bike, and QT pay me the money back at the end. 45 minutes and a couple of local tea later we were back on the road and the bike was ace. More importantly this stage of the road was the single most epic and breathtaking part of Asia to date. The road at times windy, at times opening up, along the ridges of the mountain or down the windy roads the scenery always astonishing. The karskes climbing out in epic lush green and granite, with the afternoon sun shading it perfectly, on occasion clouds creeping through, other times clear and bright, whether we were snaking through or slinking along a straight road alongside the were nothing short of mesmerising. If there is one thing every visitor to Vietnam should do, it’s this trip. Before reaching the village we headed to for the next night, we came across another village, and at said village, a Spaniard. Somehow, in seeing that the road was covered in a thick layer of washed in clay, I’d guess a foot deep in parts, save for the two tracks of vehicles’ left and right tyres to the one side, this Spaniard had opted to drive over/through the clay, and not the tracks. What a numpty! Me being me however I couldn’t just leave him there. So we both set about hauling the clay-mud-stuck scooter he was riding out of the bog, our own feet sinking in as we did, but with a couple of goes we got it free and headed our merry ways. We got to our hostel QT homestay, where we met Marc, an exuberantly moustachioed German lad, doing our trip effectively in reverse. We had some good chat, I like the cut of his jib. He was also a vegetarian which made it easier for the cooks at the homestay as we three were the only guests. Boy did they feed us. Masses of delicious food, even I couldn’t polish it off. The most amazing platter of spring rolls, morning glory, tofu with tomato sauce and rice. The homestay itself was a big hall and sleeping quarters were a curtained off area with a bug net in each. The toilet was outside and I really had to go as a storm raged, but apart from that I really couldn’t fault the place. Breakfast was a plate each piled high of pancakes, and I don’t mean shitty American ones, I mean proper English ones, or crepes as the French would call them, with honey and lime. Dee-fucking-licious. We headed off in tandem to the point where our paths separated, and we turned left on to a fantastic road. Barely paved, but a big long straight, flanked either side with thick, tall maize fields and little villages. It turned out that the villages were all in their Sunday best. Formally dressed and gathered at the rally point in the village, not sure if it was a wedding, church, market or sacrifice…there were animals, people and joy in the air, but we didn’t see much further. One of the true joys about driving through the countryside was seeing the locals go about their business. They were often remarkably dressed. Brightly coloured and patterened skirts or dress, some with head scarves, some bare headed. Overwhelmingly handsome folk, most importantly the joy for them to see us foolish folk bounding about on our bikes was evident by their shouts and hellos with wide grin! There were even high fives…one kid crossed just in front of me to high five on my right hand…which got awkward when I nearly killed him then had to release my throttle…not ideal, but fun all the same. After the maize fields, the road took a little turn as we headed once more over some mountains. When I say road, that is most definitely a loose term. There was some definite scrambling involved, to the point Conny rathered walk. She got scared if I slightly overcooked it on the throttle and popped a little wheely. I was having a blast. If I am honest, I think the road had only recently come apart in landslips, at times it was much more like riding a bike up a slow waterfall than a road but it was great, Conny never had to walk far in one go, not that she had to walk, I am fully capable! But the road only gave out for short stretches before being paved once more. Another thing to note is not to go anywhere too fast if you can’t see the road ahead, between potholes, complete removal of road surface, piles of grit, rubble or sand, and straight up cement barriers leaping out to surprise you, it is certainly advisable to take it steady, that said there are enough long straight roads to open up a little. The worst part of our final day was my horn giving in. The horn is the most essential piece of kit when driving anywhere in Asia. Every corner must be preceded by a series of toots just to let someone know not to kill you, the same can be said for any over taking move, be it a rider at the side of the road, a buffalo, or a bus struggling up a hill. Unless you toot, death is almost certain. So, being tootless, we were resigned to Conny vocally tooting in lieu of the horn. Not ideal, but we did indeed survive! Back to the road itself though, the views were excellent once more, today had become a little cooler, and the mists were again creeping over the mountain as we rode. We took the odd detour and climbed along the ridgeline of one mountain, literally cliffs falling away each side as the cool breeze hit us. WHERE DID THAT ROAD TAKE US? We got back to the village with the awesome coffee, knowing that it was only 2-3 hours from home and sat to enjoy their delights once more. Before heading back as the sun came out along the home stretch.

The few words I have written here really do not do this ride justice. It is truly a spectacular. A once in a lifetime. A marvel at every second. The landscape everchanging and beguiling from one moment to the next creating feasts for the eyes like beautiful arts on canvas and snapshots in my head that will last a lifetime in memory.

Handing back our trusty (save for the gears and the horn) steed back was somewhat of a wrench, but every second was a joy.

We stayed one more night in Ha Giang before heading to Hanoi.

Here we stayed with an old friend from back home, who lives in Hanoi as an English teacher. We were introduced to the joys of Cards Against Humanity and had a few wanders around the city, including the museum…which if I am honest is an absolute cluterfuck of nonsense. Never have I been in a museum and been so overwhelmed by so much nothing as to leave so underwhelmed. Now if that sentence was as hard to follow as it was to write, let me extrapolate. The museum is full of stuff. Almost none of it with any sort of coherence. Especially for an English speaker. I don’t necessarily think that a museum ought to make concession for the Anglophone, however, this kind of did and kind of didn’t. It had a half arsed translation of a handful of the information, which makes one wonder what the fuck one is actually looking at. Add to that the complete lack of flow and the pure shabbiness of some of the exhibits (some looked marvellous however) then the result is positively negative. Overwhemingly underwhelming and at once underwhelmingly overwhelming. It’s quite the feat to be honest. Usually if I go into a museum I have an intent to learn something but there was entirely nothing to be gleaned from this cube so to speak. Even the shonkiest museum in Vientiane had some educational merit, I left understanding timelines and about the influence of communism and the USSR on Laos, plus got to see some of the real life behind the history, which serves to bring it home just how recent the turmoil in this corner of the world was, whereas I had none of that here.

We met with Barry once more, for this week was Conny’s birthday week. He was no longer with Silvia, as indeed, that too had passed. We had decided to head out to Cat Ba, an island in Ha Long bay. We left some luggage at my friend’s house and borded the early morning train to Hai Phong where we picked up a scooter from Hai Phong Motorbike for Rent (he is only on face book, you won’t find him on tripadvisor, but he is really helpful, speaks great English as he also translates for a living, and his prices are super cheap a weeks rental costs between 15 and 18 dollars) and we headed out of town on a 15km stretch of death road to the port. Flanked by masses of traffic from the swarms of scooters some unconscionably heavily laiden, but also cars a plenty and the worse, giant trucks with scant regard for the mere annoyance that is a Westerner on a bike. They would roar past with scant regard for our space or indeed lives. Barry, almost as oblivious to the perils as the Vietnamese lorry drivers themselves, was almost taken out as he crossed an intersection, without looking (although the right was his) and a truck had decided to turn at the same intersection. In his attempts to not die by that truck, Barry oblivious once more swerved right, only at this point I was shitting myself behind, because I had seen that there was another oblivious truck driver entering the road at pace from his right. Somehow Barry last second managed to snake through nonchalantly like nothing had happened. To get to Cat Ba we would have to travel on to another island, by ferry, not exactly luxurious but fun all the same. The locals, as they have throughout Vietnam, pointed and laughed in aghast and awe at my beard. One guy even thrust his baby into my arms to take a photo of it and me, beard et al. It was very odd to say the least.

Another island and another ferry later we ended up on Cat Ba island, the North no less, with Cat Ba town being to the South. It’s not a long ride to the South however, and the whole island is definitely a rough and ready sort of place, if I was honest, I wasn’t really that impressed. That said we headed to wards town for a bite to eat then decided that given the fact it was really busy and loud, we’d head out a bit for our hotel. We stopped at a nice looking, clean, recently redone place for the night. Whoopsy. The morning came but not before the bed bugs. Lucky, it transpires that the bugs did not dig my vegetarian zero alcohol blood. Conny and Barry not so lucky, Barry in particular got destroyed. Needless to say we did not stay another night. We headed a little further out to the sweet potato. Initially only for breakfast and a drink, but then the heavens opened and we noticed that people were staying there. Turned out they had a room for at least the next couple of nights, and I have to say that I was thoroughly impressed. Breakfast was great, the room was clean, large, had AC and wifi and we got chatting to some other fine folk there. We even had fun during the storm driven power cuts. The only fault was that when the weekend came it was booked. We headed down to the Mountain View knowing that we had reserved a room given we had warning that we were to be turfed out of the Sweet Potato. It’s only a 100 metres down the road, so it was no real hassle. When we arrived, we were greeted(loose term) by a chap with zero English, but a defensive expression. He then handed me the phone and the chap we had made our reservation with a day or two before told us he’d be there in ten. He came all nervous and told us there had been a mistake. Despite our booking, and deposit that the room had been double booked and he was desperately sorry. If I am honest, I saw him note our room on the plan and that he had taken a deposit so I had no quarrel with him, I just think he was the scapegoat for a careless owner. We said no worries, asked if a dorm was available, which it was, and he even gave one of us the bed for free as a gesture. More than enough for us, after all mistakes happen. The relief spread across his face as he grinned and said “Oh I was so scared that you were going to be real angry!” to which we told him that would be pointless and that indeed we have all been there, mistakes are not a mythical boogey man, but a very real part of life…or something to that effect, only perhaps less convoluted. My only gripe with this place was that the breakfast was somewhat pitiful, albeit included in the room price. However coming from the Sweet Potato with their excellent breakfast that was also included, this was mightily inferior. It did however have a mountain top pool which came as a redeemer. It’s surrounds were still under construction at the time we were there but it was indeed a welcome dip in the heat and the view is something of a rarity from a pool.

It was at the Mountain View that they also let us stream the Lions vs All Blacks rugby match on their big screen. We had been into Cat Ba town looking for bars to show it, when we bumped into a bearded Englishman and his Welsh girlfriend, who suggested we try a sports bar around the corner, when that turned out to be a dud, we told them that they would be welcome at our hotel where we could stream it. They did indeed join. We had a nice chat, they had ridden around Ha Giang like Conny and I had done, and Barry was going to. They and Barry drank eight or so beers between them, when the girl was peckish and couldn’t find some crisps, I fetched her my packet from the dorm, which she ate half of and left them on the table. If it weren’t for what happened next I would have said it was a pleasure to meet them and that they were thoroughly decent folk. Only it turns out they are proper YTC prickfaces. When it came to check out on the bill, we were faced with the bill of all their beers, which if I am honest, was a small amount, but at the same time a bit much. As much as we live the life of riley, Conny and I are indeed homeless and unemployed, and they knew this. We have to watch our budget, and I don’t even drink. To be fair I would never really mind paying a beer for someone, especially if company is sound. My problem is that it’s such a shitty thing to do to just fuck off without settling your tab. The choice to pay a beer for someone is not for them to decide, but for me. Really, I now only think back on that afternoon and see a pair of rude pricks. They probably feel chuffed that they got one over on us and avoided their couple of dollars for the beers, and that we suckers got stiffed. Which is sad, I like to save a buck or two, but decency tends to prevail, and it is invariably not at someone else’s expense, regardless of whether or not I have deemed it that “they can afford it”. Worse still, we went out of our way to find them, tell them the bar wasn’t showing that game, and that they could come to ours, and they still chose the cunty option.

