Luang Prabang

So i left Chiang Mai and arrived in Luang Prabang. I met some friends in the airport in Chiang Mai named Jeanette and Malcolm who are 50 somethings who volunteer teach abroad. That is awesome. They were so much more in touch with local dealings than i could have ever imagined i would have learned being a solo traveler. I got on our puddle jumping jet, full of 19 rows of 4) and we basically Top Gun flew through northern Lao mountains to land the plane! Amazing scenery! By the way, it is Lao and not Laos, just learned that in asia. Laos frowned upon here. Lao is smiled upon. So i got a personal tuk tuck with Jeannette and Malcolm who had set it up previously wiht Mr. Pong. I just got a little lucky meetin ghooked up people in town. They introduced me to ColdRiver Guesthouse and i started off. I actaully met my friend David, from the Hillt tribe trek, while getting out of the tuk tuk! He was with Aroe, a Finnish guy, we caught up a bit about his riverboat ride and all. Checked out the night mkt and i ate the hell out of an 8000 kip buffet, one dollar american. We made friends with a Malaysian couple from Kuala Lumpur named Weia and Eugene, and headed to Lao Lao Garden for drinks. Just saying lao is cheap...3 US dollars bought me 12 shots of Lao Lao. Was a fun night, but not too crazy because there is a curfew in Luang Prabang of midnight. So i hustled back to my guesthouse and barely got in before midnight.

Next day i met Aroe and David at lunch and we met up with Henry, a friend of Josephine and Whitfield, and a fellow fucking American! Caught up about his travels for a bit and then we all set up our trip to Vang Vieng. Henry grabbed a tiger snooze while we all rented(hired if you are british, haha) for a ride up the Mekong. Talk about a big huge monster river, this is it. Breathtaking scenery wiht mountains, river, trees, people wrking in fields, living off of nothing, selling fruit for nothing. I was blown away by how much we live on compared to here. I mean they say that a Lao native lives on a dollar a day and sleeps in a hut wiht no running water or electricity, and no meat. NO MEAT! i couldnt be Lao for just taht reason, il spend money to eat some damn steak. Very nice people all the time and extremely country.

Met back up with Henry at Cold River Guesthouse adn headed to dinner wiht a british couple we had met. OK, get ready to be jealous, we ate dinner during sunset with a group of six people comprised of 2 americans, 3 brits, a Finlander(FIn?) overlooking the Mekong River at sunset. My green curry with rice was delicious and my two Lao beers put up a fight for best meal on the table. Then we showed Henry the night mkt and headed to Hive bar for a bit. We were all dead and had an early mornign so sleep won out.

Woke up at 7:30 caught our minivan full of 12 people for a 5 hour trip to Vang Vieng. Oh wait, did i say 5 hours, haha. That was a lie they told us at the bus station because it definitly took 8 hours to actuyally get through all the mountain switchbacks and windy roads. ALl in all i cant complain because the whole time i felt like i was in Jurassic Park or even more recent...Avatar mountains in the sky...Pandora! It was some of the most beautiful views ive ever had in my life. Our bus had a French couple, a Norwegian girl, a couple from New Zealand, two German/Swiss girls. Cool trip and Henry even busted out the ipod to rock some tunes to make the trip more enjoyable, nice move. Got to Vang Vieng a couple of hours ago and got our hostel, oh wait, i meant bungalow overlooking the river under the gorgeous mountainside. It is amazing here. Henry, David, Aroe, and I dropped our stuff and grabbed a bucket of whiskey and dinner and now i am about to hit napland before we rock the hell out of Vang Vieng. Crazy how many groups of friends i have already met here who i saw somewhere else. Gonna be a good night

Side note: no pictures because we thought me would be able to tube the river today so im on ly in a swimsuit and no camera wire. More to come, hope everyone back home is having fun and I wish you all were doing this with me.