Drama struck as we landed in Borneo. Our agent that we booked our diving trip through cancelled our booking & didn't tell us and the resort would not let us on their boat without paying them directly!!! Nightmare...seems like our agent has gone under and now our credit card company is chasing the refund! What a pain, so needless to say that put a dampener on our excitement but the resort and the diving was still fantastic!! Amazing setup on a reef with the beach showing slightly at low tide otherwise we were in the middle of the sea on stilts - amazing! Our last dive was the best seeing lots of fish, white tip reef sharks and more than 20 turtles!! INCREDIBLE...what a sight...
We also spent a day looking around Kuala Lumpur and went up the tower for a good view and walked around China Town. It was just a stopover before heading to Vientienne in Laos where we spent a day walking around the market and having dinner alongside the great Mekong river. We loved our time in this country, the people are so friendly and their faces always smiling - so refreshing. We spent a few days in a place called Vang Vieng which has a beautiful clear river so chilled alongside it in hammocks, went tubing down it for a few hours and also rented bicycles to go exploring in the mountains nearby visiting caves and a blue lagoon for a lovely swim. The scenery was incredible with these towering karst mountains behind our little bungalow. Even had 2 massages as they were so cheap!
Then we headed 7 hours north to Luang Prabang in a "VIP Air con" bus...NOT!! Maybe when it was bought 15 years ago?!...haha. It was a looooong bumpy and twisty drive but beautiful mountain scenery! We explored the town which is on a peninsular where the Mekong river and the Khan river join, it has a great night market with amazing handicrafts but we held back as we are enjoying our light bags! From here we visited 2 waterfalls which were beautiful and also went on a "Mahout Experience" (Mahout meaning Elephant herder) where we learnt how to ride the elephants sitting right behind their ears, how to control them and then bathed them too, all in the mahout outfits - we loved it...when bathing they sit down & then stand up a few times randomly so its like you riding a bucking bronco - classic!! And then the Mahouts command them to spray water which is like the water park...trunks blowing and splashing their trunks on the water & blowing bubbles...wet wet wet we were! WHAT FUN!! Such gracefully huge animals...and the African Elephant is bigger...golly! We also visited another waterfall from there and went bamboo rafting on the way back...
Photo's:
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