S-21 Prisoner

The skull of this prisoner was found and shows the gunshot wound to the skull. This was one of many.

Tragedies of Cambodia

We caught our bus from Phnom Penh which was a glorious eight hour journey with a brat sitting behind us crying the whole way! And when I mean the whole way I mean the WHOLE eight hours! The border crossing was suprisingly easy and the office was quite fancy for such a poor country. Ben had to throw away his used bullets due to a metal detector :-( . Met a friendly polish journalist who was doing some visa fiddling to stay in Vietnam working. After finally reaching Cambodian soil the heat was immense! Easily 100°! Back on the bus we continued the next four hours until we arrived in Phnom Penh. Straight away you could see the poverty, children with no shoes, shanty homes, wasteland. We spoke about how much they had suffered from the Khmer Rouge and were unsure what the people would be like despite the praises they'd got. We arrived in Phnom Penh and didnt get too harassed by tuk tuks, then walked to our hotel in the intense heat. Found a nice place for once and offloaded the bags and walked the mile to S21 prison. During the Khmer Rouge reign they had evacuated Phnom Penh and converted the local school into a prison and place of horrific torture. "The sheer normality of this prison really hits home as it was just a school in the middle of the community surrounded by homes shops and trees". Inside we found cells (classrooms) that still had the beds and few belongings left from each prisoner, and the torture devices used on the captives. It really was upsetting, they had pictures of all the men, women and children that had been kept in S-21 and chances are sadly most of them died there. The people who where kept here had done nothing wrong, teachers, doctors, people who wore glasses, people with soft hands, the list goes on with eveything the Khmer Rouge government were against. After spending three hours here we decided it was enough and we left feeling a terrible sadness for the people who tragically died in S21 and for the people of Cambodia for thier suffering.
We went back to our room and had a shower and got changed and headed out to a local family run restaurant called Mammas! We had a lovely meal here which we waited on by the familys lovely children :-) after our tea we got talking to the owners husband Thon. He was interested in what we did at home and how we came to be in Cambodia. Turned out he was a lecturer for the Uni of Cambodia! He told us how he learnt english and how is trying to.make a better life for his family. He really was a lovely man. He invited us to go on an expedition with his university class all we would need to pay for was accommodation. It sounded great and we would have went along but it lasted untill April 1st and we need to be back in Thailand then, so we took his email he said if we needed any help or advice on anything in Cambodia we could contact him. He was a gentleman! We left and went and got an ice cream and started the long walk back to our hotel.
Today we made our way to the Grand Temple grounds. It was about 3km walk from our hotel and close to the Tonle Sap river. When we got there they wouldnt let Gem in with her vest top on so we bought her a really cool Khmer Dance tshirt. We seen the grand temple which was used for the Kings talks and you could see his throne from the window as you werent allowed in! There were many other buildings including the Silver Pagoda which despite the name we couldnt see silver anywhere! We had a look at our Cambodge Bible and found that the floor was made up of thousands of silver tiles and most were protected by bamboo mats but you could see a few in places. After spending a few hours there we went to the nearest irish pub for some home cooked scoff (burger, chips & beans). We booked our bus to Siem Reap and started walking back to our hotel in torrential rains after buying some terrible overcoats for a quid! As we got back we realised our neighbours specialty was bags of fanta! So we picked two up and called it a night!
We got up early today and decided to go with the hotels tuk.tuk driver Ruun and went to Cambodias Genocidal Museum also known as the "the killing fields" This was where they have recoverd over 9000 bodies that were killed by the Khmer Rouge. There is a monument in the middle of the field with thousands of skulls bones and.clothes that they still are unsure of who they belong to. We had a headset to listen to on the way round with the horrors and true storys of wh at happened here. When we started to walk around a thunder storm came from nowhere with terrential rain and thunder and lightning like we have never see before. With the weather and listening to the stories on the headset it felt so surreal and really added to the gloomy and depressing atmoshpere of this place. As we walked around because the rain washed away a top layer of soil it unearthed bones and rags that had yet to be uncovered. We were warned about this but it doesnt prepare you. We found a tooth and a shin bone and a few rags and it really brought home the scale of death in this place if 30 years on there is still bones and clothes being discovered on a weekly basis. They say because the people suffered so badly thier souls cannot rest and that is why thier bones are still being found. After around 3 hours here we left feeling extremely sad and amazed at how the people of Cambodia are so lovely after all the hardship they have endured.
We went home to pack our bags as we leave tomorow and then.went out for tea. We walked down the road for tea sat down in.a small restaurant, our bill came to $6.65 and we had ,$6.75!! Phew that was close! We payed up and walked home with no money left and decided a night watching a film on tv was on the cards haha!
We got up early today checked out of our hotel, and began the 3km walk to the bus station. Now you may be thinking 3km is not that far! But when its over 100° and youve got a heavy backpack on, let me tell u...its far haha!! We got to the bus station, it felt like we were a stone lighter haha! We bought some oranges for the 6 hour bus journey and boarded.

