After three nights in Ubud we organised a driver to take us to the mountain village of Munduk in the north of Bali. Andre and Martha joined us on our journey to explore more of the island and share the fee of the driver. First stop along the way was the Bali Butterfly Park. We were unsure if we wanted to see this but for 50,000rp each we headed into the netting to see the butterflies. There was an assortment of butterflies and moths as well as stick insets and beetles which the staff are very eager to place upon your body. The conditions for the animals were not great, very poor for the spiders, and if you do not like butterfly taxidermy then this may not be the place for you.

Further driving north we approached one of Bali’s many volcanoes where another of its most sacred of temples; Pura Taman Ayun located at the very foot of the volcano. Everyone who enters will need to wear a sarong for most temples, which you can rent on arrival if you do not have one already. We explored the temple, walked around the lake complex and whilst chatting to a local man he suggested to visit the river. It looks like fresh water from the mountains but it wasn’t worth the walk down to see it with rubbish festooned on the sides with some very rough toilets.

Driving around Bali you get to see the real scope of the island. Pretty much everywhere is utilised for village and town life, food production and catering for tourists. The rice terraces at Jatiluwih were impressive with hundreds of thousands of green tones fluctuating between the shafts of sunlight. Our driver took us to a buffet lunch overlooking the terraces costing 70,000rp which we decided not to participate in as the food looked poor and expensive for some non authentic Indonesian food, instead we heading further down the road to somewhere more appealing. The second temple stop of the day was at the lake temple Pura Ulun Danu. Strangely no sarong was needed here, it looked more like a business opportunity rather than a holy site, nether the less we visited and enjoyed the water temple combo.

We eventually arrived in Munduk 7 hours after leaving Ubud and haggled for a room at the Karang Sari for 180,000rp per night. The room was nice enough, it just needed a thicker coat of paint on the ceiling and walls to stop it looking shabby. After waving goodbye to Andre and Martha for their return journey to Ubud we explored the street(s) of Munduk. The temperature here is much lower than the surrounding area due to the slight increase in altitude and we had a nice sunset whilst eating at Karang Sari overlooking the valleys below.

The owner of Karang Sari invited us to watch a group of local boys practicing gambelan, a traditional Indonesian style of music to be preformed at a temple ceremony. They were very good and we enjoyed a 15 minute show before our ears could no longer take the high decibel limit. Before bed we met our other room mate, a big black spider who rented the bathroom, although it gave Helen a good scare we didn’t mind and let he/she live in peace.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0, 18mm f4, 90mm Tele-Elmarit f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

So last night in our tent lovingly borrowed from Joe and our last campground in America…at least this time round! We packed up and retraced our journey back up the 89 with another stop at Dessert View on the way.

We had been booked into The Lake Powell Resort courtesy of Ryan who we met earlier in September hiking in Mount Hood. His mother-in-law works there and they sorted us out with some friends and family discount. Thanks Ryan and Paula! With a stop in Page and the Glen Canyon Dam we arrived at Lake Powell at around noon but we couldn’t check in until 1pm. When we did we had room number 666! Good job neither of us are superstitious! We booked a table at the restaurant and enjoyed some of the spa pool action! The sun was in and out and we’d already driven through storms and hail stones so it wasn’t the best afternoon for a sunbathe but we wanted to take advantage of our accommodation!

Later we enjoyed a meal at the restaurant, it’s a good location due to the views over the lake but the food was a little overpriced and the quality could be upped somewhat, we were in and out of there in 45 minutes!!

The next morning we had been booked onto a boat tour again thanks to Ryan and Paula! The tour is one of the classic things to do on the lake whilst visiting the national park as most attractions are best seen on a boat tour. It was again chucking it down when we set off at 7.30am, we didn’t have high expectations and the first part of the tour was mostly poor visibility but eventually we arrived at some sights. Due to the rain there were many waterfalls forming on the canyon rock which is very rare for the area. We took turns to go on the top deck, some people getting drenched in their hoodies! The star attraction of the park is Rainbow Bridge, a natural bridge formation in the rock, it looks amazing on a sunny day and didn’t do too badly today either. The only problem was we couldn’t hike very far as the paths were river-logged. Others marched on through the water in their trainers but we didn’t fancy this!