Enough of that. Cat Ba town, is a bit rough. I have to admit I wasn’t too enamoured originally, the night turns neon and the Vietnamese and Chinese come out in force, flooding the streets and the garbage that invariably comes with it. That said, it grows on you. There are ways to avoid the shenanigans to a large extent. The first was Yummy 2 restaurant. Much like the Yummy in Phong Na (entirely unrelated as far as I am aware) we went and ate lemongrass and chilli tofu. Very different to Yummy in Phong Na but equally as delicious. It is called Yummy 2, not because there is a Yummy in Phong Na, but because Yummy 1 is actually by the market in Cat Ba. Yummy 2 is a bit more spacious and set back from town making it a bit quieter. The food is the same but we ate many nights at Yummy 2 and it was delicious and welcoming each time. I had a Coconut Ice cream Blueberry shake each time…it was a mindblowing delight. The onion rings starter was ginormous and delightful, so much so that serendipity had seen fit for, at the exact moment I was regretting having not ordered them, our neighbouring table of Swiss folk had ordered them as a side, as such could not fit them in their bellies, and kindly offered them to me to help put them away…of course I obliged. Next on the list of food awesomeness is the Vietnameses Soul Food restaurant. The food there is cooked and served with love by one enigmatic lady by the name of Mrs Blue. The food came out slow, as everything was cooked from scratch, as mentioned, with love, and it was fully worth it. Some of the best food I had in Vietnam, and Vietnam has good food. The third and final place that needs a mention is My Way cafe. This is for when you need a cheese fix. The have western delights such as garlic bread with cheese, grilled cheese sandwich, cheese pizza and chips with cheese. I think you get the point. They do have plenty of other stuff, including a coffee machine, and Italian style coffee if memory serves, but it really was the cheese that got me. I sampled all the above dishes in two sittings and left clutching a surprisingly satisfying giant food baby belly.

By far the most amazing thing to do on Cat Ba was what we had selected for Conny’s birthday. We took a boat into the bay, to snake amongst the Karsts and do a bit of swimming, jumping kayaking and such. We opted for Cat Ba Ventures. Their office is on the main strip by the market, and their price is a little higher than some of the others but they specifically choose a route that avoids all the other clusters of boats and their paths into the main bay. It was definitely the good otion, the other boats can be one amongst hundreds, but we didn’t see a singly other boat until we had finished our afternoon kayak and that boat was coming in to pick up the kayaks we had just left. The day started with a tour out, we passed a floating village and we went around a fish farm, where they have a pet giant grouper, he is quite the beast, and plentiful Kobe, big powerful looking fish that are quite delectable apparently, among others.

Then we got back on board and headed amongst the huge columns poking out of the water, thousands of little islands as far as you can see. The water was much clearer than we expected, all along Cat Ba on the ferry rides there is nought but murky mucky red stuff, but this was clear and clean. We jumped of the boat, and headed towards a beach for an explore before swimming back. It was here that I decided I would go for a dive of the top deck, a good twenty feet. Forgetting, nay, choosing not to accept, that I am a fat thirty six year old and not a twenty something or teenager with any semblance of physical prowess, I opted for a dive. I had the foresight to declare that I knew it would end badly. It definitely ended. Badly depends on your point of view. Even I found the ensuing belly flop hilariously spectacular. I only wish that I had seen it from an outside perspective…and of course that it didn’t sting quite as much. Then to the back of the boat, here I opted for the somersault, again neglecting the fact that my trampolinist days are long gone, I entirely forgot the tuck and whip required to complete such a move. I, essentially entered the water as if II were taking one of those planking selfies of yesteryear, only I had forgot the camera. I broke the water with the entirity of my back in one single, large and maginficent moment. Yet again, I am happy to say that I was in no doubt beforehand that it would go horribly wrong, and even proclaimed such quite audibly. I just wished that for once I could have been wrong…and that it didn’t sting so much. But alas, sting it did, right I was. But hey, at least my front and back were matching in their pinkness, I will call it my Bodily Ode to the Pink Symmetry, and be happy with that.

Lunch on the boat was a veritable feast, everyone got more than enough delectable goodness. Then we headed for some more sailing and to the Kayaks. As is custom when Conny and I got into a Kayak, we realised that Conny is indeed incapable of paddling straight or in any sensible time, so tensions were fraught from the off but no more than usual. The situation was not helped by the fact that the paddles were odd, straight bladed affairs with no offset for the twist of a paddle strok, plus ours had the tiniest blades ever, everybody else had the same straight blades, but the blades themselves were twice the size of ours, it was like paddling with lollipops, that said, the kayaking was great. Round islands, and through caves. One cave ominously had a no-entry sign/danger sign, and our guide took us in. Conny and I took the rear guard, and having noticed he sounds of a clusterfuck of talentless paddlers in front of us in the pitch dark, we decided to hang back. What we hadn’t noticed, given the darkness, that the current had taken our back end away from us. A fact which swiftly dawned upon us a the back of the boat got wedged between the ceiling of the cave and the water, which in turn sent the front of our boat pivoting towards the same wall. The result was that I had to have a full on fight with a wet, dirty jagged wall from a crouched canoeing position while Conny held my paddle and avoided having her head taken off by the roof of the cave. Needles to say in the fight between David and the immovable object, the beast that I am came through and I smote that prick of a cave. We got out and as the light hit us it became apparent that I was more than a bit dirty, but still, victory was mine.

A bit more swimming and diving followed. Conny even learned to dive off the boat. She even enjoyed it so much that she carried on even when Barry and I stopped and called it a day. That lasted exactly one dive. She scorpioned and has been suffering since! Still, it hasn’t got the beating of her.

I have to say it was a truly great day out, the guides were excellent, fun and even wanted all criticism, negative and positive to help them better improve their service, which is actually something I was quite pleased to hear, although I had no negative criticism to offer, beyond a better paddle perhaps, although I could have just asked for that! Most importantly Conny had a great day to bring her into her dirty thirties, and she was pleased as punch, saying that it was the best she could have hoped for and that it couldn’t have been more perfect. Mission accomplished.

Our other time was spent on the island moseying, drinking, eating. We went for a “gentle walk” up a hill in the national park. I was sweating through my pupils by the time we summitted, having walked near verticle stairs and scrambled up rocks, thinking the track was a loop with a much easier descent. There was no loop however, the down scramble was just as taxing. The joy of the breeze at the pagoda on the top or when on occasion it made its way to us on the hillsides was immense and a feeling to be savoured. But still, we got some exercise, not sure I’d do it all again though!

We left Cat Ba the way we came, and ran the gauntlet back to Hai Phong and further on to Hanoi. Here we spent a few more days chilling with Barry, had some fantastic Indian food and enjoyed the evening scene of fresh beer, torrential rain, and random chat with a charming Welsh couple and a lovely young lady who believed in the Anounaki. From here we said our goodbye’s to Barry and headed to Siem Reap, this time we chose to Bigshot it and fly.

So, the bus ride to Vietnam was an odd one to say the least. The worst bus in the history of bad buses. A rickety old thing that had something somewhat akin to a seat/hobbit bed but it was ridiculously uncomfortable. There was no angle to make this thing comfortable. Worse still I was in the middle, with no side bars to my little cot type thing. The driver, I’m sure fully aware of this, was hooning around like nobody’s business and I was sliding out with each hoon. The tone was set for the ride the second the engine started and we were afronted by What is Love by Haddaway, the dutch-techno-pop “classic, followed by several other tunes of that genre and followed quickly and equally as loudly by some more local horror from more techno to achey ballads, just when you thought you’d had enough, back to Haddaway and it all begins again. Furthermore, the aircon unit above me had been broken at the directional grate thingymajig and as such was blowing super cold air upon me incessently, and occasionally a little spurt of water just to shake things up. A few hours in we hit the Vietnamese border. An odd experience in itself with very little signage or guidance. We were simply ushered off the bus into a restaurant. We had some lunch, it was quite the chore for me to explain no meat, despite the fact that I had it written on my phone in Laotian and Vietnamese, due to the illiteracy of the local folk there. Again, no aspersions cast upon them though, it is definitely I the awkward picky dude who chooses not just to eat food. We eventually got to a point where egg and rice were ok, so we kept getting handed eggs on top of rice. The thing is, from what I can gather at least, is these restaurants don’t really work off a menu, they just keep putting food in front of you or on your table and you eat what you feel like. I think the price is basically a fixed one. So each time the ladies were clearing plates and they noticed omelette, they tried to give it to us. It was a few rounds in that we realised that the eggs were seasoned with pork fat, as Conny was handed one with a lump of gristle upon it. That marked the end of lunch. At this point we sat around for some sign of what we ought to do, keeping the drivers in sight, so as not to get left behind. It was only due to the kindness of some entirely non-english speaking locals and their concern that they gestured we ought to walk across the border to the Laotian office to get our exit stamp. We thank them eternally for their service! A long wait later we are given our passports back, we get on the bus, drive 50 metres and are told to dismount for the Vietnam office. Another wait later we head back on the bus from hell.

I had some time ago decided that the best option after the border would be to grab some shut eye. Well. Driver put pay to that. I had thought I could listen to some of my own music to drown out the din, which was a sensible idea until the driver put on some movies. There was a screen, hidden in a place that no one could see, but driver decided he would up the ante on the volume so all we could hear was the soundtrack of chats, choons and banging gunfire. I had no chance.

We arrived at Danang, both relieved and feeling like we had been through SAS torture training. We decided we would stop for the night somewhere near the bus station to save hassle the next day. Finding a place was not as easy as we had hoped and we settled for a seedy looking place down a seedy little street, but frankly it was the only thing available. A bit grotty, but fine for a night. Danang did have one thing. Fried rice. The best fried rice I have ever eaten. All the restaurants were looking very dubious for the vegetarian, so we decided to chance it with one of the smaller places along the street, where a guy just cooked in his wok to order. I practiced my best “An Chay” Vietnamese for vegetarian and we pointed at some vegetables and even a alocal chap who spoke some English described to the cook. What came out was a huge pile of awesome fried rice with vegatables and MSG that tasted immense. Not sure I mentioned this before (I know I did, but hey ho), but I am not as averse to MSG as many are, especially those who love food. The reason being I don’t buy the hype. Of course too much MSG is bad for you, but so is salt. In fact MSG is exactly that, a salt. So those who want to decry it as the horror food that will melt your brain and give you heart disease, firstly put down your salt, then secondly go and fuck yourselves. If you are then gonna bang on to me about it not being natural, it is a chemical process, much like salt, formed from natural ingredients (comes from a root vegetable), again much like salt…wait did I say this before…it is salt. Anyway, the reason it is so delicious and that it was developed in the first place is because it is an umami flavour which we all recognise as being utterly delicious. Well, once again, I digress. Back to the travels.

