Hello from Lazy Lao

So sorry for the lapse in communication, but we just now made it back to at least quasi-civilization. In both of the last two places we stayed we only had generator provided electricity between the hours of 6 and 9 pm so there definitely was not any reliable internet to be found. We arrived in Lao three days ago now and are now in Pakse, a rather backwater town in the very southern part of the country. Are forray into the Ratanakiri province of Cambodia was a bit of a mixed bag with some incredible highs and some rather serious lows. What we thought was going to be 12++ hours on a bus to get to Ban Lung, which is just south of the Lao border in the middle of nowhere jungle-land, turned out to be a mere 10 hours on a road that was paved for I would say 6 or 7 of those hours. We crammed into a mini-bus with 13 other very freindly Cambodians, most of whom turned out to be tourists themselves as we quickly realized that the local transport was atop trucks laden with other goods. The Ratanakiri province was breathtaking. So much green and rolling mountains covered with yellow wildflowers and relaxed "communes" of wooden houses on stilts. Upon our descent from the mini-bus we were ill-fatedly greeted by Nan a local "guide" who kindly helped us secure two moto drivers to take us on a very treacherous ride to the eco-lodge we had picked out in the lonely planet. The guys had no idea how to find the place and we to the lodge just as it was becoming pitch dark but not without a moto crash that left Dave with a rather beat up and bruised foot! Our eco-lodge turned out to be a little slice of heaven with a wonderful owner. It was a bit like camping (picture mather in the jungle) but it was far away from the rather gloomy town of Ban Lung and set amid awesome countryside and the local people. Our next day was really a perfect day. After sleeping in and causing a minor crisis (dave sort of tore the sink off the wall!!!) while doing some sink laundry (that never did fully dry in the humid weather) we went on a mini-trek on a trail that led us straight from our lodge into the hillside. We only briefly got lost and with some minor bickering soon found ourselves at the incredible Yaek Lom crater lake. Truly heaven on earth after walking through the Cambodian jungle. The water was so clear and there were tons of local kids diving precariously off trees into the water around us. I even had the chance to impress the local old guys there for an afternoon dip by swimming from one dock across the lake to the dock where they had taken up residency. There was a lot of laughing and muttering about the "barang" and I got a couple of thumbs up.

When the sink finally dislodged itself from bathroom wall (we hard told the manager who claimed that he had resolved the problem while we were at the lake) and came crashing down the next morning while I was still in bed, we should have realized we were in for a bad day. After managing to turn off the water source and switching to a room that wasn't flooded, we made the TERRIBLE mistake of letting Nan take us on what ended up being an $80 tour for private car and boat (an estra $20 not originally discussed) to the Voen Sai district where people had told us you could see interesting tribes living along side of a river. After our moto-rides from hell to the hotel, we had decided that it would be better and safer to spring for a jeep ($30 more) rather than spend a harrowing two hour ride on motos. In short the road was unbelievably bad, as the wet season had not been kind to it, and we spent more time on the miserable road then we did actually visiting the villages. Our guide Nan, while knowing nothing about the local people we saw, had an inifinite number of stories to tell us about his female escapades and jacking off (which he called the american airplane). Our favotite moment perhaps was when he told us that after he dated a girl for two months he would ask her "you boom-boom me?" and if she said no well then that was the end of that. The villages (Chinese, Lao and Chunchiet) probably woul have been really interesting had we the guide to tell us more about them but without the instruction they really just looked like all of the villages scattered around a lodge and we were bemoaning the fact that we were not just spending another day at the lake. The most interesting part of the tour was a little cemetary with graves adorned with wooden sculptures of the deceased. The cherry on top of the fabulous day was realizing that we had left Dave's camera in the jeep. We called both the guide and driver the next morning but they ofcourse declined having ever seen it. It was a very sad and distressing end to our time in Cambodia but we are moving on and still having a great time. Fortunately, we did have picturest through halfway down Vietnam backed up and the few that are on the blog so all is not lost and we have my camera to document the rest of the trip for y'all.

We made our way through the unofficial border crossing into Laos having only to pay $4 in bribes ($1 for each of us to both sets of border officials). We were then chauffeured by another mini-bus to a water ferry to take us into Si Phan Don, or the four thousand islands of Laos which are formed by a widening of the mekong river. We spent two nights in Don Det, a very laid back and peaceful island that provided some much needed respite from our trouble in Cambodia. We spent our two days there biking around on it and the neighboring island Don Khon connected by an old railway bridge that was a relic from when the french had attempted to connect China to the ports of Saigon. The rodes were VERY bumpy and Dave's bike chain must have fallen off about 15 times but we had a great time biking through rice paddies and tryig to avoid water buffaloes and even got to see a dramatic waterfall. Now we are in Pakse where there isn't muh to do except catch up on e-mail and eat good food (we had incredible Korean BBQ for dinner last nigh where got some much needed help from a couple of Laos guys).

Having finally realized that we always seem to have a much better time when sightseeing solo we have decided to try and forgo all future tours and just discover things on our own whenever possible while saving a bundle of money at the same time. Today we again tested our fate by renting a moto to ride to Champasak, which was about a 45 km ride plus rickety ferry across the Mekong. After a brief lesson on how to use the manual moto, we were set lose and I must say Dave did an excellent job navigating the Lao countryside as we never even took one wrong turn. The day was really fabulous, as we got to see so much and felt so much more in control of our selves and not once did we feel like we were getting cheated! In addition to beautiful green landscapes and rice paddies we got to visit Wat Phu, which are Angkor era ruins set in an incredible hillside. While not to the scale of Angkor, the ruins held an incredible magic in that there was almost no once else around. We climbed up these incredibly steep steps into the hillside that were lined with Jacaranda trees to the sacred temples set within the cliffs. Because our moto excursion went so well today we are going to continue are adventure by heading off into the Bolaven Plateau tomorrow for a couple of nights in a town called Tad Lo where there are supposed to be interesting tribes and great waterfalls for swimming. Ok...that ended up being a really long one, but it had been a while since we had written. Go Obama and happy belated Halloween and happy birthday Amanda Morgan!

Abrazos

Jess