After around 30 minutes we all got back onto the boat and had a further 1.5 hour journey taking in more sights throughout the lake, canyon area. We even enjoyed some sunshine later on. It is a really beautiful area but we have to say that we probably would have enjoyed it more with better weather. The tour got in nice and early for us though so we made tracks for Phoenix as soon as we could.

It took a further 4.5 hours to get to Phoenix through more rain and thunder storms, moody skies and bright sun bursts created an array of rainbows! When we got to Dave’s place (Helen’s cousin) we set off straight away for a bite to eat down the road and then back at his lovely house with a glass of red wine. Home comforts!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)

Another day and another move to a new destination, this time Golden on the Kicking Horse River. Along the way we stopped to have a look at the the spiral tunnels which take the Canadian Pacific Railway trains on a spiral journey through the mountains. It was pretty cool to see the train making its way through, I’m sure a train spotters dream!

Another stop to break up the journey was at a waterfall and then further along at Lake Yoho where we embarked on a 5k walk around the lakes edge. It was nice to stretch the legs and the sun was warm so very pleasant. A few brave souls even took a dip in the icy waters!

We arrived in Golden, picked up some provisions and set up camp at the edge on the river as well as the main Pacific Railway route, good job we packed some ear plugs, those trains are over 100 carriages long! The group of lads decided to cook an Asian inspired dinner which was pretty awesome and we had an early night, white water rafting is why you come to Golden and that’s tomorrows plan.

Through Wet ‘n’ Wild and with safety instructions observed and standard issue wet suits adorned we boarded an old school bus and headed to the start of the rapids. For 75 CAD we were to be flung down a level 3 section of the river with an option to take on the level 4 if we desired. Both of us found the level 3 pretty straight forward and wanted more so we stayed on, moved further down stream to miss a level 5 and started again minus three of our comprades. This was more adrenaline fuelled, but again we wanted more, maybe we should try it again in the rainy season. David even piloted / steered us through a level 3 which was good fun. Upon paying for the extra session it was 25 CAD each so a total of 100 CAD each, which we felt was a little expensive, but not as much as we were expecting.

After three hours of rafting we were all pretty tired so it was great news to hear that the tour guides, Eric and Zak, had decided to cook us up an all American BBQ! A real feast… stuffed. A quick lesson and after no time about eight of us were all playing some poker, matchsticks as coinage, which was good fun, especially when some people thought they had a great hand, when in fact they had nothing! Hehe sorry Wym!

Up very early again the next day for our long journey to Vancouver at 7.45am. We stopped at a Redwood Forest as well as an area called Skunk Cabbage, but this was closed as a family of Bears had moved in. Another stop in Hope, famed for the filming of Rambo, was a surreal experience. A 7.5hr van journey saw us arrive in the Vancouver area and set up camp for the very last time (on our intrepid tour!), followed by a visit to a pizza restaurant.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM & Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX5 processed in Lightroom 3)

We had an early start with showers, packing and breakfast at the hostel before meeting the rest of the group and our tour leader at 8am. In total there were 10 of us in our group with 6 lads and 4 lasses plus Eric who was to be our tour leader for the next 2 weeks, we knew from the start we would be in line for a few good laughs along the way. After introductions and a little bit of where we’re from and why we booked the trip, we collected our things and found the van, our solid companion for the next fortnight outside in the car-park. Another group led by Zak were also doing the same route as us for the first 2 weeks so we would be bumping into them along the way.

Our first day in the van was very long, we were in it for around 9 hours and with no head rests there was a lot of head bobbing going on. We took a few stops along the way including a grocery shop when we were an hour or so away from Wells Gray. The cooking teams were put together and along with both of us Marian joined us and we were cooking for the first night. Or rather it was grab some wraps, a roast chicken, bits of salad and so on.