Cu Chi Tunnels - Tight Squeeze!

Ho Chi Minh City

Ho Chi Minh City

After our ten hour sleeper train we arrived at Saigon! Strapped on our bags and walked to the War Remnants Museum which turned out to be pretty upsetting. There were lots descriptions and photographs of the torture administered to the prisoners of the Vietnam War. The most shocking were the removal of teeth, decapitation and nailing of body parts...We headed in from the "Tiger Cage" (the tiger cage was a cage 2ft by 5ft by 1ft and there would be up to three people imprisoned and tourtured in them) into the memorial building. More shocking photographs, footage and weaponry were on display in here aswell as some disturbing facts about the chemical bombs americans dropped on the innocent and the suffering of the people now 30+ years later.

We left the museum and headed to the backpackers area and found the perfect $10 room. Offloaded the bags, quick shower and change and headed to subway for breakie! We booked our tours and buses, done our laundry and headed to Ben Dinh market for a wander. We ended our day with some local grub and had an early one ahead of tomorrows visit to Cu Chi tunnels and the Firing Range!

Cu chi tunnels day! Jumped on the bus with our brews and off we went! 90mins later we arrived in the middle of a village and could already here the gun fire. We travelled along the path seeing various hideouts and traps used to catch and kill american soldiers. We stopped for lunch and to visit the shooting range! There were three machine guns and four rifles we chose the carbine Rifle :-) Gem shot 2 rounds and was too scared to do more and I shot the other 8. You dont realise how loud a gun is until you fire one! We then carried on the tour and climbed through some seriously claustrophobic tunnels. We had now finished the tour and completely lost our group along with our bus and had to find another bus to get on...we managed to jump on another bus though and were home for 3 and went to Kims Tour company to make a small complaint...which ended pretty well by getting back 300,000 dong (£10!) which was what we paid! The rest of the day was spent preparing for our border crossing into Cambodia tomorrow!

Nha Trang...fancy ay?

Aki Ra

After our six hour bus journey travelling through some seriously poverty stricken villages we arrived in Siem Reap. After looking at the map and not having a clue were we got dropped off we thumbed a tuk tuk with two Polish people already in it, rammed our bags in and hung off the sides for a dollar each! Scared of the police we got dropped off outside the centre by the driver and walked in. We failed miserably to find Hotel 89 recommended by our illegal liquor making hungarian mate we were directed by a moto rider "hotel cheap cheap thata way!" which we listened to for once and he was right! $3 each with air con and ensuite done just fine. After a visit to the night market and some tasty street food we called it a night!

Todays plan was to go the 8th wonder of the world - Angkor Wat...which never happened because we didnt get to bed early enough! So we decided we would visit the other popular tourist trap - The Landmine Museum. We took a tuk tuk (?) and travelled through lots of villages along the way. Many places had wells donated by companies and people from around the world which looked to be helping the local farming immensely. As we drove through in a typical Cambodian way, the children smiled with whatever teeth they had, waved at us and shouted helooo! We arrived at the Landmine museum and read the story about how the founder Aki Ra - an ex child soldier taken from his parents to plant mines for the Khmer Rouge - had dedicated his life to removing what he had planted many years ago. Aki was an expert at his trade and until 2009 his only tools were a spear for prodding and a knife for disassembling. The government made Aki Ra stop using this method and use metal detectors and were protective clothing not his usual shorts and sandals approach. Inside his museum was a short film on his life and many of the deactivated mines Aki Ra has defused. There was a souvenir shop we got tshirts from and other bits as all.the proceeds go to the children. Behind the museum is an orphanage which houses 20 or so children from local communities who are disabled through mine explosions. We spoke to a worker at the Museum named Bill Morse who now lives in Cambodia and has dedicated his life to the cause along with his wife. We had dinner in the Orphan Cafe outside and headed back to Siem Reap for a few drinks in Pub street and an early night for the Angkor Wat tomorrow.
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Nha Trang!