We also had doughnuts and a coffee in Danang before heading to Hoi An in the morning. Another shonky bus ride away but this time only an hour or so, with fully inflated westerner tariffs and led by a horribly rude man (the man justified his inflation of our tariff by pulling out a scrap of paper that was barely legible and was just some random shit map with scribbles and some prices on it that said 1 hour=costs a lot if you are white, or something to that effect. He then sat down and laughed as he showed a local how much money he had just taken off us, right next to me. Worse still was how he manhandled the women, moving them around by the scruff of the neck or a grab of the shoulder, even a woman who had to be in her seventies had her hat knocked off by the force of his grab. A proper prick) We arrived at Hoi An and got into a taxi, this was my birthday week and Conny had booked us in somewhere nice to hang around and relax. The Corner Riverside Villa was its name and it was wonderful. Situated just outside Hoi An a bit along the river, as the name suggests, there was a pool, breakfast and bikes included. The rooms were lovely and clean and the staff as helpful as can be. Hoi An is a great spot to relax. Another UNESCO heritage town it lives up to the others, and then some. A beautiful old french style colonial town, but full of Asian flare, beauty and colour. Better still the only motorised vehicles allowed in the old town during the day are scooters and such, but after 3pm no motorised vehicles whatsoever may go in. It is a beautiful place to just mosey around taking in the glowing lanterns at night, or visiting the many tailors there in the day. Conny and I had a couple of things made there and they really are worth it. Fitted to you, cheaper than an off the shelf version in Europe and all done to your own specs in two days. We went to Maya tailors on the recommendation of our hotel and we could not have been more pleased. If I’m honest if I wasn’t living out of a bag, I would have spent a fortune in there. Also it wouldn’t be correct if I didn’t make some comment on the food. For starters, are two vegetarian restaurants in Hoi An, both just outside the old town, both wonderful, although the larger of the two (Min Hien) did rely quite heavily on fake meat as opposed to vegetables. The other restaurant, my personal favourite but I can’t find it’s name anywhere, was a small menu, wasn’t set out as starters and mains etc, it was just about 8 things. It was utterly delectable and super cheap, plus I managed to get a savoury vegetarian Bo bun there that blew my socks off, even Conny said it was better than the meat version. There was also one other place in town that deserves a mention. It was a little cafe just near one of the old houses that serve as a visitor attraction. On the stoop is a lady selling lotus tea, which is fucking delicious, and inside they have a nice little menu that they can adapt to vegetarians that was super nice.

Hoi An was the perfect spot for a relaxed birthday week. Conny, at the hotel, booked me in for the single only manicure/pedicure of my then 35 years on the planet. It took some egging on from one of the other guests (a Latvian chap who was there with his Ukrainian girlfriend who were on holiday from their lives in Greenland where the chap served in the Danish Navy. An odd situation to be in, but they were thoroughly lovely folk and it saddens me that I don’t even know their names, so if you do stumble upon this, please do let us know so that I may correct it). We hung out by the pool with our new friends, wandered the streets and markets at night, ate cakes, drank coffees and to top it off we went on a boat/snorkelling/beach barbecue trip on my birthday which was perfect. The snorkelling lovely, the fish were amazing in their colours and clusters of life. As too were the coral gardens. The boat ride was pleasant and to cap it off the lunch at the beach was brilliant. As a vegetarian I even got extra special vege portions.

The only negative I would say is that as Westerners we were tricked into buying an entirely unnecessary ticket at the start of Hoi An. To be honest I thought it was a bit dubious. We were stopped by a lady who shepherded us to a booth selling a day pas to the town and it’s attractions. We asked if it was obligatory and they insisted it was, even when we asked what if we come everyday, they said this covers it. There was however no barrier nor booth and no way of controlling it but Conny said pay, so pay I did. I even heard them saying the same to some other tourists nearby. It was only later that we realised for sure though that it was a pure scam, and we didn’t even want to go to the attractions that were included in the price, and there is no way that the ticket is needed just to enter the town like they told us. SO, lessons learned, don’t listen to anyone.

I must admit that the hotel was a proper gem. Nothing super fancy, but absolutely perfect, I could not have wished for a better week swimming in the beautiful pool at night was a particular highlight.

When we left we organised our travel from Hoi An to Phong Na with our hotel and were picked up in a lovely tour bus which then put us on to another big bus to Phong Na. We arrived at Phong Na in the evening. One of the guys who had travelled from Danang actually worked in a hotel/restaurant there and he told us about a place, next door to the restaurant he worked in. It was brand new, and perhaps not even finished yet, but we got a solid, clean room with a nice bathroom for 10 $ a night, plus next door, the Yummy restaurant, where Su the chap from the bus worked, was exactly as you would expect from a place with such a name. I had the best lemongrass and chilli tofu there I have ever eaten. Every meal was delicious…this might become a theme in Vietnam, the food here is the best in Asia by some way especially for someone like me.

At Phong Na, we were joined by an old friend of ours from our days on the French Riviera. Barry, who had worked with myself and Conny many years ago and was one of our bestest friends, just so happened to be touring Vietnam on his motorbike. We were introduced to his ladypartner, Silvia, a Spaniard that Barry had met a year previously in the Philipines, and fallen in love with and got matching tattoos within a week(a line from 1001 nights about how things in life are fleeting, the good times and the bad “this too shall pass”). A lovely, free spirited and strong willed lady, much in the mould of Barry’s previous girlfriend who is also still amongst our favouritest people and is as good and bonkers as the Finns get (for she is Finnish). Barry and Silvia were touring on their motorbikes and kind of just told us that they would be where we were when we were there so we booked another night or two and decided to hang out. We had beers, Barry had the shits, and we had a jolly night at the local Lazy Lizard hostel/bar. We met some other folk and had a right good old natter. Again as I am writing this some time after the event, I have forgotten the names of the two folk we met in particular that I enjoyed the company of most. She was a bag of bubbles and smutty fun from Essex and he was a quiet Mancunian with a suitably dry wit and a genuine nice demeanour. We stayed out for hours, which to be fare is rare for us, we are normally quite the early to bed type. We managed to get some food on the way home after Barry, then Silvia had called it a night. The next day was all about the bikes. I borrowed Silvia’s bike and Barry took to Clyde, his faithful steed, as we hit the road into the national park. It really was great to get on to a real bike with gears and a bit of poke (relatively speaking, they are still 125’s) and hit the road. We headed along the river and then off into the rolling mountains. At the edge of the park was a barrier. Barriers are nothing to Barry, the Barrier was higher at one end so he just ducked under it and sped off, I however was somewhat surprised by this development, so as I slowed to go under, aware that my spatial awareness with a helmet ain’t what it ought to be I crawled through and just as I thought “Success, I haven’t hit my head!” it dawned on me that this was indeed a bike and not a scooter, and I was in third gear. Too late. As it spluttered to a halt, I panicked nervously expecting to be pounced upon by the guard in the nearby archway. As I struggled to get the bike going I was expecting to attempt to try and use my best non-existant Vietnamese to explain myself before being flung in prison for violating the national park laws. Turns out the guard gave zero fucks. Didn’t even move beyond looking up at me in dismay.

As we progressed through the jungle in all its ridiculously plush and thick vegetation, it dawned on us what a fucking stupid idea it was of the Americans to think they could come here to this place and win a war on this unknown terrain against locals who have navigated it for an age.

We drove the roads, through some villages, we even passed some other westerners on their scooters. Some with helmets, some without, some with guides, some driving themselves…all had looks of sheer terror across their faces. It beggars belief to me that these people chose to do this for their enjoyment. A guide I can just about understand, but fucking relax if you are going to do it. The rest though…I have no idea. Why oh why would you go to a practically lawless country in regard to road safety and take up riding a bike, that you have no business or permit to ride and no experience in doing so, of course you are going to spend the whole time shitting your pants, that is if you don’t die or lose all of your skin on the tarmac. Worse still this hole thing with westerners and no helmets boggles my mind. Now I have even been guilty of this in a short trip around the corner when we didn’t have enough helmets for the three of us on a scooter, but that was really in some back water place and no traffic, and I am a massive hypocrite. But people riding around the streets, clearly with no knowledge of bike riding with no helmets wherever they go, its like they think the roads are softer in Asia and that their heads won’t explode upon hitting it without a helmet.

It was a great day and yet another great meal in our bellies (RESTAURANT NAME) it was time to head home. Sadly on the way home some cuntyballs had hit a dog in the street and left it there. At first no-one knew what to do but a couple of us silently decided almost simultaneously to go and give the dog a bit of company in his final moments. Lucky it wasn’t bloody and it looked reasonably peaceful and quick. Truly sad not being able to do anything or even know where or how to find a vet, moreover that people just give zero fucks. The only thing we could do was let him know we were there to try and comfort his last breaths. Here were two local ladies amongst our comforting few and they waited till he was gone and gave him a stroke before carrying him off.

The next morning we decided to venture in to the caves. They have here the single largest cave in the world and the cave system is enormous. The trick on the cave we went to is to get there with a cluster of people or make a cluster at the booking office. You have to pay entrance to the cave individually, but on top of that you have to pay for a boat. The boat seats twelve and is the same price if you are one, or if you are twelve. So, better be twelve.

It’s a pleasant little ride up the river, then at the mouth of the cave they shut the engine off and peel the roof back. The cave truly is huge, and I believe that we were in one of the smaller ones open to the public (the largest cave is heavily restricted as it only has a short season and a max number of 500 visitors allowed per year, at the cost of a few thousand dollars each). There is a chap at that front and a lady at the back who paddled us down the river into the cave. The chap at the front kept pointing at rocks and saying things like “turtle” or “elephant” but I was at a loss. All I could see was a lot of vaginas and a bit of bacon. But still really pretty. It is one of those moments, like at the Grand Canyon or among the Sequoias, being in the presence of something that has been shaped by millennia and has lived, one way or another, through ages. The idea of something so ancient really hits home our simple insignificance. On the way out we disembark in the cave and do the last few hundred metres on foot. Getting to walk amongst the giant stalactites and stalagmites, or even the places they have joined to form columns is breathtaking. The colours and beauty throughout is a wonder.

Tour over we headed back to the hotel to collect our things before getting on the night bus. Another shonky affair. But the semi-seats were at least this time more comfortable. As ever, there were Westerners expecting Western service and space and comfort and making a cluster fuck of it all. There was even someone who could only wait 10 minutes into the journey to go for a ciggy in the toilet. Seriously, how weak do you have to be? Every so often the same person would do the same thing. Surely there are better ways to enjoy a bus ride than sat in the shitty shitter chuffing on a cancer stick? But no, if that floats his boat then fair play. Just wished I wasn’t in nose-shot so to speak.