For the first night in Wells Gray we stayed at a cowboy ranch with log cabins, not luxury one’s but basic wooden shack’s with benches and mats, we had access to showers and both groups were staying there. We cooked up our snacky dinner, and chatted before an early night. We had all arranged to go on an overnight canoe trip the next day.

The following morning we went on a hike to a nearby waterfall, it was a pretty dull day – our dullest yet having been spoilt with the fine weather! Following on from this we set off with an over night bag and met Fred who would be taking us on our canoe trip across Lake Clearwater . Both groups went out for the trip and when we arrived at the lake we found ourselves each a canoe, and packed in our gear, of which we had so much! But if you’ve got some big bits of tarp these canoe’s can really take some weight!

The journey over to the Island took around 2 hours and it was a little chilly. When we arrived we set up camp and began the fire and BBQ. This consisted of lots of sausages, some salad and veggies along with quite a few beers going around and finally marsh mellows and s’mores. Some of us ended the night light painting on the beach and others took a guided midnight canoe with Fred. This was our first night in bear territory so we packed our snacks and toiletries in the bear bins provided around camp.

Up fairly early the next day and after packing down our tents and eating breakfast most of the group went on a 2 hour steep hike up to the peak above where we spent the night. The views at the top were very rewarding and we could view all the way down the lake and across to the surrounding mountains. We chatted to Fred a fair bit along the trek and the night before learning about the park and the wildlife that inhabits the area. The canoe back to mainland was beautiful, and far warmer and sunnier than the previous day. We canoed back at a record pace which we think must have been wind assisted. When we got back to the dock we packed up, but the boats away and went back to the cowboy ranch. As we were back in record time we had an extra hour or so to explore some nearby crashing rivers and waterfalls in the area, the waterfall being the 4th largest drop in Canada!

For our last night at the ranch and after some well-earned showers we all ate to the restaurant at the ranch which was fairly over-priced and not very satisfying. Dave and I felt we didn’t have much choice on the food option as ‘everyone’ was eating there and there are no other places to eat in the area, we could have set up the stoves but this would have been food from the kitty, so we decided to share one vegetarian meal for the same price as the meat option which was $20! The service was pretty poor so with a 10% service fee plus 12% tax we felt ripped off even though we only had one meal between us! The lads were even more unimpressed with the portion sizes. Most people felt this place was a bit of a tourist trap and perhaps unnecessary for Intrepid to use.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)

As we have a great house to stay in whilst here in Venice Beach and we are travelling for up to nine months, we want to try and save money where we can. Today was shopping day and we ended up at Whole Foods (“Whole Paycheck” as its known by the locals) so we had to be very conscious of each product we bought. We really need to find a cheaper place to shop without a car this might be difficult.

Helen spent the afternoon at Exhale for the 1st full day of Yoga whilst Dave took the Leica and a selection of lenses for a walk around the local area which included a fair few random garage sales on the street. The fishermans pier at Venice Beach is a nice little stroll into the ocean and offers some good photo opportunities.

Venicebeach.com has listings of up and coming events and we just so happened to be here for the Venice Beach Music Festival which was a nice little event. Spending time watching the graffiti artists and skateboarders in the skate park, you can easily loose track of the time.

We decided to cook for ourselves and we were both suffering from the effect of jet-lag as by 8pm we were ready for bed.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM & Olympus PEN EP-1, 17mm f/2.8 & 100mm f/2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We stayed at a great hostel in Bangkok called Hostelling International Bangkok, it’s around half and hour from Khao San road heading up river. It’s a little tricky to find, especially at 5 in the morning but once we got our bearings we thought the location was pretty good. We didn’t want to be in the hustle and bustle of Khao San and we had a ferry stop nearby at Thawet in the Dusit district.

We couldn’t check in until after midday so we decided to take the ferry south and head towards China town so we could get absorbed in some street photography. We always like getting to a big city after ambling through rural areas as there is an energy and buzz that definitely inspires us photographically. Bangkok did just this for us, we weren’t particularly interested in doing too many touristy things as per usual but we were quite happy to get lost in the streets and photograph people, places, food of course!

