Here I am in Vientiane, the capitol of Laos. It's a very strange city acutally. Not at all what you'd think of for a capitol of a country. Very sleepy, not all that much to do here either. I'm hanging out here waiting for my Cambodia visa to finish (tomorrow afternoon) so I'm really not doing all that much. But it's good to take a break.

Got here on Friday afternoon after an amazing day of kayaking down the river (no, not the Mekong) from Vang Vieng to Vientiane. Luckily they were 2-person kayaks cause I'd never done that before... Within the first 15 min on the river we capsized... We (me and the guy I was sharing a kayak with) were trying to splash Mairead and Ollie (the Irish couple I've been hanging out with for the past couple weeks). And we ran into a bush that just appeared out of nowhere! and we couldn't just hit this bush head-on... That would have been too easy. Instead we broadsided it and got stuck. One of the guides tried to pull us out and we just had to jump out to get the kayak free from the bush. But hey, it was hot out and the cool river was really nice. Our attempt to go through the rapids also resulted in a capsizing. Here I wasn't quite so smart - instead of letting go of the paddle and grabbing for the kayak I tried to do both and kept getting dragged down. Luckily the rapids weren't very long and I didn't breathe in too much water before getting through. The rest of the trip was less exciting. Except for lunch actually - we got to jump off a cliff into the river! Only about 10 meters but it was still an adrenaline rush...

So by the time we arrived in Vientiane, soaking wet, I was exhausted. And wandering around trying to find a cheap, decent guesthouse while exhausted is not an ideal situation. So we were wandering around the city and all the guesthouses we could find were like $6/night which is really expensive here. I know I know, sounds cheap. But when you're used to paying about $2 a night with a daily budget of around $6... So who did I run into? Stewart, the scottish guy I hung out with at the waterfalls in Luang Prabang! He pointed us in the opposite direction and towards a cheap guesthouse ($3 a night but I bargained them down to $2.50!) So that night Mairead and Ollie collapsed into bed and I hung out with Stewart and an English couple drinking really really good red wine. Who would've thought you could find really good french wine in Laos...

Saturday was a semi-lazy day... Hung out with Mairead and Ollie cause they were leaving that night for Vietnam (probably will run into them again in Cambodia or at least in Thailand for the full moon party). Just walked around the city seeing the non-existantence of sites. But taking in the atmosphere... We were supposed to join Stew and the English couple for some rugby watching at 2 but they never showed (turns out they found a better pub for the viewing) so we enjoyed the aircon and played cards all afternoon. Really nice when you're dealing with really hot weather.

For some reason I had a lot of energy yesterday (Sunday) and got up amazingly early. So I took the opportunity of coolness to walk the 4k to the That Luang... It's a national monument of sorts - religious of course. What it really is is a huge gold square temple. Not all that interesting to see... But the walk there was really nice. And I had great timing... Got back just before it started raining. It didn't stop raining until this morning. Guess we're truely in the wet season now!

Well this is long enough so I'm going to head off. My next plans are to head down south working my way to Cambodia. I'd like to cross into Cambodia from Laos and hopefully that'll work out. If not, I can always cross back into Thailand and then into Cambodia. Where I'm going after Vientiane? It's a bit off the beaten track - well really off the beaten track but supposed to be amazing. It's a tunnel through a mountain that you kayak through (about 4k long) and then a beautiful valley on the other side. I've heard raves from the few who have made it so I'll go check it out. Won't be alone though, thank god... Stew is joining me on this trek and hopefully we won't get stuck in the middle of nowhere! This trip will entail some creative transportation...