Vang Vieng

Laos

August 2005
6 days

Gavin wrote:
After Vietienne we went ot Xiang Xinne (or something) which is basicallyu this backpacker town surrounded by limestone cliffs in the mountains. It was very beautiful and a cool place to hang out. On our first day we went Tubing which is bascialy where you sit on a big tractor inner tube and then float down this massive river (not the Mekong btw) for a few hours. Very beautiful, but the best bit is that
along the banks there are little bars where you can get a beer and they have different things to do. For example zip lining into the river (good laugh), cliff jumping (cant believe i did it - 10m is very high!) a mad swing thing. Oh and there was this cool cave which we swam into but chickened out of going too far as it was pitch black!

Also in Xiang Xinne we went kayaking, which was pretty cool, just more of the same but more tiring as we kayaked for a whole day with a couple of stops including caving, combined with tubing which was interesting and we had lights this time!

Lorraine wrote:
Next stop was Vang Vieng. V. chilled out place mainly with backapackers. One day was spent tubing down the river (not the dirty mekong but a nicer river). This consists of lying in a giant rubber tyre and letting the curretn take you down the river. There were many beer stops along the way where you got pulled in by a big stick. You could also do lots of slip line jumps into the river, I did one ,I think Gav tried them all. Also swam into a cave but we had no torch so had to give up - plus it was freezing. The scenery all the way down the river was amazing - lots of mountains and trees. One of the prettiest places weve been to.Another day was spent on a kayaking trip on the rapids which was fun. Also stopped at another cave which was mostly submerged in water,we went into with tubes and pulled ourselves along on a rope which was pretty cool.

The town was quiet but v. chilled - al ot of the restaurants openly advertised opium shakes and teas and magic mushrooms and weed. Also, a lot o f them showed Friends all day long - not sure how many episodes of friends I watched when I was there but it was a lot!

The river at vang vien
All our activities centered on this amazing river - tubing, cliff jumping, zip lining, caving - great place during the day and at night! well very interesting.