Tubing in the Vang Vieng

Em and I werent exactly sure what to expect, the rough outline that we could gather was that you hired a tubing ring from the town and then you were carted via tuk-tuk some 4 kms up the Mekong River where there were plenty of bars serving all sorts of booze (buckets, beers, 'happy' shakes) etc, much like a Ko Pha Ngan of Laos.

We hired our rings and set off just after lunch and meet a couple of chaps on the way up who like us had never done it before. The first bar that you come to can best be described as a playground for 18-19 year old British kids playing the generic dance music that plagues the Thai Islands. There are ropes and slides and zip-lines and all sorts of shenangines going on, there would only have been a couple 100 people in this bar as it is low season so god knows would peak season with a couple of 1000 people would be like.

The first bar had a very high trapeeze line running over the river which looked kinda fun to do... so I manned up and gave it a go. I got to the top and suddenly realised just how high it was, I let go at the top of the arch of the line and realised just how high I was.. I kicked my legs Jackie Chan style and hit the water a couple of seconds after I thought I should have done.. ie was a lot higher than I thought. I got back to our table and an Argentine girl fancied a go so I went with her to the top.. she managed to face plant off the line and reckoned she cracked a few ribs...

The next 4 hours involved more tubing and sliding and a beer or 2 on the way down... next stop 4000 Islands and Don Det

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written by  Michael Russell on June 7, 2009 from Vang Vieng, Laos
from the travel blog: Escape from Blighty
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