Pak Beng. That's pretty much all there is to the town.

"You've heard of earthworm?", he asked me during our first conversation. I knew he was a Professor and that he was working in the area. So, for some reason I thought he was referring to some sort of 'project earthworm', that any Westerner with a heart should know about. Perhaps some kind of Oxfam-type scheme, where they don't just get a fish, they get a net so that they can do their own fishing. Work themselves out of poverty. That sort of thing. Yep, Project Earthworm. I was a big supporter already.

"Have I heard of Earthworm?" I attempted a serious, yet caring face. "I definately recognise the name, and the sort of area it's in, but I'm not exactly sure what it does if i'm honest."

This seemed to confuse him. It evidently wasn't the answer he was after. He resorted to simply repeating himself. "Earthworm." He waggled his finger. This, I understood.

"Oh the actual earthworm. Yeah,I know those." And so he went on to talk at me for half an hour about his earthworm fun. He'd been digging up the critters all over Laos, and had even found one 115cm long in the North. I wasn't sure if this was exceptional in the world of earthworms, so I ventured an entusiastic "wow! That's big!"

"No," he corrected. "Long, not big." Schoolboy error. Clearly, I still had a lot to learn about studying the earthworm.

My wads of Laos cash

Mist on mountains next to Mekong

Gun at the top of Phouset Hill

View from the top of Phouset Hill

The big waterfall at Khoung Si

A tiger

Anyway, the ride back wasn't so bad, as it was mostly downhill. I swallowed my pride and resorted to pushing the bike up any hills, whilst being overtaken by children on bikes without gears. Had a really good street buffet that evening before heading off to the now infamous Hive Bar for the night. Sensible planning, as I was getting picked up at my guesthouse the next morning at 7:30 for the dreaded bus to Vang Vieng.

written by  olliejohnson on September 10, 2006 from Luang Prabang, Laos
from the travel blog: A man from Cockshutt.
Send a Compliment

---

comment on this...

Of course I'd heard that this was probably going to happen from other travellers, but it's still a bit of a surprise when you see it. The reason (as I understand it,)for this armed 'guard' on most journeys between Vang Vieng and Luang Prabang, is due to the linking road (Route 13) having been attacked by bandits fairly heavily in the past. However, I'm really not sure what good it would do anyone to have one armed guy on the bus against a group of armed guys attacking the bus. Personally, I'd much rather that guns were taken out of the bus altogether, so that there was no need for anyone to fire one at anybody else. Luckily though, our trip was bandit free. I don't think our guard was up to much anyway - he spent the whole time sleeping, with his gun poking him in the side, as likely to shoot himself in his sleep than defend us against any outside terrors.

The route for the first 4 hours takes you over and around the most windy mountains you could possibly imagine. And the bus driver didn't like to break too often. So, although I'd managed to get a double seat to myself, any thoughts of lying down for a kip soon went out the window, as I'd either slam my head into the wall, or slide off the seat altogether. Eventually we arrived in Vang Vieng in one piece, and I got a room for about $2 a night.

Vang Vieng is a really weird place. It sort of springs up in the middle of nowhere. It's on part of a massive dusty flat plain, with mountains reaching up to one side and far in the distance; and the river running beside it manages to remain hidden until you're actually on it. The town seems to exist soley because of the backpackers going through it. It's a bit of a surreal place - almost like Las Vegas in that you're not sure if there is a real heart to it anymore, or whether it's just an exotic Centre Parcs.

The Guesthouse I was staying in was one of those that showed Friends from about 8 in the morning to 11-11:30 at night. And, as with most of the bars and restaurants in Vang Vieng, it had really comfortable seating (consisting of raised platforms with loads of cushions and pillows, and a small table in the middle) which, once you'd sat down, was so comfy that it was difficult to sum up the energy to get back up again. You could end up going somewhere for lunch and then staying there till closing time - on my first evening I put myself through 5 hours of Friends (series 10)in a paralysis of comfort. When I came down the nest morning, series 1 was back on, and so it goes on and on and on. Another bar showed Simpsons on a loop, with others showing various movies. On my last night I found one that had a load of Family Guy.