China town is busy at any time of day with no exception at 10am in the morning, we found alleyways with beautiful light, bizarre funeral gifts, food stalls and bizarre crafts. It’s dirty, hectic and a little tacky but all the while we took it in and enjoyed being flies on the wall. We spent a good few hours making our way through the Lonely Planet walking tour before hopping on the ferry back to our stop so we could check in.

The hostel houses some very nice retro 70′s wooden furniture and the retro theme runs throughout. Our room was very Germanesque in style with a nice hint of art deco in the decor, we loved it and thought it would definitely be a good place to hide away from the busy streets of Bangkok. We made a few plans for the next few days and caught up on some sleep before heading out to catch up with some friends on Khao San road. Nicola was Helen’s old neighbour in Leicester so it was lovely to finally catch up with her and Matt on their travels across the globe. We were relieved not to be staying in this area as the streets were packed and it’s really hit and miss for the accommodation around there. However we do know there are some good options if you don’t want to travel too far away from the backpackers hub of Bangkok.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 processed in Lightroom 3)

We booked to do a 1 day course at the Chang Siam Elephant Training Mahout School based on a recommendation from one of our friends so we didn’t have too many hang ups about which one we were going to pick. You’ll soon find that in Chiang Mai there is a lot of choice for this type of excursion. We booked through Panda Tours based at 179 Thapae Rd but the school do have an office in Chiang Mai where  you can also book this trip. There were 6 of us on the trip with one tour leader and the elephant trainers who live at the farm who are either part of the family who own the elephants or hired to train them. This isn’t a case of training an elephant to perform tricks, it’s about communicating with them for the purpose of elephant and human being to be able to live and work alongside each other. There are no wild elephants left in the north of Thailand as they were all captured many years ago by native Thai’s who used the elephants for log moving and transportation. We have found out that one elephant costs 1,000,000 Thai Baht which is around £200,000 so they are worth a hell of a lot of money to their owners.

The elephants at this farm range in age between 1-40 years old with a mixture of 9 male and female elephants. We had heard some horror stories about the way elephants are treated in Thailand by their owners and many of these camps offer elephant riding, shows, performances and the like. What we wanted to do was to spend the day with the elephants, learning how to communicate with them through traditional Thai Mahout training, feed them, learn about the way they live in the north and then go on a bare back ride to the water hole where we could wash and bathe them. So this is what we did, whilst we were there we did see fellow tourists riding the elephants on wooden seats, which we’ve heard isn’t very good for the long term quality of life for the elephant, so we were a little disspointed to see this. However everything else lived up to our expectations and from the start we had a really good laugh too.

We learned about the history of these elephants, where they had come from and why the owners had come to have them in their family. We also learned that in order for the elephants and the locals to live peacefully the elephants needed to be kept in farms and in contained areas as otherwise they eat everything they come across which over the years has led to crops being destroyed and elephant poachers getting what they want.

We learned the commands of going forwards, backwards, left, right and the all important stop which in western voice is completely different from the way the Thai’s pronounce it so we think the elephants went along with their trainers commands over ours! We fed them a good amount of bananas as they need to eat around 300 or so pounds of food per day. We went on an hour walk with the elephants and Dave and I shared ours swapping part way through to direct the elephant through the forest. We had some encounters with bushes, dung and steep inclines but it was really good fun along the way. We finished the trek at the water pool where the elephants got straight in and we washed and bathed them aswell as carrying on with a water fight that the trainers started. This was probably the most rewarding part of the day and we got to try out our new underwater Sony DSC-TX5 camera which we hope is going to provide us with another creative element to our blogs in the future.

We paid 1800 Baht each for the day and this included lunch and transport which took about an hour from Chiang Mai heading north. This was the price for sharing an elephant and it cost 2500 Baht to have one to yourself for the day. We were happy to share though. It was a pretty satisfying day, and if you do have any hang ups about going to one of the elephant camps from Chiang Mai it’s worth looking into what they do on their one day itinerary. There are some companies who only have elephants that have been rescued from poachers or farms where they have been mistreated and The Elephant Nature Park is one of these with good reviews.

