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Beer Lao Beer Lao Beer Lao

Luang Prabang, Laos


Laos is just spectacular....there is no other way to describe it. After much hassle with all the pleasures that come with travelling Thailand, Laos was simply heaven. Louang Phrabang is a beautiful old french colonial town, home to the most prized bhuddha in all of Laos and some of the most nicest sales people you will ever come across in south east asia....no hassle when you walk into a shop and no bother walking down the night market. For once i actually felt very inclined to buy hilltribe handicrafts which are a complete tourist gimmick and I even wouldnt have minded a "same same but different" t-shirt!!!

we spent a good five days here taking in the sights, waterfalls and tigers...yes tigers and the river and trying to get to a museum that was closed on wednesdays, oh and how could i forget watching the world cup with a few Beer Laos in hand....tim's hand that is!

We left the lovely town for Vang Vieng further south where the tourist trap is at the forefront....all you do in this tiny, and i mean tiny place is watch Friends 24/7 at one of the four friends bars and go 'tubing' a recreational sport lets say...where you are placed in a trucks inner tube and float downstream passing bars for beers, jumps and swings and whatever else takes your fancy!

Even though Vang Vieng is a small place it is the most beautiful place to also just hang out and chill to your hearts content....the scenery next to our bangalow says it all!

Moving on to Phonsavan....

We arrived to Phonsavan with one thing on our minds.....what on earth are the Plains of Jars???? Funnily enough when we got there, this is what we found!

These jars are over 2000 years old, and have survived the test of time....including the two million plus bombs that were droppped in the area, of which 127 objects of unexploded ordanance had been removed and destroyed just so that we could see a little of area of the Jars.....Crazy!

No-one has a clear answer as to why the jars are there and what they were used for. Our guide did suggest that in a time of the Giants, these jars were their drinking pots... i think he thought we were foreigners that clearly had a mental age of 7 collectively! Just to give you a scale of these things.....


and the most impressive thing about them is that they are solid stone, and carved out of boulders, making it seemingly impossible to transport from the quarry miles away from the site of the the plains! In all seriousness, the jars are thought to have been used as burial urns, some were found with ashes inside, and many with household/hunting objects placed either underneath the jars or inside them. Nearby is a cave that was used as a cremation site, it also housed the local population in recent times, when the Vietnamese were in hiding bringing the americans and their warfare.


permalink written by  Priya&Tim on June 22, 2006 from Luang Prabang, Laos
from the travel blog: Cheeky Round The World Trip
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yo p and tim, glad to hear your getting about in Laos. figured you would appreciate it much more than Thailand. I am most definately back and wish i wasn't.

safe travels.

b

ps. i missed the tigers! damn!

permalink written by  50watts on July 10, 2006


Mate and Matette,

Hope all is well, just catching up with the Timmy P adventures! Hope all is well and that you are both still enjoying yourselves. The photos are pretty damned impressive and looking like pictures of places that I could never imagine seeing (then there is some balding bloke in shorts and cricket hat in them and it all feel so much more possible).

Much love to you both, look after yourselves and Hope to see you soon. Is it not time for the pit stop soon? When do you pop back?

Stuart

permalink written by  Stuart on July 22, 2006


Hey Tim and Priya,

It's been awhile, we know, and we're glad you're still travelling. We've now been home in Edmonton for nearly 2 months, just long enough to wish we were travelling again!

I just wanted to comment to let you know that the fear of aluminum foil doesn't have an official name, no matter how many websites I consult; but I am happy to report that both Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia and Sesquipedalophobia refer to the fear of long words, that Autodysomophobia is the fear that one has a vile odour, and that Pteronophobia is the fear of being tickled by feathers. That last one is especially useful even though you may not realize it yet. I suggest you become familiar with it since I believe that a feather epidemic is soon to break out in most parts of the civilized world. Word to your mum.

Hope everything is well and you both are happy! We have a few pictures posted online as well, only about half our trip since I've gotten busy since we've been home. Check them out at www.myspace.com/acrossedeyes the link is a little ways down on the right hand side. Also check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Mzv7MswLW4&search=maury%20 to see a maury clip of a woman scared of balloons.

Stay in touch!
-Jordan and Heather

permalink written by  Jordan & Heather on July 23, 2006

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