Tubing in Vang Vieng

Well we finally got to go tubing in Vang Vieng - and if you have read previous posts it was the one thing Dave and I were really excited about doing.

We went with the Canadian couple Kyle and Crystal, and Englishman named Glen, two more from England - English Dave and Leanne, and of course Dave and myself. We hired the tubes, got absolutely no safety briefing; although to their credit you can hire a lifejacket. With our tubes and assorted array of dry bags, 11 of us crammed into the back of a Songathew (ute) and headed up river 4km. The starting point s a bar, and several more bars overhang the riverside on your journey down. Alcohol and water don't tend to mix so its totally something that you would not expect to find anywhere else and certainly not back in NZ. At the first bar there was a swing to which you climb rather nervously up about 15m and get launched into the fast flowing current - and as you can see the water was muddy as. I had a go - of course - and was proud of myself. Im nor a waterbaby or like heights. At this point there were maybe 20 others at the bar ready to descend down stream. By the end of the day there were hundreds. After a bit of swinging we jumped in our tubes and headed downstream to Smile Bar. We had a drink, English Dave tried to perfect his somersault (he steadily got better with the aid of some expert advice and video analysis), and we had a tug of war in the mud path. Yummy! Our third bar, and the one we spent the longest at had a swing and a waterslide. Now these were fun - although Dave and I had to retire after several goes as our bodies were sore from the water entry. We had a couple of buckets (its just what you do alright!) and watched with humour as the lines grew long.

You could tell it was starting to get dark so we headed downstream yet again but just had to make one last bar stop. We played pool (with the cue being a piece of bamboo), petanque and Dave hussled the others at a round of slingshot. By this time it was truly getting dark so we jumped in our tubes and headed for home -only that we didn't get told where to get out. By this stage Dave was sharing his tube with another Canadian girl, a Dutch couple joined us, two Irish chicks and a Frenchman that wouldn't shut up. It was fantastic fun - so much that i heard a story that a couple of people went tubing down the river for 157 consecutive days - and i don't blame them. So that was a brief summary of the trip and hopefully that the videos show you kinda what it was like. What happened for the rest of the night is history.