melpbtobali

Yes, I am back in Zurich since more than four months now!

 

I had some trouble downloading my pictures, but I think I have solved the problem now... I will finish the stories about my trip in South-East Asia soon if everything goes well from the technical side! See you soon.

Back in Pakse, we did some shopping and prepared for a tour with trekking in the Bolovean Plateau. We had to cancel the plan though because of food poisoning: both Johanne and I got really sick after having eaten in an Indian restaurant - not even one of these small market stalls where we would often have lunch or dinner! We spent almost two days between bed and bathroom...

The second day we were feeling a little better, so we stayed on our banana-rice diet but decided to try and go for half a day to Champasak, which is famous for the ruins of the Wat Phu. We hopped on our motorbike, and off we were!





The two ruined palace buildings in the lower part:





The same viewed from above, with the alley of the... phallus!





The temple sanctuary itself, called the Shivalingam sanctuary because it once enclosed a large Shiva phallus. Later on it was converted into a Buddhist temple.





The spectacular views of the Mekong valley, quite cloudy that day:



And the elephant stone.



Johanne enjoying our ferry ride to get back on the road to Pakse

We spent two days on Don Khong. It is the largest and most populous of the islands - and it has a paved raod! We were quite happy about that after our tough bike ride on the rocky paths of Don Det. After having found a room for the next couple of days, we went for a walk in the area, as usual. Johanne was looking for some more pictures of pigs for an article she had in mind about a pig's life. I joined for this cute little one.



You can have a look at Johanne's article on her blog ("Jovadrouille", under "Liens" on the left side of this page, look for "Notre vie de cochon"). It doesn't matter if you don't understand French, the pictures speak for themselves!

I went back to the hotel to rest a little, and inbetween Johanne met a really nice family, Mr. and Ms. Noy, who invited us to join them for a cooking lesson the following day. We agreed to meet Ms. Noy at 5:30 am the next morning at the small local market in order to buy the fish. The beautiful sunrise made us arrive a little bit late...



Ms. Noy had already bought the fish, apparently there is no good fish left if you don't come early! When I thought about going to the market early, I was thinking about something like 7 am, but no, 5:30 am is already almost too late... But it didn't matter, we still had Ms. Noy's sister-in-law, who holds a noodle-soup stall, to meet, and a lot of vegetables to buy!



After the groceries shopping, Johanne and I rent a bike and went for a tour around the island .





Johanne must have done something wrong or unusual, because she was taken away by this guy without warning!





No, I was just kidding... It was June 12th, and both my sister and Johannes's sister had their birthday! We were trying desperately to make an international phone call. So Johanne went to this guy to ask for help and he led her personally to a small shop nearby... no succes with finding a telephone there though.

We got to watch the rescue operation of a group of kids saving the life of a parrot:





Afterwards it was time to go back to the village for our cooking lesson. It took place in the spacious kitchen of Mr. and Ms. Noy's family-home. Everybody helped for the cooking, each member of the family and entourage preparing a different dish. Johanne and I were trying to take notes of how to cook all these dishes, looking at everybody simultaneously...











It was amazing to see how fast so many dishes were ready. A little later, the whole family of ten people plus Johanne and I were sitting outside on the front porch, enjoying a delicious Lao meal.



After lunch, the men disappeared and the women took out their tobacco. They cut a few pieces for us as well...



... and showed us how to chew (sorry about that!)...,



... and then spit out the red paste.



We had to brush our teeth with a piece of a kind of small aubergine afterwards. Johanne found it quiet convenient and brushed much more than the standard 2 minutes



Then we rinsed the whole thing off.



Johanne showing some pictures of Switzerland to Ms. Noy:



The cute baby and his grandma were also there.



After these few hours where we had been welcomed so warmly by Mr. and Ms. Noy, we went on the road again for a tour of the northern part of the island, on a motorbike this time.





We stopped for a coffee at a tiny stall on the side of the road. Again, we were welcomed extremely warmly. The coffee was delicious, the kids playing around curious and happy to interact with us strangers and the parents a little shy at the beginning but so friendly.









And here are a few last pictures taken on our way back to the village.

From Vientiane, we took a night bus to go to the South of Laos. We arrived in Pakse in the morning, did a little bit of sightseeing and hop on a local bus to go further South to Si Phan Don, or 4000 islands: a multitude of islands, some of them really tiny, and sandbars, rocks etc. formed by the Mekong.

The bus station in Pakse is slightly different from our European standards, have a look!



At least you have natural air-conditioning on those open trucks. I was even able to take a nap, and so did my neighbour! Ask Johanne if you want to see the pictures

We continued our journey per boat and had our first glance at Si Phan Don. We were quite enthusiastic.



We found ourselves a nice bungalow with mosquito nets on the island Don Det and headed for a walk in the area, delicious fruit shakes, the rental of two bikes and, finally, a nice sunset.



