Adventures in Laos (Part Two)

So, my days are getting all messed up but Luang Prabang wrap-up goes like this:

We arrived there in the afternoon from the boat and stayed at the Mixay Guesthouse (?) which was simple but was one of the nicer places we stayed in (with the softest bed - all these places have beds that are like wooden boards.) Laura and I walked through the night market which sells things like Laos foods, scarves, souvenir shirts, and bags. All of a sudden the vendors jumped up from their spots, gathered their stuff and started running. I was wondering if it was a police raid but that wouldn't have made sense considering this was a well-known everyday market. Instead I think they spotted some color in the sky and made a run for it because they predicted when the rain was going to come. We went to eat dinner in a French-style bakery restaurant (Luang Prabang has these all over the place and they have delicious looking food.) I went for a pizza (had to for a change) and was too full to get the seven desserts I planned to order from the case.

We were tipped by the often-wrong Lonely Planet to go to Hive Bar which was actually pretty good. It was a dimly lit lounge that played hip hop and reggae (first place I've been to like that in Asia) which totally reminded me of a New York lounge. We met these guys (2 Irish, 1 Welsh, 1 Israeli) who we sat with all night which was good craic.

Next day Laura and I took a boat that held about 15 people to some caves (I forget what they're called.) We stopped at a village along the way known for making wine with dead snakes in the bottle (photo upcoming.) The caves were nice (basically a buddha-worshipping spot with tons of them laid out) but I didn't think the trip was worth it because it took an hour and a half to get there and we stayed for just half an hour (and I wasn't too impressed.) On the way back we stopped at a paper-making village before stopping off at a random tree at the side of the river so the driver could grab a beehive. He was picking live bees out of it, squeezing the honey out and giving cups of it to the kids on the boat, and eating the live larvae, it was so gross!! In the afternoon we went to the nearby waterfalls via a road that had our bodies flying up and down for the entire ride. These waterfalls were my favorite of the trip (I think primarily because of the height) as opposed to the smaller ones in Thailand. We drank fruit shakes out of plastic bags and on the way back met 3 people in our minivan who were actually from NY, the first Americans I'd met on the trip (1 from Niagara Falls, 2 from Farmingdale.)

That night we ate at another French bakery which was soooo good again. Then we went to the same bar as the night before and sat with the same guys. Afterwards we all went to this afterhours Vietnamese bar in the middle of nowhere. Ashley, Becky, Steven, and Pauline (slow boat buddies) all showed up as well so we had a big entourage. We drank for a while as they played really bad 80s heavy metal music videos and when we left the bar people had completely boarded up the doors so it had looked closed from the outside. Major sketch!

More to write starting with our crazy bus ride to Vang Vieng; currently in Hoi An, Vietnam where I had clothes tailor-made but they mostly came out styled like I walked out of 1982. Taking the 20 hour overnight train this afternoon to Saigon.