THE MEKONG MISSION

Am now in Luang Prabang in Laos but the journey here has been quite a long one so thought it worth an entry into the blog on it's own.
In short, it's been a 7 hour bus journey from Chiang Mai to the border town of Chiang Kong, with 2 days of 11 hours on the 'slow' boat to Laos with an overnight stop halfway...which although as the name suggests is pretty slow it's 10 times better and safer than the mentalists that choose the speed boat!
It's basically sitting inside a milk crate with a crash helmet on for 6 hours, everyone I saw coming off was deaf, crippled and wet! Not a good look.

My journey has been far more lesuirely, and because of the route have travelled with the same 7 people for a few days now which has probably been the most sociable I've been...and have now successfully got them all hooked on poker so spent half the journeys and evenings getting there playing that! A right touch.

Got to see a few interesting places on the way as well as the boat stopped off a couple of times. Pictures are from a local (Hmong) village we stopped at, the others are the slow boat leaving Thailand and my new weapon of choice - the hangover proof Beer Lao!

Am now living it up in Luang Prabang so will update with all the stuff from here soon...have a good Crimbo all!