DON DET ISLAND

Once arrived in Pak Se, which is the main tranposrt hub in the South of Laos. I knew I would be here again so the plan was to try and get straight to Don Det as quickly as possible, as the thought of spending 24 hours in a place that seemed to offer very little besides concrete and guest houses didn't appeal.

It must have shown that me and a couple of others were pretty tired after the 12 hour journey from Vientiane, we somehow got fleeced into taking a local transport van thing with benches to go the 145KM instead of the nice air con buses tourists can usually acquire.

This meant that for 4 hours we were playing a game of how many people you can fit on the bus (26 by the way) in something that resembles the van from the Sooty and Sweep show...only smaller!

Turned out to be quite an amusing journey, although was quite relieved when we arrived so that I could shrug off people leaning on me when sleeping and feel the blood rush back to the numb parts again!

Don Det Island itself is about a 10min boat ride from the mainland of Laos and is the Southern most point you can get in Laos without being in Cambodia, which is literally 100m away.
The island as you may expect is pretty small and quiet, and only has limited electricity...so much so that you can tell when the barman is making a fruit shake as the power from the blender dims all the lights!


I've also been on a couple of trips to the waterfalls around here, one of which involved my bad ass bicycle (in the pic) and it's chain coming off over a dozen times, as well as getting 3 punctures!! The future is clearly not orange, and it made 1 hours worth of riding take 3, as well as a stop to the local mechanics, who was the only one who knew what to do!

All very amusing in retrospect, although am glad the island was quite deserted when I shouted obscenities at the top of my voice after the chain fell off for the 12th time and I'd wiped my black greasy hands on my face by accident!

The second trip to the bigger of the waterfalls (biggest in SE Asia) was also good, and again not just for the scenery....we stopped for lunch before heading back to Don Det, and our fascination with the random foods on offer involved me and my tour group that day chipping in for a bowl of deep fried frogs and having a go....and they were actally pretty good!

Although they were very salty, the crunchiness of the little critters was pretty good, and I had a bout 6 or 7 with my beer...not sure if they were that good for me to order them again as a regular snack, or if they would replace the 'mighty peanut' as beer snack of choice but were still good none the less.

This was also the first stage of an eating challenge I have set myself which will be attempted in Cambodia...those who know my girlie phobia of a certain creepy crawley can guess already but will let you know what other random creatures I'll be eating before the 'main event' in Cambodia!

Have just got into Pak Se now again this afternoon...all being well I'll be heading East to the Bolovan Plateau tomorrow which is equally as remote, so will update with my time there once I've left and heading North again before Vietnam (Hanoi).