We leave early today, 7AM, but wanted to get up even earlier to see the monks receive their alms at 5:30AM. Waking up is hard to do and we sleep in until 6:30AM. It was too ambitious I suppose. Today's bus ride was horrible. We're used to between five and seven people charing the Stray bus, leaving ample space, but today the bus has thirteen travelers and three Stray employees. The only good thing about the six hour journey is when we stop off at the top of a mountain where the view is nice. We eventually arrive in Vang Vieng.
A lot of people are leaving on the bus again tomorrow, so everyone is doing tubing today. Tubing has made Vang Vieng famous: You hire a rubber tube, go to the river and drift down the beautiful scenery surrounding you. Along the way are bars - everyone gets drunk. The trick is to be careful or you might die, and people do. In fact, two weeks ago they took all the swing ropes down following two deaths. In the Tuk-Tuk to the starting point we drink cans of Beerlao that Jan bought for us. We're in a big group (Stray travelers) but Rachelle, Charlotte, Jan and me feel like a sub-group, because we don't know the others very well.
Before we even get into the river, there is a bar - the starting point. As we arrive, we get coloured string bracelets and whiskey poured into our mouths from the bottle. The place blasts music, everyone is drinking and it reminds me of a mix between what I imagine Magaluf and an American frat party would be like. Limbo, beer pong, beer bong and buckets of alcohol. We order a vodka coke bucket between three of us whilst Jan sticks to beer. We chat whilst watching what seems to be mainly Brits acting drunk.
Grabbing our tubes, we jump into the river, which has a surprisingly strong current, and we float to the next bar. They throw rope to you as you float by and you pull yourself to the side. More music blasts and we get a whiskey bucket, shared again. At the bar, people are trying to climb a tall bamboo pole in the middle of it. With many attempts, most fail. I've loved climbing from a young age. I remember climbing the trees in the back garden of my house in Germany when I was 8 years old. Since then, I've always climbed. At University I started climbing lamp posts, often after a night out, and just before coming to Southeast Asia I climbed a lamp post when I was hanging out with my best friend. The bamboo at the riverside bar looked approximately the same size as a lamp post and it had been a while since anyone had climbed the top. Jan and I head over. I get to the top without too much difficulty - it's the getting down that's hard because it's slippery and you can't slow yourself down before hitting the ground. Someone comes over and shouts over the music, "you get a free bucket for that!". I go to the bar and claim my prize, a bucket of vodka and Sprite. Jan manages the same.
At the next bar there aren't many people, so a quick drinking race between Jan and James on one team (James is a Stray traveler that joined our quartet at the second bar) and Rachelle, Charlotte and me on the other team. My team loses the race.
The fourth bar has a few more people in it and we spend some time there. I do a flip off the side into the river. When we come to leave, our tubes have been stolen. Apparently, that happens a lot whilst tubing. We have to get to the next bar tubeless. Once there, we don't get drinks and just steal tubes that are there, moving on to the next bar swiftly.
The fifth bar we go to has a huge water slide. You buy a drink to get a smiley face painted on your hand in nail varnish and you're allowed to use the slide. Rachelle goes first whilst I hold the beer. Without enough momentum, she comes to a stop just before the end and has to jump off. Then I go up and try to do a front flip off it. I don't know what went wrong, or what I ended up doing, but hitting the water hurt and the picture Rachelle took didn't look like I was doing a front flip at all.
We spent a lot of time at that bar, no tubes again. It's getting late so we worry. Swimming to the next bar we find no tubes, cut our losses and get a Tuk-Tuk home. At this point it's just Rachelle, Charlotte and me, because Jan and James went missing.
Losing the tubes is bad because you lose your deposit - 60,000 Kip each. However, when we get to the tube rental, another Tuk-Tuk arrives and Rachelle steals three tubes from the top. We get out deposit back, minus 20,000 Kip for bringing them back late. A girl from the Tuk-Tuk starts arguing with Charlotte after seeing Rachelle taking the tubes even though there were clearly more tubes on the Tuk-Tuk than people riding in it. I stay out the argument and things get resolved. During the argument we meet a British couple and we all go to a bar for food and drinks.
I don't know how it happened, but at the bar, Rachelle and I ended up in a cake fight with a group of children aged between 3 and 12 years old. they smeared cake all over our faces and we chased them around the bar. I also entered a pool competition under the pseudonym 'Sven', but did very badly.
Grabbing our tubes, we jump into the river, which has a surprisingly strong current, and we float to the next bar. They throw rope to you as you float by and you pull yourself to the side. More music blasts and we get a whiskey bucket, shared again. At the bar, people are trying to climb a tall bamboo pole in the middle of it. With many attempts, most fail. I've loved climbing from a young age. I remember climbing the trees in the back garden of my house in Germany when I was 8 years old. Since then, I've always climbed. At University I started climbing lamp posts, often after a night out, and just before coming to Southeast Asia I climbed a lamp post when I was hanging out with my best friend. The bamboo at the riverside bar looked approximately the same size as a lamp post and it had been a while since anyone had climbed the top. Jan and I head over. I get to the top without too much difficulty - it's the getting down that's hard because it's slippery and you can't slow yourself down before hitting the ground. Someone comes over and shouts over the music, "you get a free bucket for that!". I go to the bar and claim my prize, a bucket of vodka and Sprite. Jan manages the same.
At the next bar there aren't many people, so a quick drinking race between Jan and James on one team (James is a Stray traveler that joined our quartet at the second bar) and Rachelle, Charlotte and me on the other team. My team loses the race.
The fourth bar has a few more people in it and we spend some time there. I do a flip off the side into the river. When we come to leave, our tubes have been stolen. Apparently, that happens a lot whilst tubing. We have to get to the next bar tubeless. Once there, we don't get drinks and just steal tubes that are there, moving on to the next bar swiftly.
The fifth bar we go to has a huge water slide. You buy a drink to get a smiley face painted on your hand in nail varnish and you're allowed to use the slide. Rachelle goes first whilst I hold the beer. Without enough momentum, she comes to a stop just before the end and has to jump off. Then I go up and try to do a front flip off it. I don't know what went wrong, or what I ended up doing, but hitting the water hurt and the picture Rachelle took didn't look like I was doing a front flip at all.
We spent a lot of time at that bar, no tubes again. It's getting late so we worry. Swimming to the next bar we find no tubes, cut our losses and get a Tuk-Tuk home. At this point it's just Rachelle, Charlotte and me, because Jan and James went missing.
Losing the tubes is bad because you lose your deposit - 60,000 Kip each. However, when we get to the tube rental, another Tuk-Tuk arrives and Rachelle steals three tubes from the top. We get out deposit back, minus 20,000 Kip for bringing them back late. A girl from the Tuk-Tuk starts arguing with Charlotte after seeing Rachelle taking the tubes even though there were clearly more tubes on the Tuk-Tuk than people riding in it. I stay out the argument and things get resolved. During the argument we meet a British couple and we all go to a bar for food and drinks.
I don't know how it happened, but at the bar, Rachelle and I ended up in a cake fight with a group of children aged between 3 and 12 years old. they smeared cake all over our faces and we chased them around the bar. I also entered a pool competition under the pseudonym 'Sven', but did very badly.
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