Time to leave Vientiane, time for another ride on a tuk tuk, then the night bus, with a van in the morning to take us on to the ferry port. The tuk tuk came early evening to take us to the station and on to the night bus. We were the third and fourth on the tuk tuk, which at six started to look a bit full, and we seemed to be going in circles looking for people to fill it further. My jaw nearly fell open as I saw Yank and English walking out of a hostel as we rocked up. Luckily we only picked up a few Dutch and such before heading to the switch to the van. We switched to the bus, which was somewhat special. For the lonely traveller this could be a wonder or horror, depending on one’s luck and one’s point of view. Despite the bumpy start with the driver who didn’t speak much English (again I say this with no detriment to him, as we are foreigners I his land, he is in no way obliged to know our tongue, point is simply that it makes life difficult for us lazy none Laos folk) and that he wouldn’t entertain one request to be on the bottom deck, as she had arranged this prior with her travel agent. Which to be fair to him, I highly doubt had happened beyond the tour operating having just said yes to the travel-sick lady’s request, then thinking exactly no more of it the moment the money touched her handflesh. We were all sent upstairs to the top deck, and here’s where it gets weird. The bus is simply a series of double beds. Conny and I were set, one bed, one couple. The German girl, the American lady, the Dutch girl and a couple of others… not so much. The thing is, you are simply assigned a number and go to bed. If you are a solo traveller, your number is simply paired wit that of another solo traveller and you share the one bed, with nothing dividing you. Odd as fuck. It did work out alright for the American and German who were paired together, I can’t remember who the Dutch girl got but I don’t think it was too terrible. Once the bus got underway, the driver for some reason locked the toilet and hid the key. Which was fine by me but the girls were not overly happy. A bit later on the locals started to fill the bus up, and then someone came around with food. Only none got to us at the front. That said, we did see from the Dutch girl, who was last to get some food among those who did, that it was not exactly appetizing. All I can describe it as was some attempt at a sandwich. It was a kind of meat-hair with sauce splodged in the middle of a square of sandwich bread of the worst order, and folded into a triangle. It looked, to be honest, as if someone had taken a distinctly vigorous wipe of their arse with a piece of bread, after a not-pleasant poo, and had in their vigour, dislodged some bum hair which got caught in the poo smear. Stranger still the bus stopped and the driver ran out to the shop on the corner. He gleefully ran up to the front of the bus with what was clearly the replacement for the “food” that we had sadly missed out on. A strange alternative, but I think a million times better, they handed us all a “natural” soy milk carton. Natural my arse, it tasted like sweet porridge, but still, sweet porridge or stale-bread-arse-wipe? I know my feelings on the matter.

The ride itself was pleasant enough. I just know that it could have been awkward given that I heard stories of young ladies being given beds with strange men who at best have hogged the bed, and at worst taken liberties. Save from a few moments that the bus clattered the over-hanging trees or it sounded like a wheel fell off (the first few times we were felt assured that the bus had 6 wheels…but after a few more it started to become a little worrisome!)

We arrived at the bus station and had to wait before climbing in to our next van. Not exactly a luxury affair, a Mercedes from the early 90’s we then had to pick up a few more guest house folk…upon watching the large framed, inappropriately dressed and sour faced lady mount the bus, we knew we were going to have to put up with some noisy opinion being spouted for the next few hours. We were not wrong. It started with her moving around a bit to try and keep herself the “good seat” Then it was her getting in the way whilst trying to protect the good seat from invaders. Somewhat amusingly 20 minutes in, the good seat failed under her not inconsiderable weight. The back of the seat fell back, less fortunate for the girl behind’s knees, but it did make me chuckle!

Furthermore she loved to tell tales of her hollywood lifestyle, being some sort of studio exec. As her tales progressed, I was not surprised to find that she was less of a bigshot exec but more of a hanger on and wannabe. Her initially glamorous tales of going to the Oscars and such became later that she was one of those people paid to wait outside and fill seats when the stars went to the loo, lucky for her she was of a certain size, perhaps she could charge double, after all, if you have to pay double on a plane to sit on a seat, why not get double for doing the same?

We arrived at the port…well… ish…we were somewhat unceremoniously dumped at the end of a road, which clearly led to some water, and were told to head that way. We did so, we also figured out that we had to exchange our bus tickets for boat ones. None of this was made clear, nor was any of this obvious, but we motley few loaded with backpacks front and back puzzled our way through. If I’m honest, I think we were the local sport, all those folk pretending to go about their days and their jobs were really just spectators placing their bets on who’d get it, who’d erupt in anger or who would fall/lose their luggage to the Mekong. We were on the same boat as some of those from the bus, including the travel sick girl from the big bus. It turns out she has a name. Her name is Kari(strangely pronounced Kerry) and she is entirely lovely. She is an American, it also transpired that she thought exactly as we did upon seeing the large sour faced lady climb in to the bus and the more more she heard her speak the further she sunk into her seat through shame for her great nation. She became our best bud for our time on the island. We headed out in search of a bungalow on Sunrise side. Yes, so called because that is the side of the island that the sun rises on. The other place you can stay is Sunset side, I think you get the picture.

We headed up past “town centre” by town, on Don Det, we mean slightly populated, a few ramshackle restaurants and guesthouses, a couple of even more ramshackle bars and not much else. Just beyond the big smoke of the city limits lay some basic riverside bungalows. 30 000 kip a night, further up were some more but as the heavens opened, Conny got cranky and decided she could not be arsed to search. We settled for the most basic of basic, not even with wifi, but realistically that was ok by us. Kari carried on up the way a little and found one for 40 000 kip a night, but this one did have wifi. I have to say I enjoyed the 4000 Islands. It’s very rough and ready. Not really for the luxury seekers (that’s not to say there aren’t some posh places to stay, one chap wanted 200 000 kip a night in his somewhat mediocre looking hotel, but on the other islands there were some more high caliber looking places). If you were to go to one of these more plush affairs,, you would still be on these same islands and to be frank, their entire charm is their relaxed un-refinery. There are some gems though. The first is the café in “town”. As you traverse to Sunset side from the town centre, there is a cafe, called Bamboo café. Owned and operated by a lovely Korean chap, who made awesome freshly grounded drip coffee. The soundtrack was also excellent and I had many a delightful coffee in his place, the girls had a few coffees and a few beers. We never actually had his food, which was a shame, because he did some traditional Korean stuff…If I recall correctly it was due to my vegetarian-ness that we didn’t but it looked delightful. That said, the food on Don Det was generally excellent. And super cheap. We are talking a dollar or two for a main meal. Usually delicious ones at that. Breakfasts could be as little as 50p. I personally found it nicer to stick to the more out of the way places that were pleasant and cheap. The exception to the rule is the Indian restaurant on the main road, called Jasmine. It cheap and wonderful. In fact there was another wonderful Indian restaurant over on Sunset side too, but the name escapes me. Jasmine is surely the winner on the basis of it’s mint sauce alone. Minty cool and Chili hot all in one rich yoghurty gloop. Awesome.

The next big selling point to Don Det is the Irrawaddy Dolphins. These are a very rare species of dolphin, although not as rare as we were led to believe (there are only ten left on Earth!) no but still very rare and definitely troubled. The ones in Laos do number only around 10 and breeding it transpires is somewhat challenging for them as they fear a set of dams on the river have separated the boys from the girls of this particular group. Still, in order to go and see them we could either take a tour which would be very costly or we could rent a bike for the day and just head that way on to Don Kong, then take a local boat to go and find them. We opted for option 2 which we think was a win. This way we cycled up along Sunset, over the bridge (there is a small fee to pay as a kind of day ticket thing but nothing extravagant) and then on to the waterfalls. They say waterfalls, but really they are giant rapids. Beautiful giant rapids, carving through rock and tree as far as the eye can see. Lucky we came on our bikes too, because the entry to these falls is through a park, which your day ticket covers the cost of! We headed down from the falls on one of the two roads we could take. At the end was a spot called Dolphin Boat Jetty. Here, rather than the extortionate tour rates we found that three of us could get on a boat and mosey out with a local to the exact area the dolphins were chilling in. By far the best way to do it. If just for the boat ride itself it was worth it. These guys know this ever changing beast of a river like the back of their hands. The driver took us straight to the dolphins who we watched for an hour or two doing their dolphin thing. It truly was lovely(and bear in mind at this point we thought we were witnessing the last six) and I do hope that the measures the Laotian government is putting in place to safe guard them pays off. That said, don’t know what they are going to do about the lack of mating pairs. It is my understanding that they are quite territorial and wouldn’t necessarily just take to another dolphin being dropped amongst them.

As our final day drew we headed to the ferryport once more and made the journey across the Mekong. Then onward to Pakse. We stopped in Pakse just one night, a beautiful little bungalo by the river, super cheap, dinner provided by none other than Jasmine Indian Restaurant, Pakse branch, quite by accident as we stumbled upon it. Then further the next morning we climbed aboard the bus from hell to Danang, Vietnam, more about that in the next piece.

For those of you, my avid readership, who have not read my last piece, there are few parts skipped over to save repetition, but you should get the gist of it.

We were picked up in Chiang Rai and steered to our seats next to English and Yank. Little needs be said for their companionship on this van trip than was said previously so look it up if you feel so inclined. To say they annoyed the very essence of me would be to put it mildly.

However we got to the Laotian border, the van driver having very clearly explained what to do and what not to to and who to pay and who not to pay, so we headed on foot to the passport check for exit, then on to the bus that took us across the bridge, to a further immigration passport and visa booth.

Of course it’s a little convoluted, but who cares we were crossing an international boundary and its all part of the fun isn’t it? I saw some ATMs and tried to get some money out, initially a bit hesitant at trying to get a few million out. It’s an odd feeling busting out wads of millions of any currency. Makes one feel like those terrible 1%. Alas, a 1%er I am not as my credit was not good enough for these machines, despite there being plenty, I just think they were being dicks.

The very air itself changes when you cross in to Laos proper. It’s lighter. Time moves slower people give much less care to the stress of the day. Rules seem more to be suggestions as evidenced by the fact that we 10 crossers were squidged into a 5 seater pickup. Again, parts of this were mentioned before…Yank’s attempted coup and her effort to abandon me at the mercy of the Laotian folk. She had made a point of saying “Why has he gone for money? Who comes across a border without their money?” I may have said that before, but keep that in mind. It becomes relevant later.

We get to the slow boat port. Heavens throwing all the wet they can muster at us and we sit down to a coffee and such. Watching the other travellers and the locals slowly gather for the boat. Many talking of how fucked up they were or how terrible something else was, but less of this, we have moved on!

The boat itself is a long wooden affair. Quite narrow, some bench seating at the front, some car seats on wooden rails that are entirely NOT screwed to the floor at the rear. Conny and I took a seat, and did what we do best. We played UNO. We have become quite the international UNO players.

As you may have guessed, the slow boat, is not ironically named. Pacey it is not. The first day was a bit wet and cold, but the views were pretty nice, I also managed to catch a few winks. Strangely, there are a lot of pink water buffalo along the river. They are actually quite beautiful. More striking still is the lifeline that the river is. The settlements dotted along are some times no more than a few little shacks, to a small villages with a basic road structure within, but no road into the village itself. The locals use the slowboats to haul everything they need, even their motorbikes.

The day drew to an end and we docked in the village of Pak Beng. This place now, basically, exists entirely to service the foreign folk on their way down the river. Every other building is a guesthouse or a restaurant or a shop selling supplies. We managed to get a room with a big bed, AC and a private bathroom for practically nothing 50000 kip I think, the restaurant next door was where we dined, as the owner said “you should go there, my wife can really cook”.

The second day was a different boat but only “same same but different”. The weather played ball today and was lovely and clear. These boat guys really must know these rivers like the backs of their hands, manoeuvring these cumbersome beasts around the swells and gentle rapids as the river was looking quite full. Today as we passed, there were children bombing in the water and sliding down clay gulleys they had turned into mudslides, their faces beaming with sheer delight as they splash into that murky clay water plunge pool at the bottom, arising looking somewhat like a dipped Churro.