So after our booze cruise we decided it would be a good idea for a detox in Nha Trangs famous spa Thap Ba.We decided to do it on our own and hired a bike between us instead of getting ripped off by someone. What we didnt realise was it was an 11 mile round trip and 29°...Bens legs were nackered when we got back haha It was a brilliant day we had a mud bath, mineral bath, full body massage, jacuzzi and pool with waterfalls! When we were getting our massage Ben was delighted to hear he looked like the guy out the titanic...Leonardo Di Caprio! I just started laughing and thought she had some of that massage oil in her eye! Now thanks to her I have to spend the whole holiday with Ben telling me he looks like Leo! After dodging the traffic and nearly getting lost we made it back in one piece. We got some delicious sea food and went back the hotel to relax..

Vin Pearl day was next which is an island over the sea from Nha Trang were ya get the worlds longest cable car over the sea to the island! It was pretty cool and took about 15mins the views were amazin!! We got to Vinpearl and there was sooo much to do, first of all we started with the waterpark which had loads of brilliant slides and ben made me go on the biggest one first! I got dead scared but loved it in the end! We went on loads more slides and a wave pool! We then went on a roller coaster and a few rides and watched the animal show. We followed it all with a meal by the sea and ate the local delicacy Snake head fish with rice! We got the cable car back and met the dutch lads for drinks on the beach!

We spent our days lazing on the beaches and our nights meeting up with the Dutch lads drinking strong licquor as they say. We taught them scouse they tought us Dutch and we always seemed to end up in the why not bar until all hours! We even had our paddys day there in honour of all our irish friends! Gem spoilt herself to a manicure and pedicure for two quid on the last day :-P And from Nha Trang we left on the night train to Saigon in just ten hours

Our Map

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Saigon Special Brew!

Booze cruise number 2!

Day - 39

So after our rude awakening by the builders we decided to get up and go n explore Nha Trang. We had a walk around the town not before stopping for some noodle soup brekkie tho! Nha Trang is a beachy town with a centre of shops bars n restaurants. After we had wandered around we decided to relax on beach, it's known as one of the 6 most beautiful beaches in the world! And it is beautiful! Untill...it started raining haha! We might as well been at burbo bank haha! So we decided to head back the room n get ready for our boat journey!

After coming back the room got showered and dressed and headed to the bar to meet the rest of the gang. After having a catch up on what everyone had been doing we got onto the boat and had to do a death jump onto the boat, there was like a 2 meter gap between the boat n the side n ya had to jump across..! Scary! So we got on the boat played lots of drinking games...ate spring rolls...and our mission was to drink the boat dry...so u can imagine how the night ended haha!!!

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Viet Breakie

A local specialty! Delicious!! Alot nicer than it looks.. :-)

Which ways Nha Trang?

Day 38

The walk to the station...started early and stopped for some local breakfast (spicy chicken noodle soup) along the way. Picked up some fresh fruit an water and got to the station just in time or the 10 hour day train down south. This was by far the hardest train yet with it being in the day and a seated train full of locals. Gem had some fellas stinky foot stuck in her face she was nearly sick haha! Finished the Da Vinci code, finished Stephen Kings The Mist AND had a sleep! We eventually rolled in around nine and started another mile walk which might sound easy! BUT when it's about 80 degrees as humid as hell and with a 15 kg rucksack on you start to get abit agitated! Sooo we got to the hotel with the old woman shouting "MR BEN???" and were told our room was only on the fourth floor with no lift. Without putting the bags down we done the seventy steps to our room shoeless (taken off when we came in btw). Our room was like heaven as you could imagine. It even has a flat screen tv! With english channels!!!! We dropped our bags and went to meet the gang at the nearby bar. We went for some fried rice and to get our tickets for tomorrows booze cruise!! After retiring to our room sleep was slowly upon us!.........untill.....6am!!! The builders started building!!! As loud as they possibly could in the room next to us grrr! Earplugs in and tried to get some more sleep in....

