Vang Vieng like Yangshuo and Halong Bay has the incredible karst teeth potruding from the earth, making the landscape look incredible. The Nam Song River runs through the town and with it holds the world famous tubing spot of Vang Vieng.
What happens here is everyone goes North up the river to an area where there are lakeside bars and gets completely hammered, basically. Im sure you can guess that the place is completely flooded with British backpackers since we are the binge nation. What a horrible label to hold. The bars have lots of different activities for the pissheads to entertain themselves with like beer pong, bucket pong or some shit? and the numerous number of trapeze swings, zip wires, death slides and straight freefall jumping spots into the river. At this time of year as well the water is considerably low for the stunts that some people perform on the apparatus. Legend has it that a few deaths have occured here, mainly from knocks to the head on the rocks that jurt out of the water. We wernt taking any chances.
We had to have a go on the trapeze swings of course, but the water was deep enough there (I checked). I did manage to get a nasty rope burn from some little kid running the trapeze who threw the excess rope of the swing around me by an accident. I managed to remove it from around my neck but still came off with a burn to the arm. No biggie. We also covered one another in black marker pen, with the mark of the day being 'the punch spot' on Vince's arm drawn by yours truly. The following day, he had the biggest bruise, but we just kept telling him he needed to wash the pen off properly.
After the big river piss up, everyone heads back to the main town and continues the drinking there. Theres a lot of drug usage in these parts, primarily shrooms and opium. Im sure I could list a hand full of people who would be in their element here but thats another blog I think. During the night a thunderstorm struck the area and all the power went out, causing the parties to come to an early end. But it was a great day to say the least. We have heard about peopel staying here for 2 even 3 weeks, doing the same thing day in, day out. Once was definately enough for us. There was even talk of a girl who had been working there a year, getting paid 2 quid a day but also recieving free drinks and accomodation........what a loser.
The day after the madness, is usually spent in one of the million and one bars/cafes showing either continuous repeats of 'friends' or 'family guy'. Since Maj was training me up to watch more friends it was a great way to realx the day away. But once again the shitty food of Laos made an appearance. Apart from that, it would have been spot on.
We met a few more people here including 2 sets of 2 Mancs (Beth and Kate, Claire and Kim) a guy called Chris from Tumbridge Wells, who was travelling with Beth and Kate, and a lad from Wakefield who was travelling with the other two, we just knew him as Wakey for the time being.
Since it was unwise to take the camera tubing, we only have a couple of pics here, one of Vince's sore arse. I think him and Maj are getting too close.
Vang Vieng Photo Link: Sorry! Lack of pics here. Couldnt afford to risk losing the camera when drinking. But Check Luang Prabang for the two pictures we did take of the misty mountains!
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