The most amazing thing however was the scenery. The hills were covered in thick lush forests of bamboo. To a man of my ilk they looked glorious like giant forests of curly kale, thick and untamed, ripe for the picking. Punctuated by more of the little settlements or the odd temple or shrine. The river almost like the one that did for Augustus Gloop in Mr Wonka’s factory, with the locals speeding along on their high speed narrow boats or sauntering on barges like ours. We arrive at the Luang Prabang pier, which is not in Luang Prabang at all, but 10 km away. The thing is, we all knew this. We departed, I even managed to cut my foot between the toe crease of my little toe on one of those rust filled car seat to wooden slat joints on the non fixed seats, but it wasn’t such a bother. Less could be said of our YTC comrades. Everybody that was on that boat has booked the same ticket through similar people, and all read the reviews and infos on the internet, Still, there was a French girl who asked if she could stay on. The driver said yes, but then she asked “And you will take me to the pier in town”, to which he replied “No, I’m going back.” That made me chuckle. But as I got off I could hear some dreadful sound grating at my ear. Violently scratching my ear drum. Ceaseless and unabating. It was Yank. She was yapping on about how terrible it is, it went something like this but I may not be exactly correct:

“This is fucking ridiculous, I’m not getting off. We paid 1600 Baht for this…” I must interject here, because 1600 Baht is merely 42 euros. FOR TWO WHOLE DAYS OF BOAT TRAVEL TO EXACTLY WHERE THEY TELL YOU YOU ARE GOING! Anyway, I shall let her continue… “they just put us on the boat with no water or drinks and they didn’t even feed us” sorry I have to interrupt again here, there was a snack bar on the boat and they would prepare food and she had plenty beer on that boat …”It’s a disgrace this, is ridiculous, I’m not getting off”…don’t start me on this thing of her expecting western style treatment or other such things mentioned in my YTAC article, just her very voice was setting my skin acrawl with it’s tone, then came the piéce de résistance…”You can’t drop us here, we have to pay for the taxi then to get into town” Now I must once again remind you that at no point is anyone under any illusion that this isn’t the case. It is a clear way for locals to get a tourist tax, but who cares? It is what it is, that is how it works, suck it up and deal with it…but wait…here it comes “I don’t have any money to buy a taxi to the hotel, I only have a few Thai Baht, I didn’t get any Kip out yet, I can’t afford to get the taxi, I paid to get to Luang Prabang”

Yes Ladies and Gentlemen. Yank. The lady (loose use of the term) that plagued my entire journey with judgement, whinging and frankly cuntish behaviour since the second we left Chiang Rai, who then decided to stage a revolt for fear of not getting a good seat on the boat despite the fact that we were in the hands of the local operators and THEN had the nerve to slyly chatise me behind my back with her incredulous “Who comes over the border without cash” jibe, is complaining that she came over the border without cash. WHAT A FUCKING TWAT?!

Two minutes later I watched as she was unceremoniously led off the barge and she waited with a face of a lemon sucker for her luggage. Our only goal that night was find our hotel, get some food and avoid the YC’s.

We stayed at the HOSTEL IN LUANG PRABANG. A little place, in a decent location, it was a little ramshackle, but pleasant. The proprietors were a couple of Chinese lads, young, I’d say around 20, who had the balls to move to a different country and give it a go at a business they don’t yet know much about, but they are giving it a good go and are very eager to learn and please their guests. I admire them to be honest and would say that although they got a few minor things wrong (they were in a state of disarray as we got there as they had only just been there two months, and things were dusty and being painted, and the outside looked shabby) I would have no hesitations recommending this place to anyone, and I am confident that they would be in a bit better shape.

Luang Prabang is lovely. The temples are a little more rustic and lived in than those on the Thai side. The town itself is another UNESCO heritage centre. Again, this means physical development is somewhat halted and that the town maintains a uniformity and charm, but not in a pristine clinical way. The buildings are still diverse enough to keep it interesting, just that they mesh quite well, paying hommage to their shared Laotian and French influence. The feel of the town is lovely. The streets are a little more daunting in traffic, as we move east we are finding that the hoards of bikes on the roads are becoming more dense, traffic is fluid and wits must be kept. That said we hired a push bike for one day and moseyed along by the river and looked at some of the temples and the sights of the town. The next day we hired a scooter and headed out to the local falls.

The first falls, were actually intended to be our second…only we went the exact wrong direction out of town and then missed the turnoff that would have taken us right. Instead, we knew we’d come to the second set of falls, Tad Sae and then we’d take a boat to see them. We did exactly that. Got off the boat, and entered the apparent entrance area to the water falls, the guy at the door asked us to pay him, can’t recall the price but he in the same breath said that there is not much water in them, they are dry. Unsurprisingly we decided against it. He then offered to take us on an elephant ride. Something I, as many would, would turn down even if it was free. Knowing how these poor giants are trained is tough enough, to see them in their pens, saddled and waiting is such a sad sight. That people still enjoy coming to these places and paying to do such things hurts my heart. I get that they have done this for thousands of years, and I get that the animals are very well suited to this kind of travel through jungles and such, but the neglect and barbaric practices that have been highlighted innumerable times to all and sundry beggar belief as to why the tourists still support and perpetuate the trade.

So, surprised as he was to see us, 45 seconds after having left his boat, we climbed back aboard and headed back. At least the 1€ we spent was a pleasant little boatride.

The second set of falls at Kuang Si however was an entirely different affair. I loved it there. The ride on the scooter was spectacular. Country roads, wooden rickety bridges, and best of all, butterflies. Thousands of the things. Truly filling the air there is something supremely serene about seeing the flight of a thousand butterflies on the summer warm breeze. Different colours and sizes, equal beauty, it was a sight and feeling to behold for sure.

At the falls, I was semi annoyed by the groups of folks taking up all the nice photo spots/scenery and being loud and inconsiderate, but then again I am a grumpy twat, and why shouldn’t I expect that these beautiful spots be kept pristine and for me alone. Fuck those tourists, ruining my holidays. Of course I am joking. Sadly, this is a thought I hear very often also. Tourists complaining that the places that they visit are too popular with tourists and that to preserve their natural beauty the locals and governments should do more to avoid the places becoming too touristy. Only touristy enough for THEM to have enjoyed it of course…”It was soooooo much nicer when I came 5 years ago…now there are just too many tourists, I can’t believe they let it get that way.” Fuckwits.

Back to the falls, they are stunning, stages and pools climb up to the largest chutes and pool. Here is where the majority of folk stop. Conny and I thought we’d saunter up to the top. It’s quite a steep path. It was longer than we thought, It was bloody hot and humid that day too, so by the time we hit the top I wasn’t sure there was any sweat left in me, but it certainly was worth it. The top has a series of pools, shadier than those at the bottom with a few bamboo structure viewpoints on the lip of the falls, the outlook is astonishing. The water is cool and clean, there is an option of a bamboo raft to its source for a fee, but best of all, are the cleaner fish. The first nibble feels strange, sharp even, but then once the realisation hits that that is just the headbutt or the suck of the mouth, then it becomes an entirely lovely feeling. Before long I looked up to see Conny’s bemused gaze falling upon me. I asked what her issue was and she enlightened me that I was looking somewhat odd, stood in a pool head just staring at what looked like my feet. I elucidated her to the fact that I was watching the spectacle of a good fifty or so fish nibble at me below the knees, and not only watching but feeling too. It was a wonder.

The post Uno way down was somewhat on the treacherous side. I’m not sure we were actually on the right path. It seems that we were following the water path and not the human path. I had to go barefoot halfway down, but we made it despite the fear of infection in my open wounded toe, we made it just fine. The best part of the falls, I have to say, is not the falls at all. Spectacular as they are, pleasant and relaxing as they are to while away some time amidst and take the edge off of the tropical sun, the true gem here is the bear sanctuary. They have a native bear in Laos called the Moon Bear. They have a crested front similar to that of the sun bear but are generally bigger. I suppose they’d fit somewhere in between the US Black Bear and the Sun Bear on the Bear scale. They are adorable. I have a fondness for beasts of all descriptions if you hadn’t noticed. Bears however rank amongst my favourites. I was gutted to have not spotted any in the wilds of America. Although these weren’t wild, they had been rescued from the poachers who had attempted to take them from the wild, and sadly they weren’t able to be released. There is something so emotive about watching the big bears. They simultaneously remind me of my old dog Mufassa, and the great apes, yet are clearly distinct. They just look like such fun, awesome creatures, full of power but clumsy grace. There was even one with three legs, but he didn’t let that stop him climbing trees and playing in his pool. I will struggle once more to fathom the ideas of people who can see these beautiful things as a dollar sign, and those people with wealth, and the education to know better that believe the bile extracted from the magnificent wonders can magically make you strong. Like the people who give the poachers and the traffickers a market for their shark fin soup or rhino horn powders and ivory trinkets. The world would be a far nicer place if they were wiped off it’s face. I’m not saying I would be the one to do it and that there aren’t far more nuanced discussions to be had. “Just sayin’”, as the yoof of today would put it.

The food in Luang Prabang was delicious. From the local restaurants, to the street food of the market, we had no trouble getting something for me, the market in particular had a vegetarian buffet. It wasn’t the kind of buffet where you could go back as often as you like, so I was met with bulging eyes as the other diners saw the extent to which my bowl was piled high. It was like a food Jenga. But with so many delights on offer I was at a loss of what else to to. Plus, I have never been thought of by those in the know as anything but a capable dispatcher of food.