Danang's Han River

Danang & The First Beach

Day 37

Free breakie in the hotel went down nicely with three free brews :-). Shovelled tha lot down and off we went in a cab to avoid the angry motorbike lender to the train station to catch our train to Danang! An easy 2 and 1/2 hours of the best scenery we'd seen yet and we arrived. After being plagued by cab drivers and the usual lot we mad our way to the hotels (hike! ESP with backpacks lol but we made it! ) but first a stop in a locals cafe for some proper authentic street food which we didn't have a clue what we would get as per but it was delicious and chilli-fied to the max! After leaving with burnt lips we found ourselves a boss little hotel for 12 quid (bit steep but oh well) and dropped our bags at last. Had a minute to chill out then started the HIKE to China Beach which according to Gem was the first place the americans grounded during the Vietnam War. It was also part of a movie and is 30km long. The sand was gorgeous and the locals friendly, we got talking to some local guy who wanted to practice his English, and watched some inline skaters. We chilled there for a while then headed back to the room for a shower and out for tea we went after watching how the Venetian in Macau was built because it was in English! We headed to a pizza place where the proceeds went to deaf people who also worked there but they'd moved and just left a sign telling us...Sooooo we found another pizza shop which smelt delicious n gem couldn't walk past! It was a nice change from rice and noodles. We walked along the canal afterwards and witnessed some street dancing 50 year old women doing some Latino hip wiggling jig which the local men found fascinating. We found a coffee shop and had a brew wrote this blog then wandered back to our hotel in this quaint beech town.

Motorbike Madness!

Ok so maybe this isn't a real blog entry but we thought we would share the love haha!

Top 5 Things you never thought u could carry or do on a motorbike....

5 - A Family 4

4 - A mountain bike

3 - A woman riding side saddle breast feeding

2 - A lampost

1 - 2 wardrobes

And we also saw a postcard with a picture of a man with 3 fully grown pigs on his bike but that couldn't count Cos we never Actually saw it! So there u go the maddest things we have seen on a motorbike! (upto now!) A lil game all the travellers play...we will keep you updated :-) haha! Xx

Night train to Hue

Day 35 + 36

The start of our fifth week in SE Asia and were getting another 12 hour night train! We got our tickets in the morning and then some supplies for the trip. We had our tea at the local noodle shack and packed our bags and checked out the hotel. After the sweaty walk back to the station we were boarding the train in no time. We had a shared cabin with two locals who we swapped Oreos for oranges and weird green fruits that looked like limes but tasted like s***. After 5 minutes gem was asleep and I was not long after! Before we knew it twelve hours had passed and we were pulling up in Hue (pronounced Who-Ay). After being harassed by an endless amount of taxi,tuk tuk,motorbike,cyclo drivers we were on our way to find a hotel. A walk later we had found our top notch room and had rented motorbike to see the local sights. Any insurance? I asked and the guy didn't seem to understand the word. Oh well on we went through the maddest 7-way crossroads with no traffic lights you had ever seen to the Citadel. We never entered only done a lap of the place to see the ground which were pretty good anyway! Next was the tomb of Emporer Tu Duc. He apparently built the tomb and beheaded the 100 men who built it so no one would know where his body and treasure laid. People are still unsure whether his body lays in the tomb. After sweating out about a stone we got completely lost on the motorbike and eventually come across what we were looking for - the colosseum they used for fighting lions and elephants. They cruelly removed the teeth and claws of the lions so the elephant always won (to preserve there national animals respect). We then found our way back to the hotel to get washed and dressed again! We headed to the train station to get tickets for the early train to Danang where we would be staying tomorrow night. Back to the room to read the bible (Lonely Planet - Vietnam) and off we headed for tea in a Indian restaurant were we asked for our dish to be hot as the waitress laughed....dunno why coz it wasn't hot at all! Scoffed the food went the shop for water and back the hotel to take the scooter back. Packing our stuff away tonight so an early one is on the cards. Nighty night!

Vietnamese Specialties!

Halong Bay

Day 34

Got up at 7 to get our stuff ready and get downstairs for breakie and a listen to the locals Dance music on full blast over jam on toast and brews.

After brekkie we got on the bus to go on the boat trip to Halong Bay. We got on the bus Ben fell straight asleep n I looked out of the window for three hours lol! (Fun Fact - Half of the Vietnamese populations surname is Nguyen!) So yesterday we thought we wud do a wash as our clothes were gettin smelly so we had our nice clean clothes in our bag along with our books ect...as I got off the bus I dropped the bag of clothes....right into a river....of poo!!!! Omg!!!! Only I cud
Do this!! Ben just looked as if he wasn't even surprised as I brought the bag of pooey clothes n books over to him oops :-o everything was smelly n brown oh dear!! So then I started to nearly be sick because of the smell so i went n got some plastic bags from the shop to put everything in, then I looked at the clothes I had on n the poo somehow had gotten all over my leggings....So there I was standing in the middle of Halong smelling like poo
Covered in poo holding a bag with clothes n books full of poo...kill me now haha!! Ben just laughed!