(Sony DSC-TX5 waterproof camera, processed in Lightroom 3)

We said we were never going to go to Vang Vieng, we’ve been told many a horror story of people ended up injured from their tubing and partying experiences and we thought we’d just skip it and explore another part of the country. However chatting to fellow travellers we got the impression that Vang Vieng offers more than the opportunity to go tubing down the river and get inebriated on toxic substances.

We took a bus journey to Vang Vieng which was around 5 hours from the capital and arrived at a decent enough time to start looking for accommodation. There was a group of us looking and we all managed to get into our first choice La Jardin Organique, Dave and I ended up sharing with Corrine to lower our costs for a few days and so it was 100,000 kip between the 3 of us which wasn’t a bad deal at all considering the costs in Vientiane. They have a good selection of accommodation here with bungalows, guesthouse style rooms and cheaper rooms for 40,000 with shared bathrooms, also the owners are very accommodating indeed and the female owner certainly seems to be the one negotiating prices with tourists over her husband!

With accommodation sorted early on we set off in search of finding some kind of trek/kayak trip that would cater to our needs. We went to a few companies along the main back street of Vang Vieng and found a company located around 10 minutes walk up the street from Le Jardin Organique on the right hand side, there are so many but these guys offered a 2 day tour that included hiking, caves, waterfalls and kayaking. The more of us that were interested in booking the tour then the price would come down, so after a good mint and lemon shake at the organic cafe in town we opted to book the trip and later on found out that Doug and Emma would also be joining us so that would shave off some of the cost. The total came to roughly £50 for the two of us to do this trip with food and one night’s accommodation included. That evening we went back to the organic cafe and enjoyed some good home-cooked soups and curries.

We met the next morning at 8.30 am for the tour and hopped onto a song thaw along with others who were going on a one day kayak and cave tour of the area. We all got off at the same point but the kayakers went one way and we the other. We started with a Buddhist cave in a village around 15km north of Vang Vieng along the Nam Song river, the cave is called Phu Kham cave and hosts a reclining Buddha along with a shrine and other symbolic Buddhist monuments. We were there for 5 minutes or so and our guide then started the trek. The first part of the trek was very steep indeed and took us up a karst peak, through dense jungle like foliage and we had a few clear moments where we could look out over the area, but otherwise it was quite hard work and in the heat we sweated lots. The walk led us to another cave, this one being much more interesting than the first, with no other tourists around for a start which is always a treat! We were led through one part of the cave where new stalagmites and stalactites were forming and the light shining into the cave was beautiful. Our guide started to get a barbecue going and said lunch would be around15-20 minutes later. So we explored the cave, Doug enjoyed the spa like water coming from the river and we cooled down after the heat of the walk.

Lunch was really simple but very good indeed; barbecued kebabs with vegetable fried rice, a baguette and bananas, it certainly filled us up and did the trick. After lunch we continued to walk through the secret eden forest area which is a valley in the middle of the peaks where no-one goes through other than the villagers as it’s surrounded by steep peaks all around. It was once an area where a hill tribe village lived and no-one knew of their existence until the Indo-Chinese war and then they left for more mainstream areas…we do try to remember this information when it’s told to us by our guides! We then carried on back up the peak and out to the other side, followed by a further hours walk to the eco-lodge built next to the river where we had stopped earlier in the day to drop off our bags. We got into the river to cool down and waited for our rooms to be organised, there seemed to be some confusion as to where our accommodation was but after a while we found ourselves in a wooden lodge which was simple but did the trick. We enjoyed a good local meal cooked by our hosts, accompanied by our guide Noi and this was followed by some card games.

