December 5
We got up early to pack, return the bikes and grab some breakfast before the 8:30 pick up for the bus to Muang Ngoi. All seemed to be going pretty well until we had to argue with all the bus drivers about not squeezing 4 people into 3-person seats on the bus. The ride was the usual, driver flying around the mountainside like it was a video game but this time a level harder with the added challenge of swerving around the potholes in the ground and 900 people in the streets. Needless to say, it was extremely difficult to sleep but was only about 4 hours - and no one puked, so it was bearable. At Nhang Kiaw (?) we grabbed a Tuk Tuk to the boat and munched on some coconut cookies until 2pm when we piled onto a long tail for the hour journey to Muang Ngoi. Muang Ngoi is super cute, kinda like Tonsai in that it's off the beaten path; has only one "main" road where everything is with a super cool huge mountain towering in the back. Most of the cool restaurants have riverside views and are great at night, the sun sets behind the mountains and the moon floats in the black sky, great stars too!
December 6
Breakfast at Ning Ning's - had Shakshuka that was actually just an omelette with tomato onion and TONS of garlic. Little kitty jumped on my lap while I was eating so I shared my breakfast with it! Then we journaled on the porch for a little. Found in the guidebook that we should go on a hike so we did! Saw a little cave - got really dark and we heard a noise so we ran out squealing hahah. Then we crossed a cute little stone path across a baby stream and walked some more and found a ton of flowers with sooo many butterflies! Really pretty ones with blue and turquoise, monarchs, little white little yellow, orangey ones! So exciting and so we spent a good half hour there on the side of the road just trying to get a good picture of them :-)
Kept walking, came to a fork in the road - went towards Banna and Huay Ban villages. Saw fields with cows, took some pics with them for another 15 minutes haha. Massive beehive anger over the path to the bridge that Hila walked so I went through the water.
Saw kids fishing - had caught a snake and fish!
Walked through more fields and caught a glimpse of a snake but it was gone when we tried to find it...Went to Banna, wandered through the town and got lunch at a restaurant on the end with a cool view and hammocks. Ordered curry but they made me really boring noodles instead. Wished we had our books and more food. We walked home and stopped at the weaver/restaurant on the way home and scheduled weaving for the next day!
Dec. 7
Woke up early and had the buffet breakfast which was tasty! Then went to our weaving workshop which ended up being us doing some weaving for 30 minutes each and then getting really bored haha then we spent the rest of the day journaling and reading next to the river...