Ben: I don't think it was poo, who has a poo in the middle of the street? I think it was gem just over reacting!

Gem: Yes but were in South East Asia...it cud be possible, and it smelled like poo!! Anyway after we had both calmed down after the poo incident we got on the boat and sat down to lunch it was delicious fresh fish, rice spring rolls, clams (which we thought we were brave trying lol!) a garlic butter salad n oranges yummy It was delicious but my tummy was feeling a bit off for obvious reasons :-/

After lunch we arrived at the bay it was beautiful really scenic and very foggy which gave it an eerie and ghostly feel. The boat moored and we got off to get into our kayak! Life jackets on and we were paddling in no time. We got in the way of a ship and has to get out the way sharpish as it was beepin it's horn at us! Then as we paddled through a rock and a boat crashed into us coz it didn't stop! We decided to get out the way for a bit coz it wasn't working out so we went into open water and you couldn't see at all! We headed back to the dock after our 40 minute sail and got back on the boat for the next journey.

We then went to a cave found at Halong Bay 19 years ago and walked through it with a tour guide who gave us a little speech :-). The cave had multicolour lights inside and was apparently still alive! We finished the tour and headed back to the boat for the journey back. After a 3 hour bus ride we were back in Hanoi and going out for tea and drinks. Gem was taking forever to leave our room so I pretended I'd left switched the lights off and jumped out the wardrobe. I've never seen anyone so scared in my life. She screamed covered her face jumped up and down, ran back in the bathroom and told me she just nearly thrown up. Once she'd calmed down (no pun intended) I got her some famous Hanoi spring rolls and it was like it never happened! (Fun Fact - People from SE Asia dont eat at home they always eat out!) Tonight we will be leavin Hanoi so weve packed our bags and are checking out early to head for hue tomorrow another night journey from hell were guessin! G'night y'all :-) xxx
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Halong bay...spooky!

One Pillar Pagoda and Vietnam Face

Ho Chi Minh & The Hanoi Hilton

Day 33

Woke up at 8 feeling hungover and started our scheduled sightseeing day. Walked about a mile to the resting place of Ho Chi Minh (the old ruler of Vietnam throughout the 'Nam war). He is seen as something of a idol around here and you could tell because the queue was HUGE. A slow walk later and we met the old fella in his glass now surrounded by soldiers dressed in respectful White uniforms. We then wandered over to the museum and the one pillar pagoda and chilled out for abit. After some much needed hangover sitting around we walked to the 'Hanoi Hilton'. The Hilton was nicknamed by US pilots who were imprisoned here during 'Nam who described it as luxury! We seen some of the torture equipment and the cells of the prisoners and wandered round taking photos. Headed back home and caught a glimpse of the legendary tortoise that lives in the lake brother of the 250kg bad boy stuffed in the lake building. We were all touristed out and went back the hotel to book our next days trip to Halong Bay. Had a nap went out for some food and were back in the Hotel early ish for our next days adventure.

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Hanoi

Day 32

After our crazy bus ride and drinking session last night we had a sleep in and an easy day. We went to see a giant stuffed turtle inside a place of worship on the lake and seen a few people getting some wedding photos taken. Gem was shocked to see a girl wearing brown converse underneath her wedding dress. We stopped for some grease in the local KFC first one of the trip! We then went to see the Lengendary Mr Cuong who sells motorbikes to ride the Coastal road but gutted when we seen his shop was closed :-(. Bumped into the Irish again who told us were the meeting place was for tonight and went to get washed and dressed. After walking round for what seemed an hour we found the spot and a London couple from the Slow boat were waiting for us! We went for some street food and as usual the food was boss! We went to a few bars and the Dutch lads never fancied it coz the next day they were starting there three day trip of Halong Bay and stuck to beer corner. We ended up sitting upstairs in a bar until close with jack, nadia and the irish until we were threw out. Some chicken fried rice on the street later and we were off home to bed!

