Life's a beach!

After a couple more days of exploring Chiang Mai - which is a lovely chilled out (and quite refreshing to be abvle to walk around it without having a bucket of water chucked down your back (ala songkran))- we had decided on a whim to visit Laos aswell... just cos everyone everywhere said we should - damned peer pressure.... !? hehehe... so of we wander to get a traditional slow boat down the mekong to the middle of Laos (Luang Prabang). This is reportedly one of the most uncomfortable horrible things you can choose to do since it's two days of 7 hours sat on wooden benches with no leg room, but it was actaully a really nice couple of days - read books, sat doing nohthing and then read some more - fun :D

Laos is, like everyone says, a wicked country - we original;ly missed it out or plans because it didn't l;ook like thetre's much to do there - and there isn't really, but it''s an awesome place just to be - some how we spent over a week there without even meaning to - i've no idea wheer the time went! Um... we saw some more temples, watched the sunset over the mekong, went kayaking ont he mekong with two girls that we 'knew' (sat together on a bus for 10 mintues) from chiangmai and had run into again... then visisted a cave and thw Whisky village where they make Laolao -lao rice wine - and very nice it is too! The only problem with laos is that just about all the locals are in bed by 10pm... soooo early and there's a lack of anything much to do in the evening - except Hive - so i guess that just makes it easier to meet other foreigners... weird place though - because you all get the slow boat in together, you cant wander around town with out there being someone you know or some one to say hi to - v nice atmosphere.
After Luang Prabang we spent a couple of days in Vientiane - Laos' capital. Which is much like luang prabang, but bigger and with less of the charm... didn't stay there too long, then headed back to thailand to get to the beaches... :D

So, after another 16 hour bus/boat journey (last night on train back we worked outthat we've spent upwards of 90 hours on long distance buses etc so far!) we arrived on Ko Phangan and first sepnt 2 days up the north of the island reading and relaxing in hammocks. Theer after we headed down to the 'party beach' of haad rin. After being initially a little disapointed (alright beach,. but ive seen better, and not much to do in town) we soon got into the swing of things. Get up at 11am/12pm and laze around on the beach until around 6pm when you get dinner and maybe watch sdsome of the 24 hours friends or simpsons episiodes that some cafes play - then maybe move on to another cafe/bar anmd watch one of the nightly free films on offer. Head down to the beach around 10.30pm where there are plenty of bars and you can sit on the sand and watch the fire shows (with fire poi/puy and fire staffs and some of the most beautiful talented guys you're ever liekly to see on a beach). After that, me and nna being little obsessed with puy, we went and asked the guys if we could use their paraffin and then spent the rest of the night playing with the fire puy - sooooo much fun, although we did end up going back every morning completely covered in soot and stinking of paraffin... hohum... great fun though. On our last night there we went to one of the islands half moon parties (since we don't have time to stay til full moon - alas) which is actually not on the beach but in a cool forest setting with lots of glowy uv things - wicked place for a party.

After that, despite our initial questions as to whether to go to the beaches at all, we really didn't want to leave - sooo much fun - but cambodia and vietnam beckon and thus we found ourselves on a lovely over night train back to bangkok last night. Now i'm really really tired.

I guess we'll probably go to cambodia either tomorrow or day after, and spend as little time as possible doing angkor wat and pnom penh and around so that we can use all our visa for Vietnam for the remainder of our time...

I can't believ how quickly time's going - me and anna have been travelling for a month already, which is prastcvailly half our time to gether and then i've only a couple of weeks and i'm home again!!!