Apart from all this culture, I also managed a couple of day-trip type activities, one of which was the famous (among backpackers anyway) tubing along the river. You get given an old lorry-tyre tube, which you jump in and stop at the various bars along the route back to Vang Vieng. We started at around 1 as we'd heard that things didn't really get going until then, but it turned out that as it was the sunniest day for a long while, the river was absolutely packed. The bars were really good fun, and apart from serving beer and other drinks, had music and massive rope swings that took you really high above the water. We were having such a good time in the bars, that it began to get dark before we realised it - and we had to get the tubes back by dark,
a)because the hire-company asked that you do so, and
b)because otherwise we had no idea of where we were going or when to stop.
So, in a slight panic, our group of about a dozen quickly jumped in the tubes, tried to stick fairly close together, and hoped for the best. It turned out that we needn't have worried, as the neon lights of the bars beyond the finishing points guided us home.



I also spent a day kayaking, but there was only 3 of us doing it, so I had to share a kayak with our Lao guide, who soon quized me as to whether I was married and about my girlfriend. He told me that I should have 3 girlfriends, and although he explanied why, I couldn't really understand him. So I asked him whether he was married. He wasn't. Did he have a girlfriend. No. He laughed when I asked this. I was beginning to feel uncomfortable, but was slightly reassured by the fact that if he tried anything on whilst on the kayak, I'd just capsize us.

We stopped to look at some caves later in the morning. The first one was the 'elephant cave', so called because there was a rock that looked like an elephant in it. And that was about it. There was some buddhist stuff in there too, and our guide (coincidentally called Row) decided it was time for a story. One that would sap our will to live, as it would plod on for the next 15 minutes, with Row using his great theatrical talents to give different voices to all the different characters. I think it was about a dragon that lived in the cave. The monk that lived in there too told him he was lazy. And then so did a monkey. The dragon said that he couldn't do anything else because the villagers were scared of him. So the monk said he could stay and guard the temple. There was no further mention of the monkey.

Then we went to another cave, this time semi-submerged, and to go through we laid on tubes and had to follow a rope. It was actually a bit more fun than I've just made it sound. Afterwards we kayaked back to Vang Vieng.

I'd heard through the grapevine that there really wasn't much to do in Vientiane, so I decided to just book a trip all the way back to Bangkok. This still gave me a couple of hours to have a look around Vientiane in between bus journeys. My impression of it is: it's still a bit French. Went over the 'Friendship bridge' back into Thailand and boarded our 'luxury' sleeper bus that would arrive in Bangkok at 7 in the morning.

written by  olliejohnson on September 12, 2006 from Vang Vieng, Laos
from the travel blog: A man from Cockshutt.
Send a Compliment

---

2 comments...

There are two Phi Phi Islands, with the smaller one (Phi Phi Ley), being the one that was used for The Beach movie. The Thai government wanted to keep at least one fairly untouched, so no 'development' is allowed on Ley; it's all restricted to the bigger island. Both are still stunningly beautiful. The larger island is basically 2 parallel sets of hills joined in the middle by arcs of sand. This creates 2 bays and 2 main beaches (though one is now primarily just a harbour), with a small town in the middle. I took this photo from a viewpoint on one of the hills.


From this, you can see why Phi Phi was hit so badly by the Tsunami - such a thin, flat strip of land. It's only really beginning to properly recover. Over 2,000 people died on the island, the majority of which were tourists hitting the beach first thing. There are now warning signs around the beaches. However with the advice consisting of "run to higher ground", I'm not sure how much good they would really do. At one end of the main beach there is a memorial garden for the victims of the Tsunami. I'm not usually one to say this or that really affected me in any great way - I'm almost perpetually and frustratingly underwhelmed. Perhaps that's why I came travelling. But anyway, walking around this beautiful little garden, decorated with various things that were washed up by the Tsunami, and then seeing the wall with plaques of names of some of the people that died, and photos with notes from relatives... Well, it was very moving. I think it's added to by the fact that there's still a lot of obvious work going on in the clear-up. It makes it all very real rather than just some abstract tragedy. But, as I say, there were plenty of tourists on the Island when I arrived, and it was getting busier and busier, which is what the Island and the people need more than anything.