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The walk of doom

The 27 hour bus ride

Day 30

We checked out our hotel and started getting more supplies for our loooong trip! We got some tuna sandwiches which we made in the hotel reception like scruffs! Walked round for about two hours trying to find a good book shop who would swap our books. Was sad to see Paul Carters book swapped but 'The Da Vinci Code' is supposed to be a good read...Went our favourite Internet cafe for a brew and to upload more photos. Got our visa's and bus tickets and were picked up at 5. It took two hours to get round the corner and by seven we were on our way to the main bus terminal. We were warned about Lao bus times being abit mental and when the say ten they mean twenty so we began to worry...We got on the bus at last and found ourselves with the Irish girls again! We got stuck in poo corner at the back and couldn't even explain how bad it smelt and thought it was goin to be an even longer trip...In our three bed section we were joined by a Dutch lad called Daan (he told me it was the first time he'd slept with a lad but I weren't too sure) who laughed about being minorities and getting stuck at the back! Gem freaked out after being at the back for five seconds saying she was having some kind of claustrophobic panic attack. We had an argument wit the conducter who let gem sit in his seat for a couple of hours.

Gem - Ok, so it was supposed to be a couple of hours...turned out to be one hour! The men on the bus were so angry at us we think because we are White lol! Pointing and shouting at us to stay in the corner at the back haha! Me ben and Daan ended up squashed in a coffin like corner that smelt of wee...oh great 24 hours of this!!! So night time came and so did the snoring......Jesus some people can't half snore!! So between the snoring and the constant playing of loud music by the horrible little bus men..(they would wait until we were all asleep then play some Laos style music as loud as possible..wake everyone up...then turn it off and they would go asleep!!) Ha this was like some form of torture! So we reached the border and was awakened at 6am by Daan saying hurry up we need to go the immigration, so we got up and were greeted with a freezing cold fog, so we walked over to the immigration office and the madness continued....! The little bus men in their fluorescent orange tops made an appearance again, they began pushing and I mean elbows, shoulders, standing on toes haha, to move us all out of the way. They pushed to the front with a bag full of the priority locals passports (they didn't ask us for ours!) while we stood looking like idiots getting pushed from here to there.

Ben - Eventually we had enough and the ten of us pushed them out the way and we got out passports signed and got moving down the foggy road. You couldn't see ten feet in front of you but we were told to keep walking for 15 minutes straight ahead. It was like a scene out of a horror film. We kept walking expecting to meet a load of zombies round the corner and just accepted that we was gonna die. There wasnt any zombies but we found all our luggage had been thrown off the bus and we thought they had gone without us. We got out passports stamped again and walked down zombie road a bit longer then found our boss bus. They had driven the locals though the Borders and over hills but decided we (the europeans) could walk it which was great...After the bus drivers had finished there hour long breakfast while we sat on the bus waiting they decided to swap busses and we were on our way again. After a read and another few sleeps we rolled into Hanoi at about 7:30 (27 hours later). We got mobbed by around 20 cab drivers for a lift then all decided to get in a minibus for a quid each which turned out alright. The fella who ran the minibus also had a hotel which we decided to stay in and it turned out to be the best one yet! Hanoi is cold and wet like home but a nice compared to the humidity and heat of other cities. Pants and jackets on and we were out again at 8:30 to sample the local dish which was a 'meat' soup which gem didnt fancy and i'm pretty sure it was dog (a vietnamese delicacy!). Ate the dog and we were having beer Hanoi in a place like the newz bar with newz bar prices. Jibbed tha and we were in beer corner sitting on 6 inch high stools swigging beer for 60p a pint. Few drinks later we were playing drinking games in our hotel and learning Dutch slang and losing badly. Bed was calling. 2 am.

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Preparing for 'Nam

Day - 29

So today we had a well needed and well deserved lie in (yanno cos r life is so hard at the moment like ;-p) and got up to have a wander round Vientiene. It's a really nice place quite small and reminds ya a bit of France. We decided to buy a book on Vietnam coz we don't want to miss anything so a little barter with the bookshop and the book was ares! We are booking to go to Hanoi tomorrow which is the capital of Vietnam and it is a 24 hour bus journey from Vientiane...apparently it's not that bad of a trip! We got our visas and bus tickets and got some noodle soup with pork for breakfast :-). We headed back to the room to start packing up our bags and got washed and dressed. We headed to an Internet cafe were it took an hour and six computers to upload 45 photos for you lot so you better appreciate em! ;-). Bumped into an Irish friend from Vang Vieng and got chatting about where to meet that night for a drink (no suprises there!). He was with a friend who straight away said 'Scousers?' which we tend to think of as a bad thing but he said that he loved us! He'd spent "the best five years of my life" there and went to the same Uni as gem so they got on well straight away. We got ourselves some tea at a traditional Lao cafe and headed the bar to meet the lads. After a few there we called it a night and went home to prepare for our long trip!

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