The way back to our bungalow on our bikes was fantastic. The night was falling and nature was taking possession of the small path again. We had to stop for a herd of water buffalo and for a family of ducks which were going their way at a quiet pace. Tiny frogs were hopping here and there and cows were observing us from the side of the road with shiny eyes. Fireflies were all around us. It was amazing just being there.

Life is very primitive on the 4000 islands, especially on Don Det and Don Khon, which are connected by a railway bridge (the railway is not in use any more yet). There is electricity only from 6 pm to 10 pm. As of 10 pm, the islands get all dark and even quieter. This sounds ok since we don't care about television. Brushing our teeth with our frontal lamps wasn't that much of a problem either. But the nights were really hot since the fan stopped working at 10 pm as well! We wouldn't have needed to look for a bungalow with fan at all since it is of no use when you need it the most...

The next day, we rode our bikes on the path that goes across Don Det. We had a look at this old locomotive from the French colonization time. The old railway line is not functional anymore, you will discover a little below what happened with it!



The road was quite rocky. In the middle we thought it might have been a better idea to walk, but we were so close to our aim (or thought we were!) that we kept on going. Johanne had to step off her bike several times to get the chain back on, no wonder with what the bikes had to endure.



We made a few stops on our way, one of them to have a look at how the grilled fishes that you can see everywhere are prepared. This is the emptying stadium. Johanne is showing to the lady the picture she had just made of her.



And here is what happened with the defunct railway line: the local people used the railway to make fences and bridges, like here!



I didn't trust this bridge that much, even less if I was to carry my bike, so Johanne brought her own bike to the other side and came back to get mine! We were able get further a little, but the next bridge we saw was even worse, it didn't get quite to the other side, so we had to turn back nevertheless... and do the bridge thing the other way round, thank you Johanne!

We met these kids on the way, who were going crazy for the pictures. They (and we!) had fun!



On our way back, we made a detour to have a look at the Li Phi waterfalls.



And had a nice and fresh coconut juice.



Then we crossed the bridge to get on Don Khon, where we saw beautiful paddy fields.



We stopped at the pier, where Johanne managed to get us a boat with boatman to pick us up the next morning. We wanted to be picked-up at 5:15 am in order to watch the sunrise from the boat, then go and see another waterfall and finally get dropped off at Don Khone, another island. Arranging for all that with only a few words of English and a lot of scribbling on her and his hands took some time!



We enjoyed another beautiful sunset, on Don Det this time.





And here we go, the next morning shortly after 5:15 am.







The Khone Phapheng waterfall, considered to be the largest in Southeast Asia by volume.





One of our friends the water buffalo, on the way back to the boat.



The boatman hadn't told us that his boat had a leak: Johanne and I had to alternate dipping the water out of the boat!

We spent four days in Vientiane, the capital of Laos. The city is quite small, we could go almost everywhere with our bikes within a few minutes. We took our time to appreciate the almost meridional ambiance, doing nothing the first day but walking around, drinking a delicious Lao coffee and enjoying one of the best oil massages I've ever had.

We started with the visit of the few monuments to see on the second day, after a stroll through the morning market, where Johanne learned how to make a delicious papaya salad. She promised to make one with cucumber instead of papaya when I come back, I am looking forward to tasting it!

And no, Johanne is not standing on a chair while watching how the lady is doing the cooking...



Here is the Pha That Luang, or Great Sacred Stupa, the most important national monument in Laos.





Vientiane is also famous for its beautiful sunsets over the Mekong River.







These two little girls had so much fun posing for the camera.



Afterwards, all the kids playing along the river came running and wanted to play this new game with us. Johanne even let them use her camera, how courageous!



Luckily the kids did get bored after a while and disappeared all of a sudden. We could make some more pictures on our own.





This is the Wat Si Saket, built in 1818. It is the oldest temple of Vientiane since all the older temples were destroyed by the Siamese.



The cloister contain innumerable Buddha images, tiny ones in the small niches and bigger ones in front of them.



The building where the monks live. So nice and colourful that I had to look at the map of the surroundings several times before being convinced that the monks, who possess almost nothing, really live here.



On our last day in Vientiane, we took a bus to go to the Xieng Khuan, or Buddha Park. It was a really hot day. The shade in the park didn't even help to cool us off after the one-hour ride to get there, in a bus that was completely full, with no air-con of course... I thought I wouldn't even have the energy to take pictures, but I forgot about that in front of the beautiful Buddhist and Hindu sculptures scattered all around.









We spent our last minutes in Vientiane enjoying another sunset over the Mekong, then got on the night bus to go further South.

I have only a few pictures about Vang Vieng, so I'll tell some stories instead.

We took the local bus to go from Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng: eight hours on dust roads among the hills, going through small villages, sticky rice plantations and the forest. We were the only "non-local people" on the bus. It was quite an experience to watch all kinds of men and women, kids and monks get on and off the bus with their luggage, the monks having only their bowl for rice, some other people carrying heavy loads for or from the market. One guy even had a carbine with him!

