Lions and Tigers and Bears!

Still in LP. Sadly there is no ginger kitten today but after my adventures yesterday I think I can deal. Yesterday Anne and I went to a waterfall about an hour away from town. There were also two encloures there where they keep some animals rescued from poachers. The first had 5 Asiatic black bears (are theese the same as sun-bears cos that's what they look like to me) 3 adults and 2 babies, and the next one had a fiver year old tiger that was rescued as a cub - it's two siblings weren't so lucky. It's name is Phet (diamond in lao) and it was so beautiful! It had a large enclosure of natural forest but for some reason when we visited she had been locked in her night enclosure. This meant that we could get right up close to her, close enough to pat her even! I - very carefully - stroked her paw while she studiously ignored me in the manner of cats everwhere. So special.

The waterfall was great, met a lovely lao girl running a snack stall. Dtiq is 16 and has had to leave school cos there's no money. She doesn't have a boyfriend at the moment - is still stung from a bad breakup and thinks that she isn't attractive enough - but she is open to all opportunities. So if you know of any single straight men who are still young enough to go out with a 16 year old without raising anyone's eyebrows please send them Dtiq's way.

Take care all and thankyou for your lovely emails. I repeat - Laos is a landlocked country and nowhere near the Andaman Coast. We were planning to spend some time down there but of course not anymore. Send your thoughts to all the victims in my beautiful second home and beyond.

Luang Prabang

hi all,

i'm in an internet place in Luang Prabang, Northern Laos with a very vocal ginger and white kitten on my lap -it keeps trying to get me to stop typing and pet it some more but it's so cute I can't bring myself to get rid of it.

Thought I should surface for a quick update especially after hearing about the Earthquake - Anne and I are nowhere near the ocean - in fact it feels like the deversation is happening in a whole other world from the peacefull hills and rivers we find ourselves in. Still getting up to date on what's happened - newspapers are very rare in Laos, like hen's teeth in English and my Thai is not quite up to understanding the rather frantic speeches of the Thai news reports. So horrible.

I feel like any news I can give is pretty meaningless when such a thing is going on just a little way away but I know that you all are interested so I'll give the quick rundown.

Anne and I are loving Laos, which is much more developed then when I was last here, but still very easygoing and relaxed and beautiful. We've been taking the travling slowly, spending at least 3 days in each place. Savannakhet was dusky and quiet, with a string of great bars (well stalls with a coal fired bbq, an esky of Beer Lao and a couple of plastic chairs) on the banks of the Mehkong. Spent most evenings there drinking beer and watching the sunset.

Vientiane was tourist central after peaceful Issarn, but we enjoyed the good - French influenced western food - love thai and lao food but its nice to have some variety. Did some beurocratic stuff like extending visas, Anne was sick for much of it and spent lots of time in bed.

Veng Vieng was backpacker central with a main street full of 'traveller' bars with Friends dvds on repeat and the offer of 'happy and funny for you' shakes and omelettes etc. Not at all my favourite scene but the scenery was spectacular, next to a river with a view of fabbo Asian mountains - the kind that just go straight up from the flat plain. We went kayaking and tubing down the river (tubing definitely more fun, like being in a lounge chair on the water) and relaxed by the water.

Now we're in LP after taking a 'vip' bus full of irritating tourists up here. Anne is taking more active control of organising stuff after it became obvious that I'd been doing most of it.

Must go, Anne's waiting and there's a whole city to explore. Happy assorted end of year holidays to all and please stay safe and well.

Hello from Phi Mai

I have surfaced in Northeastern Thailand to touch base with everyone. Sorry
it's been so long. Anne and I pretty much went straight to the beach from Bangkok and stayed at a little bay with no email facilties (not much facilities at all as it happens). It was lovely, we did absolutely nothing for 5 days. A couple of days ago we got outselves together to leave there and headed into the NorthEast of Thailand. We spent a full day on a number fo buses and got a lift from some nice Thai people and ended up here in PhiMai, a small town with some nice Khmer era ruins and a huge festival that just happened to be starting the day we arrived. Has been great fun exploring. We've decided probably not to go to Cambodia this time, in favour of going to Laos instead.
But our next stop is Khao Yai national park. I've been there before (Jenny
knows all about this ;) ) and it's relly lovely, and I need tosee some nature.

Things are going well, we're a little off the beaten track so email might be difficult, but we're fine and all is good.

Hi from That Phanom

Anne and I are now in NorthEastern Thailand right across the Mehkong from Laos. It's a lovely little town here and we're staying with a lovely women, who has decorated her guesthouse with her own paintings and plays Nora Jones all the time. It's very relaxing.

Tomorrow we're going to head into Laos and then north. So far its been very quiet. Can't quite work out where all the tourists have gone. Everyone is saying that its very quiet for this time of year. I wonder whether the trouble in the South has scared people away. That's a real pity if its true, what's going on is hard enough for the people anyway.

Anne and I had a great time at Khao Yai national park. We stayed at the same place that Jen and I did a couple of years ago. It hasn't changed at all. Did the same tour too, and saw Elephants! There were 8 individuals that we could observe for a while, they were right up next to the road - maybe 10 metres away! 4 females, 3 babies and a youngish male. We also saw an older male trying to mate but he went off into the jungle when our car showed up. It was very cool.
Unfortunately the night safaris have been becoming extremely popular, when we went - not even on a weekend - there was a long line of trucks all following each other - I looked back at one point and all I could see was a long line of spotlighting lorries. A traffic jam of spotlighters. It's amazing we could see anything at all.

After that we went to Khon Kaen in the heartland of the NorthEast. THis area is famous for it's silk and we were lucky enough to be there for the last day of the annual Silk Festival. It was great, a warren-like collection of tents and stalls selling everything from penis enhancers to hardware and fairy floss, mixed in with old-style sideshows - we saw a tent advertising giant spiders and snakes and a bearded lady (not kept with the snakes thank goodness!). Somewhere in the middle of all this chaos there was also the silk market. We bought some to send home, then sat down at a little noodle stall to people watch and drink beer which also readily availiable was apparently not permitted at the festival and had to be hidden - ours was put into a paper bag that only came halfway up the bottle - not at all conspicuous!

The weather is very cold for Thailand - you need a jumper at night and a couple of blankets on the bed. Anne had a buy a coat from the local market - she's very proud of her $3 purchase!

I'm having fun practising my Thai - people are so helpful - stopping buses for us and looking out for us. It's hard to get global information though, not cos Thailand doesn't get international news, but cos as a traveller I don't have access to it - if I lived here I'd have cable telly and a subsription to the Bangkok Post, not to mention a cell phone and the internet, but as a traveller I have to rely on what I can find. I found a Bangkok Post in a shop before but it was from Dec 7.

This state of affairs is unlikely to get much better once we enter Laos. Will continue to send emails when I can and thanks for all your replies, it's really great to be in contact with all my special people.