Another good part of the tour was that we could choose our own breakfast from the menu at the eco-lodge, this was a first on a tour!! We had a bit of a wait for the tour guide and kayaks to turn up and whilst doing so the rain decided to come down, our fist rain shower in a long long time, it was really refreshing. The rains don’t last very long so we were able to get into the kayaks and start the first leg of this part of the tour. This time we were heading in the direction of Vang Vieng as we would eventually land up there later in the afternoon. The first part of the kayak took only half and hour and we got off to start trekking again, we were all aching a little from the steep climbs of the trek the day before but today we were promised it wouldn’t be so steep! This was the case though and after half an hour of walking we landed at our third cave of the trip, it was huge, we were able to walk through one entrance under the peak and out to the other side. During the wet season water comes crashing through from a river located further up the hill and right now it was completely empty with only large tree branches and trunks as evidence that water does come through at great speeds and volume. It was very cool indeed, we walked with head torches and took in the scale of the cave, not as bit as one’s we’d seen in Tha Khaek but impressive in other ways. On the other side we climbed out into the sunshine and our guide asked us if we wanted to go to another cave or to the waterfall up the hill. We opted for the waterfall and began the walk upwards. It didn’t take too long to reach though and when we got there we met a few other people on tours, including Ann who we’d met in Tha Khaek. We enjoyed another dip in a deep pool, it was much colder than the river temperature so it wasn’t long before we were sat warming up on rocks and enjoying another kebab and rice style feast.

The last part of the tour was kayaking all the way back to Vang Vieng, it was around 13km or so to get back and we took in a few rapids along the way, they were pretty tame though but we had fun going through them all the same. We passed through where the tubing starts and were faced with hundreds of happy go lucky backpackers enjoying the Vang Vieng tubing and zip lining into the water. It is a pretty mental site, from the peacefulness of the valley and mountains to an Ibiza style day by day party, music blasting out and everyone getting wrecked, really odd! As we got closer to Vang Vieng we passed more and more tubers coming to the end of their little adventures and we landed at the bay just where La Jardin Oraganique is located, perfect for us. We had already pre-booked a room there so we were able to check in straight away, they had an even cheaper room for us 80,000 kip between the 3 of us and it wasn’t any worse than the last other than it wasn’t in a bungalow.

Later on we attain town at a Lonely Planet recommended restaurant which didn’t really live up to it’s reputation, although opting for the local barbecue was the best option, for those after western tastes don’t expect to be in a rush. Still this is Laos after all!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We woke up early to the sound of eager cockerels the first going off at around 4.30am. It wasn’t the best night’s sleep with a very hard mattress indeed and snoring echoing throughout our eco-shack. We had a cooked Laos style breakfast in the form of noodle soup, eggs and fruit, Helen was getting her appetite back and starting to feel a little more like herself again. We left the village at 8.30am and began to trek once more through forest land, past more karst peaks and made our way up and down a hilly terrain which required a little more effort than the flatness of the day before. We had a few descriptions of plant-life and the area and we walked for a good 4 hours before arriving at the second village for a home cooked lunch. We sat inside someone’s home at the back of a shop and chilled out awaiting more food, it was really kitsch inside with old wardrobes, bright wall colours, retro tiles and clothes everywhere. It was a good little stop for photographing! More rice, more soup and stir-fried egg and we were all ready for a nap. No time for this though as we were waiting for a pick up to take us to the Blue Lagoon.

On the usual itinerary there is a tractor ride involved whereby you get pulled along on a cart by one of their home-made style tractors; not like ours at home. This didn’t happen for us because there were 8 in our group and the tractor wouldn’t cope with all of the western weight. So we had a mini-van take us to the lagoon instead with music blasting out of the over-hyped stereo. It took around 15 minutes to drive to the lagoon, packed in on a bumpy ride. The lagoon lives up to its name and is a very intense copper sulfate looking colour, it’s hard to believe that the lagoon is natural as it seems more like a chemical phenomenon. There were no scientific descriptions available from the tour guides only spiritual ones. It’s quite deep and plays host to shoals of large fish. Most of the group plunged in for a cooling swim after we walked around the edge of the lagoon, we both decided to photograph and observed from the sidelines. We hope the photographs show the intensity of the colours and the subtle reflections that glowed.

