Busy busy busy..... that is what we have been. Rich getting well again as we did not set off when we thought but on the 28th!! I think Vientaine is great but not that much!! We were lucky that we did stay as long as we did as by the end of the first days cycling Rich was ready to literally drop.
We have good news on the Tibet front too, we have arranged to join a tour that has been arranged by a lady in the UK who advertised it on the Lonely Planet forum. Rich was Mr Dubious but we went round the houses and have sorted it out so we are booked on a tour. Thats the good news, now we have the headache of trying to book transport to Tibet. Flights look a nightmare with bikes and the train just as bad so we have some planning to do!
28.07.10 (Vientiane to Thinkeo)
Our route out off Vientaine was following a route description that we have found on the web. There is a great website written by a couple who travelled the world for a couple of years by the looks and written up route descriptions. It is great and lets us know what the hills are like, horrendous, just incase you wanted to know!
So there we were peddaling out of the chilled city where its the dogs that are the biggest pain for cyclists. We were considering finding a stick they were that tenatious, I am just glad there were so few cars on the road as we ended up in the middle of the road on one occasion!! Setting us up for Tibet were they have mastif's that like to play 'bite the cyclist'!! I think the fact that Rich was not firing on all cylinders and we relaxed a bit too much due to the website saying 'just follow this this and that'. Well we found ourselves on little more than a mud track. Ooops. Rich was not best pleased as he knew he did not have anything in the reserve tank. We asked at a stall in gestures and it appeared that we were going on the right dircting just not on the right road! We decided to carry on and are glad we did as we got to see a lot of the Laos contryside and villages that we would not have seen otherwise, also there was a neat little 1 car ferry that took us across the Nam Ngum River for about 35p.
Once we had found the right road, re-fueled and watered we headed off on the last part of the days ride. This is where the hills started, they were not too bad and would have been great to get our teeth into, if only the sun had not come out. Ping.... two over heating cyclists, so we decided to walk, Ping.... two hot cyclists but not about to keel over cyclists.
The guesthouse we were heading too had closed down so we got stung for a song further down the road. Rich was in no state to look any further, the place was lovely and brand new, they loved us, two cyclists covered in mud.
29.07.10 (Thinkeo to Vang Vieng)
The following morning we set off early and ground out the miles and hills, we did 64 miles and made it to Vang Vieng without getting lost, mind you we did have to only turn right at a T junction once. Vang Vieng appears at first as a rather unwelcoming place when coming from the south, due mainly to the old CIA airstrip that runs between the main road and the town, so you end up seeing the place hidden behind trees and this obsolete eyesore inbetween and have to run the gaunlet of massive, deep puddles to get on the airstrip, work out where you are then head off into town.
Vang Vieng itself is very touristy so we were able to have western food although Rich chose the wrong Pizza and ended up with one that had pretty much everyting that does not go together on a pizza. We had some things to do on the web sorting out our Tibetian Travel Permits and moving money around which was made all the easier by the thunder storm that raged overhead cutting the power every 5 minutes and dropping the all important internet connection. We were both exhausted so headed to bed for an early night.
30.07.10 (Vang Vieng to Kasi)
Today started good and finished bad!!!! we headed out of Vang Vieng clutching our freshly made up bagguttes for breakfast, yum yum. We made good time and although the hills were steep and at times long we did well doing 40 miles before lunch. We stopped at Kasi the lunch stopping place for the busses from Vientiane to Luang Probang and Ponsavan the two northern tourist towns. Had a bite to eat, at this point we had to make the decision to either carry on a further 13 miles or stay in the town.
We knew tomorrow to be a killer of a day and wanted to lessen the distance as much as possible so took the decision to go for it.....our survey says, XXX Wrong! We knew that out of town there is a big big hill which on its own would have been tough but do able. But low and behold our freind the sun popped out to say hello and fried us!! After 45 mins of pushing the bike up hill in the sweltering heat we took the soul destroying decision to head back to the last guest house that we saw. We were both destroyed and not happy with the end to what was a promising days cycle. Luckly we have once again managed to pay over the odds and found a lovely room. (Rich turned his nose up at the bungalows that had squat toilets.)
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