The first involves a mountain bike, some caves, a river and alot of mud. Yesterday (Tuesday) Dave and I hired out mountain bikes and went exploring on the outskirts of the town. We had to pedal across one of several little fragile bridges (the same one which was absolutely destroyed in last nights downpour), before we came to a series of paths. We biked along the countryside past farms (they're not like farms from NZ), crops, children hauling things from town to market and so on. The road either consisted of small boulders like a river bed or red dirt/clay that was now turned into puddles and mud. By the end of the day my white t-shirt (and my first outing in it) was brown! We explored three caves in toatal, all three you usually have to pay to enter but at none of them was someone collecting the $. In fact, all day we didn't even see any other people looking at any of the caves. The caves were amazing!! Beautiful crevaces and shaes led one past of the cave to another and as couple of them went further into the cliff face than what we were prepared to do. Some of the guide books even warn against travelling without a guide as travellers have been lost for days in the past. Fo one of the caves we had to ditch our bikes and wade through what may have been a tiny creek ankle deep in the past. It was up past my waist and flowing considerably fast. We made it across, went through a bit of bush and ended up at a lovely waterfall. Its all part of the adventure. On the way to the third cave (well we couldn't actually find it and its the one we had actually been looking for all day) my bike gears bent so the trip back to town was a bit harder. We washed our bikes in the river, at that point i felt like a Lao (where the river is used for almost everything and anything).
The second thing involves eating and watching FRIENDS. Lonely Planet summed it up well when it briefed the reader about Laos on page 267, stating, "Vang Vieng eateries will lure you under their roof with the display of hit comedy series on multiple TV's." Actually - don't quote me on the page # or the actual statement but its something to that effect. Every restaurant, and there's hundreds, play episodes of FRIENDS, The Simpsons or the Family Guy all day long. You simply wonder in, lax out on cushions and pillows on a stand above the floor, order something to eat, and watch one of the multile TV's. Great for the rainy season or when you're starving but hard to justify when its good out. Consequently i've now seen Ross's first failed marriage, the trip to Barbados, Mike and Phoebe getting married in the snow and Joey and Rachel almost getting together.
Other than that, its been a bit of reading, a bit of walking around town, and a bit of contemplating life.
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