Our next destination was Vang Vieng. Here we stayed at a place called the Orchid. It was fairly cheap, had a nice view, and the aircon and shower we needed. There was a certain amount of mould and it wasn’t exactly spotless, but it was certainly among the cheapest and also certainly passable. Vang Vieng isn’t exactly our kind of town. We enjoyed our stay, but mostly because we kept it brief. The town I suppose is most famous for tubing. An activity in which the yoof float down the river on large rubber tubes, getting spannered and stopping at multiple pubs along the way. Not exactly my cup o’tea, I see it as almost exclusively the haunt of the YTC’s that trouble me so, but that is not to say that ALL who tube are such. Either way, each to there own, I’m not here to follow anyone else’s rules and nor should they mine. We opted to hire a canoe and paddle a few kilometres of the river, with a spot of tubing (without the pubs) in a cave. Most of the group were Chinese or Thai. I was amazed to see how grown humans could fail to grasp the concept of paddling if I am honest. There was one boat in particular was zigzagging from the off, due to their incapability to paddle straight. There was another similar pair who struggled from the off and capsized at the first hint of whitish water, which, if I’m honest, was hilarious. We met a couple of French folk on the way down and got to practice our linguistics, which were in need of some sharpening. We descended some rapids, upon one we even crashed in to the French pair and capsized them. Of course I claim no responsibility as they had managed to get themselves caught up in a tree and had broadsided into our path! They were however lovely and I did feel bad. We then noticed paddles and bottles floating away so Conny and I took it upon ourselves to collect them, most of the boats in our troupe hit some trouble on those rapids and we had quite the collection by the end. Sadly we had not seen the younger French lady’s skirt, which had also vanished in the maelstrom of the white water. Just as all hope was lost, our guide plunged into the water and miraculously had spotted the skirt at the bottom. We were a complete troupe once more! We parked up and had lunch, they even prepared me some vegetarian kebabs to accompany my rice, and fruit which I thought was particularly nice of them. The cave, as they tend to be, was cold, dark and beautiful. The experience was somewhat more intense than we had expected, with the gentle tubing only taking a small amount of the trip, the rest was on foot which the French ladies had not come prepared for. There was even a little bit of scrambling and some of us bust down a water slide! Les Frenchies and Conny were not amongst their number. Afterwards we headed back to the boats and canoed the last two kilometres to home. I was even challenged to stand up like the guides and paddle Gondola style. I fully met the challenge thank you kindly. The evening we ate at the vegan restaurant and had the most amazing meal. Mine was ok, nice even. But Conny’s was spectacular, a bunch of flavours we had not seen anywhere yet on our travels at once absolutely beautiful and unexpected. It was a kind of rice with mushrooms and tofu dish with some herbs and leaves that we haven’t fully identified but were something apart from the norm and above average tasty. The morning of departure came and we decided to try the other thing that Vang Vieng was famed for. No, not the boozy hangouts selling their happy shakes and weed, that was definitely not on our to do list, particularly as we had seen our YTC boat buddies head into one such place from our, in regard to tameness, diametrically opposed seat at the vegan restaurant. The other thing that it is famed for is its sandwiches from street carts. The basic starts with some salad and shredded veg, but then to get the classic one must add an omelet. I eschewed the omelet in lieu of cheddar cheese and fried onions, which was delicious. I did however get Conny the works. People had been telling us that we must get one one girl was so overblown by it that she went on to say she had no idea what it was they did to make such a simple thing so spectacular, that after all was said and done it was an egg and salad sandwich, but there was some magic involved. Well. I watched intently as the lady made the sandwich. A nice baguette, some nice veg, all good so far, but as yet no magic, then she got a couple of eggs, cracked them open, and there it was. It was a blink and you’d miss it illusion or slight of hand, but just behind the bowl of pre whisked eggs there was a sachet. A sachet of magic powder. The mystery of delightful food particularly on the orient for a hundred years or so. Yes. MSG. Much maligned, but that in my opinion is a malignation akin to that of vaccines. Blown up thoughts with very little evidence. Potentially spurious and nefarious reasons to defame it, and also I would make a guess that many who take the mantle do so in an attempt to be intellectually different and as such a bit superior, when in fact the evidence points to MSG realistically being no better nor worse than slat in ones diet, not to be over used, but certainly not the demon death dealer many think it to be…but…I digress. This sandwich was expectedly fucking delicious.

We got the van to Vientiane. Again, for us, not really a destination town, but a place to rest, and more importantly get our visas for Vietnam in order. Vientiane does have its charms, although not plentiful. There is the promenade by the river and night market. The market itself is somewhat underwhelming, the promenade quite amusing as the locals come out in hordes to exercise. Dancing en masse to a lycra clad microphoned leader up front on a stage, the same a hundred metres further along. I kind of imagined at the end it turned in to something like a scene from Gangs of New York, where the work out gear clad combatants fought one another to the bitter bloodied death with nose and ears being the tokens of the day. Runners in droves plodding up and down the walkway.

There is also the giant Arc de Triomphe style arch. Supposedly, as a result of the French offering money and cement to the local government so they could better improve their transport links and to create a new airport runway. Instead they built no runway, and just built a giant arch. Brilliant, useless and a wonderful slap across the French’s visage.

Then there is the COPE museum. This place is the very reason anyone should stop in Vientiane. It is a museum, based in the medical centre that specialises in prosthetics and rehabiliation. Sadly this is a very important and in demand service in Laos as a carry over from the days of war in the region. The landscape bears the scars of war. Grave sites. Ruined buildings and such. However the land is taking those back and development goes some way to cover them up. The saddest legacy is the buried munitions that are still live and unaccounted for. They number in their millions and are responsible for the horrific deaths and mamings of children and adults simply going about their daily lives. It was a horror to me to discover the sheer amount of bombs, particularly evil cluster bombs with the intent of fragmenting and ripping through whatever they came close to. I won’t dwell on the details of the numbers and such, there is only one you need to know to understand the gravity of the situation and it is this:

Laos was subject to so much bombing, that if you were to average the amounts out, to plane loads and their frequency over a given period of time, it would equate to this.

One plane load.

Every 8 minutes.

For 9 years.

Please. Reflect upon that. And the damage that that would continue to do today. Then think about all the horror that our governments perpetrate today in the world. Of course it’s in the name of peace. But we know better. Money, power and influence are the goal, and to my mind, they are no justification for such horror.

We also met Felipe, the Columbian. A proper decent sort, I had wrongly diagnosed as a potential YTC, he too was in the office getting his visa in order. He had been on our bus/boat trip from Chiang Rai to Laos. He had eaten a hideous smelling bun in the overloaded pickup, but not in and offensive way, we all even had a giggle about it. He was one of the ones who tell tailed on the Yank and her miserable faced attempt at a coup. I must say, he proved my assumption to be somewhat asinine. A highly intelligent chap, with a solid heart and an intellectual curiosity not dissimilar to my own. We had a great da out wandering around, we went to a local museum, it was highly amusing that some of the artefacts were made of papier mache by what could at best be five year olds, the idea that a guy was actually paid to make some of those is laughable. However it did actually show us some of the time lines involved and some of the photography brought a startling reality to things that are often resigned to an idea of a long past history when in fact they are quite recent in the scheme of things. We had coffee and lunch with Felipe and I was happy to realise I was wrong. He is no YTC, he was a thoroughly nice chap, most importantly we shared the same hatred of several aspects of YTC-ness, in particular the purchase of the elephant pants. The worlds worst thing. Maybe we will bump into him again, maybe we won’t. He will however find a place to stay in Austria if ever he wants it.

From here, we decided to head to Si Phan Don, or the 4000 Islands as they are known. But I feel that is enough for this piece. You can read about that in the next post.

Yes, I know that is a testy little title, but it grabbed your attention! But sadly I think it’s deserved. My mother will be horrified at my dropping of the C-bomb, but it is indeed a word laced with intent, sometimes these things ought be said. I don’t think ALL young travellers are cunts, just an alarming number of them. I should preface the following bundle of words, sentences and thoughts by saying I try to stay away from generalising in a real sense. I occasionally do for effect, or when noting observed tendencies within a group or another, but it is always done with the understanding that really, everyone is their own person and has their own ideas governing their conduct, that labels don’t really apply. Plus I am a massive hypocrite, just one with a bit of a brain and perhaps some conscience or humanity, or at least I like to think.

Back to travellers, particularly cunty young ones, I am again not saying it is all. I am saying that through our travels we have met, seen, bumped into or indeed been lumbered in the presence of some who show a marked behavioural deficiency. Those terrible folk who have earned a place amongst these grumbles show one or many of these deficiencies and tend to exemplify the horribleness of which I speak. The number of which is somewhat startling and also may just do what broad strokes do and tar the opinions towards young (Western) folk doing something good. I have met plenty of nice young travellers, I say plenty, a few, like Holly and Ivan in the last piece, or Felipe in the following one, but all too often I see the same shit attitudes.

Enough of explaining my thought process and negating any ideas that I am an ageist, travellist, cuntist prick.

I shall use specific interactions with some of the folk I have had along the way with people (loose terminology) to highlight my points, but by no means think that I will remember all of them and you will have to simply trust my judgement (I apply my judgement liberally, judgemental is a word that may have been bandied at me before, but then again, so has unassuming) that it all too oft seems to be part of the same malaise that affects a certain type of traveller.

First case in point. A young English girl and a young American girl. We were sat on a minibus for 2 or 3 hours, felt like an eternity, by the mid way stop I wanted to gouge out my own brain and murder the two girls, if I was going to hell, it sure as shit wouldn’t be fair to leave these two for other people to suffer, I would be dragging their bitchy souls with me.

It didn’t start well. Thirty seconds in to the ride “English”, as she shall hence be referred to, spies the box labelled Tips for Driver, Thank’s”. She and “Yank”, the American that I call a Yank because she has apparently got, in her own words “a problem with the Yanks”, got to talking about the tip box.

“I’ve got a tip for you, get another fucking job” cackled English

“Oh you tell it like it is girl, fuck off I’m not giving you[driver] a tip!” came the Yank’s response, eyes and face alight at the hilarity of their shittiness.

“Why should I give you a tip you’re shit?”

The statements and questions were obviously said without intent to be heard by the driver, just shitty little wimpy cat-calls from the anonymity of the dividing wall had he indeed caught it.

They then followed it up by mocking the use of an apostrophe in the word “thanks”. I happen to be a fan of grammar, even though in my haste it occasionally abandons me. I have a particular bug bear with the level of comprehension of grammar in people today, my face often twitches when reading the Face-walls of some of my friends or acquaintances. I can understand a typo or a slip in concentration but I frequently see too many mistakes that show a lack of understanding of the words that people are choosing to use. But therein lies the rub. These are more often than not British English mother tongue folk making these errors, many of whom do not appear to appreciate the difference between US and British English. How on earth one has the nut sack to criticise the English of people from another continent, who living in developing nations have managed a comprehensible grasp of a quite complicated and intricate language such as English, I will never understand. What a gaggle of cock-swallowers we must be to think that acceptable. I’m not saying I don’t occasionally laugh at things that end up being a little drole or odd looking, but really these girls spat venom with their words. Worse still, it’s not like us Anglophones who learn French or German, for example. Those languages at least share common threads of influence and an ENTIRE FUCKING ALPHABET. It just stinks of disrespect and fuck-tardery.

On the linguistics point, I was riled a mere few minutes down the line, when talking about Quebec.

Or a girl from Quebec I suppose. Yank mentioned that she had a friend from there and she softened the “Qu” to form the “W” as she pronounced it then went on to have a discussion that it may or may not be pronounced “K-bec” adding that as her friend was from there and she said it must definitely be pronounced with the hard K but who knows. Trying to be helpful I chirped in “it’s both, one is English, the other French” I offered to the party.

“It’s definitely K-bec” exclaimed English in a dismissive tone that boiled my piss.

“Have you been?” asked the Yank

“No but it just is”

I could have coped with this had their yapping not set my piss to bubble point, but it had, still I held my tongue choosing to just think what came next. It’s not her fault that she doesn’t understand that I am fluent in French, or that I have been to Quebec (in fact, Yank thought it was by Vancouver), or that our A-level French assistant was Quebecoise. I just found myself listing in my head the cities and ridiculousness of her logic. Who gives a fuck what the girl from Quebec calls it? When speaking English it remains Anglicised. English speakers should no more say it with a hard K sound than they should say (phonetically) Parree (for Paris), or Raaance (for Reims). The French wouldn’t or shouldn’t say London as opposed to Londres, nor should they drop their heavily accented veriants of Birmingham or Manchester. We don’t say “I’m doing a bit of travelling this year… I’m going from London to Gotebourg,then Kobenhavn, via München to Den Haag, then on to Napoli” with our best Swedish, then Danish, German, Dutch and Italian accents. Instead we use their names in English. Fucking twats.