The Guesthouse I found on the Island was called Ban Thai, and I mention this because the woman that ran it, Mrs Lee, was an absolute legend, and I highly recommend staying there if you get the chance. She's like a mother hen looking after her brood - she runs a tight ship and keeps everyone in line, but goes out of her way to do everything she can to help you out. She learns everyones' names and always asks how you are and where you're off to. When I arrived she was bollocking this Israeli guy for being late, and when I checked in she told me, "don't be stupid" and put loo roll in the toilet. Wouldn't dream of it Mrs Lee.

Every evening I ended up at "Hippies Bar", where I met more and more Irish every night, with pretty much everyone going off to Australia. With all these Irish around me talking about how Australia was the land of opportunity, was the place to go for a better life, how they didn't think they were going back, it was like being taken back 100 years ago to when the Irish flooded to the States.

With the Coup in Bangkok a curfew had been set in place, which I hadn't had the opportunity to notice at Railay. It meant that no music was allowed to be played after 12 for the next 2 weeks. They could serve drinks, but couldn't play music. This seemed pretty pointless to me, as people still stayed out till the morning regardless of the lack of music.

spent one of the days here on a boat and snorkeling trip around the Islands with 4 Canadians and an English girl from my Guesthouse. Had a really cool day relaxing amongst some of the best scenary I'd seen so far. We went to Shark Point (which was sadly devoid of sharks), Bamboo Island, Monkey Island (where I wanted to resume battle, but they weren't up for a fight. Cowards), and finally Maya Bay on Phi Phi Ley. Unfortunately we arrived at low tide, but it was still pretty spectacular.

Mrs Lee woke me up on my last morning on Phi Phi to make sure I caught the 9 O'Clock ferry back to Krabi. She'd organised my whole journey down to Malaysia. She wished me a safe trip and I was on my way.

written by  olliejohnson on September 21, 2006 from Krabi, Thailand
from the travel blog: A man from Cockshutt.
Send a Compliment

---

comment on this...

Long beach on Perhentian Kecil

We shared a taxi into Kota Baharu, from where we'd be able to get a taxi to the port in the morning. Used a map in my Lonely Planet, and actually found what I was looking for. Got a ticket from the Guesthouse for the speedboat to the Perhentian Islands for the morning. This also included the price of the taxi to the port at 8 the next morning. Somehow I slept through my alarm (though to be fair it is just my ipod's alarm turned up to maximum), and was woken by banging on my door at 8 telling me my taxi was waiting. Everything was shoved into the backpack and I dived into the cab offering my sincere apologies to my travel companions not only for my lateness, but for my not having time to shower. The speedboat to the Island was amazing. The guy just floored it.

My 'chalet' on Perhentian Kecil

View from my chalet in Perhentian Kecil

My fellow learners and me

Sunrise over Big Island

The damage caused by a locked out Ollie

Richard Keys and Brian Clough.

I'm now back in Kota Bharu, and will be heading off to the national park in the middle of Malaysia; Teman Nagara, tomorrow, for more animal fun. The 'Jungle railway' to the park leaves the station near Kota Bharu at 6am. It's going to be an early night.

written by  olliejohnson on September 25, 2006 from Kota Baharu, Malaysia
from the travel blog: A man from Cockshutt.
Send a Compliment

---

3 comments...

On the Jungle Railway down to Jerantut

On arriving in Jerantut (the stopping-off point for journeys into the jungle), we decided to share a room there that night, and head off to Kuala Tehan (the town right next to the National Park) the next morning. The main highlight here was the male receptionist with a ridiculously high voice attempting to flirt with us, and his clear interest in Flo. We went to an 'information meeting' in the evening and were lectured at by the guy giving the talk, who had an annoying habit of shouting "get it??!!", at the end of every sentence. We left after half an hour, during which he'd managed to describe only that there were 2 ways to get to the park; bus or boat.

Water Buffalo in the jungle

Flo posing in the Pink Palace

Me and my 'lovely bear and friends' bedsheets

written by  olliejohnson on October 3, 2006 from Jerantut, Malaysia
from the travel blog: A man from Cockshutt.
Send a Compliment

---

comment on this...