Vang Vieng

At first let me say sorry that I didnt write anything for long time, I am in paradise right now, but this paradise had a problem which is too expensive internet access, almost 4 times more expensive than Vientiane, thatâs why I didnt use of internet very often, but no choice and I have to answer my emails and up load the website, so lets pay it. Ok I won’t eat tonight due to internet expenses!!!! Hahahaha

After I got my visa for Thailand!!!(It is stupid, Thailand is free for many countries and I have to talk about its visa as a subject), I had to stay few more days in Vientiane to receive a parcel that my friend had posted from Iran, so there was no reason to stay there more and I had few days free. I decided to come to Vang Vieng and stay here for 3 days and then cycle back to Vientiane. I have to take a bus to Vang Vieng due to I dont like to cycle a road twice and I am going to cycle back in this road.

Vang Vieng is 150km north of Vientiane and it is located in mountain. The Mekong is passing through that and also surrounded by many green hills and it make it very beautiful. It is a very small town and a spot for tourist. Tubing (flouting on the Mekong on tube), caving and trekking are the popular activities that people do here. On the way coming and in the bus I met Deoralian who is from Switzerland we came here together and we shared a room (it is common; always travelers do it to save money!!!). He is 20 years old and more than 10 months on the trip. After bus dropped us in an airplane land field that is used also as a bus station, just we walked to the main street and after 10min we got a nice room which had a wonderful view from balcony and also good price. So it was the time to make a plan for what we could do in Vang Vieng. We decided to do tubing for first day and trekking and camping on the mountain for second day and also stay over night in mountain, it sounded great.

After a long time that I was in rush, it was wonderful having certain time to relax and enjoy of nature.

The first day we went for tubing and jumping to the river by rope. It was amazing, we rented a tube and then we did hitchhiking for about 12km, and from that point just we were flouting on the river and river brought us down to the town. So nice feeling, just flouting and do nothing, it was the same as my life, flouting and doing nothing, no swimming, no effort to get anything, just trust the river and let it bring you to your place. At night we came back and began to talk about camping, it was for a long time, almost after Nepal I didnt have any camping in nature and I was very happy. The rain over night made us a little bit lazy and we started about 9:30 from our guest house. By few km walking we reached to the market and after providing some supplies we began again to walk along the road to the point of start. We had to cross the river to access the mountain and waterfall that we were looking for. From the when that we did tubing we knew that there is a bridge just near the valley, we turned left to the river a little bit earlier and we found an alternative bridge there, it was hanging bridge and full of movement. So funny and also risky passing the bridge.

After that we began trekking in a wild nature. Just few rice fields and after that just mountain and jungle. After about 3 hours trekking we found that it is so difficult to access the waterfall. I didnt have good shown and just a pair of sandals that is not good for trekking. So just we saw that it is nice to stay there and just relax and enjoy of view. Making spaghetti and tea, was all we did, and also making fire and watching moonrise. In whole night we had rain and just we slept with sound of rain drops which were hitting the tent. Ok I leave you alone to imagine how it was wonderful and how much we enjoyed.

Just I came back and tomorrow I will cycle down to Vientiane for 2 days and then ¦..just GOD knows.

7 Sep 2007