Prior to this the bus had been asked by the driver if we would like a coffee stop later. I had said first that I always have time for coffee, which is true. To be fair the rest of the bus hadn’t heard. English piped up with “No, I don’t want that, I’ll veto that for the bus” then she turned to Yank and said “I can’t be fucked with coffee, if we don’t stop we might get on the boat earlier and get the best seats”

Yet again I refrained from attempting to argue, there is a way things seem to be done here, they always involve lots of waiting and you never get anywhere exactly before whoever is in charge wants you to be there.

Then conversation took a turn for the worse, if it could, it started out with Yank saying how she couldn’t wait to get back home, to spend quality time with her puppy. The two gush over how cute the dog is and that it really is like having a baby. Only as far as I’m aware people don’t tend to abandon their young children for months at a time (if we are talking doggy age here it’s years!) to swan off and get pissed in warmer climbs trying to suck and fuck as many different nationality boys as one drunkenly can (sorry, an assumption was made there, but I’ll stick with it, I mentioned judgemental, right?). Not only that but it was left with first her brother, then her flatmate. Turns out she doesn’t even like the flatmate. She is even bitching about the fact that the bitch should just pay her her rent “already” and not say “but I was looking after your dog”. Now although I a gree that the rent should perhaps not be abandoned like that poor puppy, but I would have though it would be smart to have come to an agreement on this, before either assuming that she will look after it for free or just agreeing on a separate rate for the dog care. From what I could hear, the former seemed to be what had taken place which again is a solid sign of a prick, but the malice of which she spoke about this girl. Fat, lazy, disgusting and unhealthy, a bitch (black pots and kettles did spring to mind at this point). Never does anything, never seen real fruit and veg. They then proceed to destroy her processed food dietary habits, again something that I have no problem with in theory, I prefer real food myself on the whole. Only problem is in the very same breath they got to talking about the food here being great. How they absolutely love the packaged tuna toasties from 7-eleven. English says she loves them so much that she eats one daily without fail, has 2 most days and even has them 3 times a day sometimes. Oh the natural goodness.

Then came flood defences. Yank was from Mississippi. Her house built on a flood plain, apparently parts of New Orleans city are still neck deep in water, she was there to party in Spring Break or something. Strange that I didn’t see that when I went on Halloween. English chirped in “We have places in England that are like that. Not as bad but, I don’t know why they don’t just fix it, divert the river or something, put something in place.” I really didn’t want to get involved but I thought it my duty to at least give them some semblance of a rational thought.

“It isn’t exactly that simple you know, these measure have other effects and it’s a bit more complicated”

“No they can do something, of course they can if they just do something in a five year plan, it’s easy, they can fix it in 5 years.”

What the actual fuck did I just hear? It was that same fucking tone of dismissal that got my piss boiling earlier. No actual thought to her statement. Just a statement of hopeful opinion, marketed and expressed as fact, in a tone that hurt my brain and heart in equal measure. I wasn’t going to quiz her on this for fear of murder, but I got the impression she didn’t realise that you can’t just divert the flow around shops and houses. Overflow will affect other peoples land that it wouldn’t have before, perhaps a farmer for example. What says that he should have his livelihood ruined because someone chose to build in a stupid spot? Oblivious that the anti flood measures will likely affect the ecosystems of the river. Or that the altering the river at one point has huge connotations for the entire river system all the way down stream. I felt like breaking the girl’s nose. But that would have been rude. She was already fuck ugly (sorry, I’m being catty aren’t I…I just can’t help it). When we changed bus to pickup in Laos, I went to get some local currency. There was a sign saying ATM 200 metres down the road, so, given the ATM at the border hadn’t worked, I asked if I had time to the travel organisers. They said yes, so off I went. Apparently, the second I left Yank started bitching “Who goes to another country without cash?”

“I’m not going to miss my boat because he’s an idiot”

“Can we go without him?”

“Someone even said she tried to call a vote. I got back and we loaded in the pickup. She had opted for the back and not the cab. As the heavens opened I felt avenged.

I can’t be bothered with the specifics of the conversation any further and I am sure you are tired with my complaining about these two lowly horrors, but I attest that the whole thing was littered with that thing that often comes with new university graduates. Their ability to recite stuff they have been told, without actually having a grain of comprehension on the matter. The absurd position of within one sentence supposing something to be the case at the start, that by the end of the sentence is clear pointed fact. The mind boggles every time I hear it. It is not just these two I have heard talking like this either, again not all young university graduates are like this. I certainly can’t claim to know them all and I can’t even claim that most are, just that I have encountered exactly too many.

Turns out that these vans are a prime place to find these kinds of cocksausages.

A few days prior we had been on the bus from Chiang Mai to Chiang Rai. An American chap got on with his partner. They had been travelling for some time. At a food stop he listed off an impressive tally of countries in which he or they had spent a good amount of time. But Holy Jesus, the whole way there he had talked about people as groups with such disdain. The fucking Chinese buying everything and ruining it. The fucking rude Australians. The dirty Asians. When I challenged him, that it isn’t really fair to colour everybody with such broad strokes, no but it’s a short cut.

He spoke of how the service in Australia wasn’t up to his standard as he was paying money, it should be what he wants. Another piss boiler of a statement. I often got that attitude during my many years in service, and more often than not it was an attitude from Americans. As much as you think that is a generalisation, you may be correct, but it is also an observed one that comes from a systematically very different approach to their consumerism and their service industry. Mostly I would tell them to fuck off.

This one had got on the bus and said “We all going over the border and getting the slow boat” when I told him that was our eventual plan, but I don’t think the slow boat works from Chiang Rai, he was flummoxed. Worse still another young traveller decided she would jump in and not only express herself, but elevate herself above the rest.

“No, we have chosen a different experience”

Who the fuck says that? What a ridiculously loaded statement! I’m paraphrasing here but all I heard was “No, we aren’t your usual tourists who do the usual tourist thing, we are doing this our own way…but really, the bus is cheaper”. I get it OK, nobody wants to be as mundane as everybody else. In saying that I am not like these whingy and superior folk I may come across as whingy and superior, but to be honest, you’d be right in your assumption. The thing is, I know that I am a tourist, I know that I am a grumpy fuck that doesn’t want to be bothered by 20 year olds being dicks. I know that what I am doing is not breaking any moulds. I know that I am not going to appreciate anything but tourist Thailand or wherever else because that is what is accessible to us.

I try to appreciate the differences and the things that I see are unusual to me, and I try not to assume that because something is one way at home it doesn’t mean it should be that way here. But I am flawed. I fall in to that trap the same as everyone else, I don’t like the amount of litter I see here, but you can see plain as day there is a very different societal approach to that here and also a waste system to match.

There was one guy on the slowboat from the Laos/Thai border who was undoubtedly the king of the bullshitters. Another American, sorry, it’s a true thing. I first became aware of his wankiness as he was chatting to some Canadian folk across the way. Most of the young fucks were up the front getting pissed up, at 10 am. These three were sat discussing stuff but BK (Bullshit King) was harping on about how he has the perfect financial system, that he just needs to put x amount of his monies into y investment and he is set. Infallible. He talks of how the finance people have it all wrong. How he knows better and its down to his own foolproof system. I would like to see him attempt that with my former employer, a multi-billionaire businessman with more than a little business savvy about him. Little BK would have shat his little BK pants at the destruction wrought upon him. He then went on to talk about his studies. How he aced all his classes. That his marks were amazing, he claimed to have genuinely slept for some of them, even though he simultaneously claimed he was sat at the front and always quizzing the lecturers which is why he was so good, but back to the sleeping, he claimed he had learned them while asleep. I mentioned to Conny that that is called by osmosis, he probably would have known that if he was so bright. The worse was yet to come, after masses of shit talk where yet again assumptions were claimed as fact or opinions as truths or just flat out inaccuracies as accurate, it was delivered with such smug “surety”(thanks Donald) to be convincing, at least to the Canucks. To be fair, they were a bit wet behind the ears. Daddy was paying the trip, more college fresh folk “same same but different” as they say over here, at no point did they question this guys bullshittery. His scifi novel epic trilogy in the works, that he hasn’t written any of. But then…this…Moon Base.

This fuckstart has decided he wants a moonbase. Although it won’t be governed by laws of any other nations, and they won’t be beholden to any corporations. Note at this point it had gone from wouldn’t be to won’t be. No hypothetical here. He marvels them with his “credit system” instead of money, straight from every scifi film ever, but the Canucks marvel at his originality. The credits will be earned as to the societal importance of ones role. Strangely he uses a cleaner as his example of what is a low value job, “definitely not worth extra credit unless she is a very inspiring cleaner who gets others cleaning real well”. Personally I think cleaners would be quite important. But then he says we will only have the right people, we won’t accept anyone with any prejudices of any kind. Skin colour, gender, sexuality all of these things. They will be deselected from the gene pool before they get there, so there won’t be any of these kinds of problems. The thinkers, the architects, engineers. They will get the best, who will work for those extra credits because, you know, man need incentive and this is their incentive. It will be a completely new and innovative structure to an economy. Nobody would have any power over us. We’d have masses of missiles and we would only use them when attacked.

My mind was raging. Why oh why does this guy think he is owed his Moon base. How does he intend to stake a claim. How the fuck is he in space in the first place without being beholden to corporations? Is someone going to get him there and fund his building of a base, for nothing? Maybe his flawless investment scheme will pay for it. How does that compute with his “Humans need to be incentivised”? Who the fuck is going to let him colonise the Moon and go “oh crumbs, he beat us there, it’s his now”? The guy is straight up delusional. I wanted to destroy him but politeness just meant I quietly raged under my breath at Conny. I swear the last thing I heard him say was “I do hope I get my Moon Base, I think I should run it, I’ll be good at it, I got all these ideas…”

I am hearing everywhere people talk of Thailand as this magical place, lovely people, great food and very cheap with beautiful scenery. Which indeed it is. But is it the goal for the world’s metropolae to replicate what’s here? Fuck no. It is still a third world country. It is flawed, it is something to experience and savour, but it won’t shape my life in any inextricable way. More importantly, the majority of these young traveller types are intent on “experiencing” Asia, but if you hear their tales, they all involve getting off their faces in tourist bars, or on boats, or in hostels. This talk of learning culture and broadening horizons is pure bullshit fantasy. I wish they would call it what it is. They are here because they heard it was cool, and they could tell their mates how sophisticated they are. They will have their ridiculous Asian elephant print MC hammer trousers to complete it. What the fuck is with those by the way? The young folk lap them up. “Oh but they are traditional and sooooooooo comfortable”

Erm no. They aren’t. Open your fuckeyes fuckwit. The only people wearing them are fuckwits like yourself (admittedly one German guy “got” the irony). I should state here that this is a problem for westerners of all ages in these parts. The elephant pant is as much an issue for the middle aged traveller as it is the young cunt, but as a middle aged person one generally can be forgiven such sins due to deteriorating eyesight, an innate desire to feel young once more and copy the young folk, or indeed dimensia’s early onset. I am quite sure that tis could soon become an “early indicator” or a warning sign for the onset of Alzheimer’s and the like.