After a group photo we continued in the minivan to a point from where we walked a further 2 km to meet our pick up trip. At around 3pm we met our pick up back to Tha Khaek and we were back in the town at just before 5pm with an en-route detour to the bus station so that we could book bus tickets for the next day of travel. Back in Tha Khaek we checked into the Travel Lodge along with the rest of the group and settled in for a relaxing evening of food, chat and planning. It’s a really good spot for meeting other backpackers and they have a good outdoor seated area. We would recommend staying there and the dorms are good value for money if you’re on a budget, we paid 50,000 kip for a double with shared bathroom.

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)

We were picked up at 8.30am or so from our guesthouse and much to our delight there were an extra 4 people booked on the trip and so we received $10 refund each off the original trip price. We were able to take our main bags and leave them at the Tourist Office securely whilst we would b out on the trip, after dropping them off we went on our way to the first stage of the trek.

There were 8 of us in total and we were a good mix of people with 2 cheeky tour guides carrying our food from place to place. We took a Song Thaw for about an hour towards the national park and stopped at a wooden bridge, this presented us with a problem; we couldn’t go any further in the vehicle over the bridge with all the food and people packed inside of it, so we off loaded, carried the food and walked to the village around 1km away. When we got there Mii was waiting with a scooter and took the food from us in preparation for the lunch-time spot.

After a short introduction to the village and our guides we walked for around an hour and a half and landed at our first cave of the tour. It wasn’t so big in size but was good enough to explore with head torches. Onwards from there we continued to walk through forest and farmland and ended at the lunch time spot which was at another cave, here there was also a lagoon going into the cave and so everyone stripped off and went for a swim. Helen wasn’t feeling up to getting into the water and was still surviving off re-hydration drinks. The lunch was served on a long picnic bench and we fought off the flies whilst eating barbecued fish, chicken, sticky rice and vegetables, it was okay but the flies didn’t help! We stopped at this spot for over and hour and then continued to walk to another cave. This cave was very impressive, for 15 minutes we all sat or snoozed letting the lunch settle in the peacefulness of the cave. Dave went off to explore a little and photographed the rest of us snoozing away. The tour-guides then led us through one part of the cave guided by torch-lights and out into another much larger section of the cave. There was water and a sand-bank that led towards a large exit point. At one side of the cave there are steps leading up to a Buddah shrine and fantastic views across the cave to the other-side where we snoozed. We were told that once a year there is a festival that happens in this cave and around 3000 people go there to celebrate for 3 days, as always in Laos style, we could only imagine what this would be like.

After leaving the cave we walked another 5 km to a Stupa and then a further 1km to the village where we were staying that night. The village farmed tobacco and we were surprised at the presentation of the village homes in comparison to those we had seen and stayed at in Cambodia. There are around 90 people living in this village with mostly young children under the age of 11. When we asked where all the older children were the response was that in the dry season they go to the town or city to work and send the money back to their family, coming back in the wet season to farm. The children were good fun to photograph but we got the impression they’re used to westerners coming into their village as they showed off, grabbed at the cameras and were quite cheeky. Still it’s all good for the purpose of photographing.

Our accommodation comprised of an eco-style hut with great views from the village of the surrounding mountains and we enjoyed chatting on the balcony of the hut whilst the sun went down. The bed’s were made for us with mosquito nets and bed covers provided. We will say one thing though; always carry a sleeping bag liner or inner sheet as they don’t clean their bed linen very well and we noticed a few bugs crawling around!

We played Putong with the locals (boules) and managed to beat the French couple from our group, one of whom plays it every summer with his brother!! Not bad! The locals cooked us dinner and we all ate together along with them on the balcony of the guesthouse. Later that evening we participated in a traditional Laos Bacai ceremony, this involved the group sitting around a circular table with a candle and flower arrangement in the middle. For each person there was a portion of sticky rice and chocolate bar that we would accept as a gift.  The head of the village came to each of us one by one accompanied by his two deputy leaders, he prayed for us, spoke of good things to come and all of us were predicted we would ‘live long liiiife’. He placed a cotton bracelet on our wrist and the gift was in the pal of our hands. Following him his deputy’s did the same so we ended with 3 bracelets each and many many wishes of a long life!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f2.0 & Olympus PEN, 17mm f2.8 & 100mm f2.8, processed in Lightroom 3)