I suppose the biggest thing that fucks me off is that the young cunts come to a place seemingly to open ones mind. But all I can see is that they are closed further. Little to no appreciation of anything other than cheap piss to throw down their gullets and cheap rooms to sleep in. Worse still they expect this all to be done to western standards and when it isn’t they feel that they are entitled to be rude and disrespectful to people, the places, the traditions the ideas that exist in the places that these folk have come to.

I think I have at this point come to the end of what is an acceptable amount of rant, I surely have more, but alas I feel it is time to abate.

I must add once more that I am by no means perfect and everybody does everything for different reasons. I understand this and that is just fine by me. Perhaps I am indeed just old, but I just wish I saw a little more decency and respect.

We clambered aboard the night train, and were aware immediately that it wasn’t what we expected. I’m not entirely sure what I expected. Perhaps cabins with bunks on either side and a narrow walkway along one side. Kind of like I would expect to see in an old Poirot film or something. But no. We were found our seats, that were two seats facing each other with a bunk at the top that folds away. The train eventually got into motion and we were handed the menu for dinner. Entirely meaty and as such not great for the likes of me. Conny had already had some seafood soup from her favourite street seller in Bangkok, but just incase I had stocked up on crisps for later.

As later came by and the sleeping car had filled up with it’s mandatory fill of Germans, the Loud American and a couple o’Frenchies, I decided to head for a wander. To my delight I went to the “facilities” and found the loo was a throne around a hole in the floor. Even in the dark of night and the bottom of a toilet I could see the train tracks whizzing by. The whole thing was a very rickety old affair. And all the more charming for it. I am pretty sure one guy/girl either really wanted to see me pee, or just didn’t believe the engaged sign/non movement of the door, because there was an awful lot of trying to get in. Plus peeing takes longer on a wobbly train. There has to be a certain level of stream control and aim employed combined with a strong arm all whilst using a sturdy leg stance. The last thing I want is to be whacked by a spectator tumbling through. Next on my wander I was taken to the food car, a dingy looking dining area, and at the back, a proper kitchen, with actual food being cooked. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I turn to walk back to my seat as my belly let out a vexed grumble, but then, lo and behold! A menu! With the word vegetarian on it, I did not hesitate and ordered one up right away.

“Would you like to eat that here or should I serve it at your seat Sir?”

“Really, you can do that?” I replied, my face a radiant shade of awe.

“Of course Sir”

“I don’t know really, whatever suits you, what’s easiest?”

“Go, sit!”

I took my seat with a beaming content that was evidenced as Conny pointed out the look of a happy Cheshire cat amongst my usually drab and frustrated looking features.

“There’s a vegetarian menu” I marvel

Conny looks less impressed, but still happy I get some food.

I see the waiter striding to me tray in hand, but just as he gets there he plops the tray to one side and as if by waiter-magic he pulls a table out from nowhere, he sets it up and then delivers my meal.

A vegetable stirfry dish, some rice, some soup and some weird tofu/mushroom/awesome thing that I never expected on a train. Even some banana cake I had requested for Conny’s benefit and a coffee to boot! “Winner, winner, non-chicken dinner” I thought to myself as I unceremoniously destroy it.

Just as I am finishing my last morsels I see what had come to be an expected sight making it’s way toward me and us. It had started earlier on in the evening, as the train had got underway, there was an occasional clacking and shuffling down the other end of the carriage and then I noticed any unmanned seating was being expertly set into beds by a young and feminine featured man. He daintily pulled the bunk down and with precise swiftness and a couple of slaps in the right place made the bottom seats slide together as one bed. He then took the bedding and curtains down from the top and made both beds, lickety split and just like that in a flash. As the evening drew on and I was eating my meal I heard “I want to make your bed now” from a couple of docks down and a bit of confusion as Germans stood in the aisle and the familiar clacks and slaps rang out. Then one dock closer. Then just as I finished dinner, the waiter was upon me a split second before “Iwant to make your bed now” was directed at us.

We watched a movie in bed (sticking with railway orientated fare we watched Hatchiko, Conny cried). Then I moved on up to the top. If I am honest I didn’t sleep too well. I think its a bit like a boat, the gentle rocks down below are only amplified up top. Bashed about a bit I did manage a bit, when not being disturbed by a loud banging that I firstly assumed some train employee would address and secondly was way too lazy to investigate myself. The morning came around and we emerged an hour or so before we got to Chiang Mai. I went to use the facilities and was again tickled by the movement below the poo hole, but I set about my business of a number 1. I was happy to see we were going slowly at this point through the window, as were the spectators gathered at the crossing as they raised a giggle and a cheer! They were either laughing with me or at me, or even marvelling at my skills, but that’s a blank I shall let your mind fill in.

Our hostel at Chiang Mai was Manon Hostel, a little place off a back street, off a side street, off an alleyway…the taxi had a little trouble finding it, but we got there. I was another basic double, a fan, a bed, not much else, but it was clean and quite cute in an old fashioned traditionally hutty kind of way. We liked it. The owner was super nice and helpful too. We got chatting to a lovely young lady, Holly, and decided to go to the local Thai Boxing night.

I fucking loved it. It wasn’t the grandest of spectacles and the arena was only half full but the fights were excellent. The practitioners were some of them kids, some of them adults, all of them tough as balls. Some fights were a little more subdued but even in these the hits were hard. Some fights were hell for leather. One even included an English girl and I was convinced she was going to get the shit kicked out of her by a Thai lady. First round she looked ropey. Flat footed, a bit scared of a proper dust up so to speak, but then in the second she loosened up. By the third she had snapped a front kick into the Thai fighter’s face (both to my surprise, and the Thai girl’s I think) and by the end of the fight she was dominating. A well won victory.

Only one fight of six was stopped early and I can’t even say I saw what happened it was a blink and you’ll miss it TKO from in a clinch a knee was thrown and a chap was doubled as I can only assume a rib or two had snapped.

To be honest there isn’t much to Chiang Mai. It has a lot of temples, way too many to see. Whilst we were there we decided to partake in a cooking course. There were quite a few that were based in town, but we elected to go to an organic farm with a cooking school attached. Our teacher was Ken, a cuddly bear type dude, he clearly liked his food and clearly knew how to cook it having several years in several professional kitchens. He was a funny bugger too. I have to say the school was great. We learned some techniques and combos, ate way too much food and had a good laugh. The food really was quite simple but wholly delicious and we got to make it from scratch with the simplest of ingredients. Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t mind blowing information, I can cook as it is and would have a good stab in the dark at those dishes but being shown and tasting it was ace. Plus we got the cook book to take home. We also went to a hot spring down the road as part of our trip…but really it was 30° and it was only for your feet, so was entirely unnecessary. I would however recommend the course simply because it is nice to get into the real Thai countryside and see a farm and a market not geared towards tourists. Ken and the cooking course really was great. Better still was that we even had enough leftovers to feed Conny and I plus Holly(who didn’t even come on the course) when we got back to the hostel for tea.

The next day was lazy. Some strolling, seeing of temples and markets, we did find a cracking little backstreet with some coffee shops and beautiful street art, plus at the end was a bakery, attached to an Irish pub. We headed back to that pub later that evening. First we stopped at a rooftop bar. Somewhat misnomered THC bar, it has a certain connotation. Much to the chagrin of one Brit Expat who was told he could not smoke the chunk of weed he had in his pocket there. His disgruntlement only grew when Conny pointed out that he was smoking a cigarette under a no-smoking sign. He was even defiant, I would hazard a guess that he assumed Conny was one of those smoking police types who will ask you not to smoke near them. When she informed him that she didn’t give two fucks about his smoking as he is entitled to if he chooses, but the fact that we were on a building constructed of some very dry bamboo, he did become a little more polite.

Holly however had a craving for a pie. Having seen them at the bakery earlier, Conny and I were happy to inform her they looked awesome. So to the pub we went and fine pies were munched.

I liked talking to Holly. She’s a young girl, recently university’d, but she is also bright and a bit of a thinker. We talked philosophy and politics and such. Normally topics that can land a hard brained softy like me in hot and deep water. But she is smart enough to understand that we may differ on our opinions to the solutions, as her approach leans more right as opposed to my left leans, we want essentially the same thing, good shit for everyone.

Our next destination was Chiang Rai. It was on this bus we met another wise young soul, Ivan. This time from Switzerland. Again only a youngster, but a youngster with a brain. Much like Holly, he isn’t your average “young traveller” (this nomenclature will become apparent and appropriate in my next piece I will some times refer to them as YTCs). Having travelled a good way and still got a bit to go, he’s enjoying himself, but he also appreciates that coming to these places teaches you to appreciate back home in Europe, particularly us in our Germanic parts of the world. I’m a bit tired of the “experience” this and “culture” that of the “young traveller” because really they appear or claim to come here for both yet are blinkered to either. But again, more of that in the next piece. However, Ivan, as Conny and I have discussed, can’t fucking wait to be able to eat Fondue or Käsespätzle and the wonders of good dairy. We will be happy in areas of outstanding natural beauty without the need to sweat profusely through ones eyeballs. It’s not that we are not enjoying our “experience” or witnessing and learning about different “culture”. We are just also honest that its quite good where we are from too, and we don’t have to pretend that the world is “sooooooooo much better in Thailand, I wish I was there”. If I’m honest I like complete pavements and no piles of litter on the floor on my way to the pub. It was quite refreshing to meet someone with the same thoughts and balls to say it.

We stopped the bus at the White Temple in Chiang Rai. If I may have mentioned that the temples are numerous, and may have conveyed that if you have seen one you have seen them all. This one doesn’t fit that bill. Part Sci-fi, part Gothic horror with a Buddha in the middle it is a sight to behold. As you get to the walkway in front, there is a pond of arms reaching to you, for what appears to be dear life. The donation pots are hollowed out skulls suspended amongst monsters that are eating other monsters. The surrounds are populated with things that look like power rangers or pokemon. It’s all a bit fucked up. Chiang Rai itself is nothing more than a gate way to Laos in reality. Yes it has a night market where Conny got a nice hotpot (a clay Fondue Chinoise affair, where you cook your own food in a broth, I would have loved to try it but sadly the only had Chicken broth) and yes the main strip is nice and neat. But really we were only there to get the bus to Laos. Oh and it has the Cat Cafe (Cat’n’a Cup, to be precise) A fucking bonkers idea. A cafe, where you eat or drink surrounded by cats. We went in for breakfast, we chose to eat that out in the no cat zone. However, afterwards we headed in for coffee and Uno. The cats, for the most part, were aloof, nonchalent…as cats do tend to be. There was the odd one that would come for a stroke, some lay there being as handsome as they could, others were probably plotting murderous ways to destroy us and take over the world once they had eaten us. Others were super cute. There was one fluffball that bit Conny. That made me smile. But seriously, the coffee is decent, the breakfast was nice and the cats as entertainment is so fucking bizarre it can’t be anything but brilliant.

Next stop Laos. We had booked a van to the border to a slowboat down to Luang Prabang, 30 seconds in to the bus ride, I could tell that my piss was on heat and soon to be boiling. I thought someone might even die. That you can read about in the next piece.