A lot of the passengers didn't feel so well on the curvy roads. I had never seen so many people get sick at the same time. The bus driver's assistant distributed small plastic bags to the ones who needed it (about half of the bus), and they made use of them! Very discretely of course. Everything is ok until here, but there comes the sad side of it: after use, several passengers threw their full plastic bag out of the window, just like that, on the grass along the road. They did the same with their empty bottles and food containers. There is a lot to be done on environmental issues in Lao, or the country will turn into a giant garbage bin over the next years, and this would be such a pity.

We arrived in Vang Vieng late at night and walked along the main road, looking for a guesthouse. There are only two big streets in Vang Vieng, so there was no risk of getting lost. Both streets look exactly the same: an internet cafe, a bar, a guesthouse, an internet cafe again and so on, with pancake stalls offering exactly the same pancakes for exactly the same price every 30 meters. A place made entirely for tourists. And the most important part, which makes Vang Vieng what it is now: every single bar is playing reruns of "Friends"! You can even sit at one bar and follow several different episodes simultaneously since the bars are so close from each other. People actually have to sit as close as possible from the screen in order not to hear too many different reruns at the same time... I used to be a fan of Friends in Switzerland and I could watch some episodes many times before getting bored, but this was really too much in this tiny town in the middle of Lao...

You will probably have noticed that our first impression of Vang Vieng was not very positive... We decided to stay only two nights in order to have more time in the South of Lao, which is less touristy than the North.

The next morning, we had breakfast on the river, the Nam Song. The beautiful views made us forget a little bit about Rachel and company.



There are a lot of beautiful caves around Vang Vieng, which makes it worth spending a few days there despite the lack of charm of the center. We visited the Tham Jang, in a walking distance from town.



The main part of the cave was well lit, but there was this very dark coridor at the end of the cave that we did want to explore... Two advendturous girls and a frontal lamp, a little scary



At the end of the cave, the reward: a little terrace with a fantastic view over the valley.



This is it for Vang Vieng. Now I should really move on with this blog... I am posting this from Singapore Airport! I survived the Siem Reap Scam even though I was in the middle of it, I admired the splendors of Angkor and commemorated the victims of the genocide in Phnom Penh. Then I experienced the mix of cultures and the culinarly delights of Singapore, and here I am, ready to board for Bali. See you soon!

Here are some more pictures of Luang Prabang, where we spent the rest of our time discovering the city itself. We had a great time just going here and there, visiting some temples and enjoying the local life, the night market and the wonderful massages. Everyday we were supposed to start packing, but we always finished by deciding to stay a little longer...

This is the first temple we visited, the Wat Xieng Thong, built in 1560.



The main entrance has beautiful decorations on the walls and pillars.



The rear wall is decorated with an impressive mosaic of the tree-of-life. It is so big that this picture cannot render all its beauty, but you can already get an idea.



A very ancient reclining buddha inside one of the chapels next to the temple:



The walls of the chapel are decorated with beautiful mosaics.



After the visit, we went on a bike-ride to discover the life of Luang Prabang outside from the touristic areas. This is the Nam Khan River. The light had changed very rapidly a few seconds before, a thunderstorm was about to burst out.



The Lao people show great respect for their women and take care not to knock them down. Everybody knows that women always think about thousand things at the same time while they cross roads and that they do not watch where they are going, right?



We cycled to the Phousy market, Luang Prabang's main market. If you don't have much time, you can find everything for your dinner at the same market stand, for example if you need some fish, mushrooms and let's say some kind of furry animal!



The bird-flue stand:



Luckily there are also tons of healthy vegetables and herbs.



The next day, we got up at 5h15 to watch the so-called almsround, or alms procession, of the Buddhist monks. A lot of monks live in the numerous temples of Luang Prabang. Since monks are not allowed to work, they rely on the alms of the population for their meals. Every day, the inhabitants of Luang Prabang come down on the streets between 5h30 and 6 and wait for the monks to come by in order to place some sticky rice in their bowls. A lot of Buddhist people also come from outside of Luang Prabang in order to give their alms or just watch.





At the end of the largest raw, we noticed with surprise that the rice was going the other way round: the monks were sharing their rice with people who had joined the raw because they needed food as well.



After the procession we climbed up to the temples of the Mount Phu Si, a small hill from which you can have great views over Luang Prabang and the surroundings. It was only 7h in the morning, still a little dark!





These five pillars stand for the hand of Buddha.



Before taking the bus for Vang Vien, our next destination, we finally visited the Royal Palace. It was constructed in 1904 and was inhabited by the royal family until the revolution of 1975, when the king and his family were exiled to northern Laos. The reception rooms are magnificent! Unfortunately there were "no pictures" signs all over...



The temple where the royal family used to pray, also very impressive:



That would be it for Luang Prabang, the next entry will be about Rachel, Ross and the other "Friends"!

By then I will be in Cambodia if everything goes well, leaving tomorrow with the bus. The journey is reputated for beeing tough on the bumby roads between the Thai-Cambodian boarder and Siem Reap, we'll see in which state I arrive there!

Johanne is now on her way to the airport, she'll fly back to Switzerland in a few hours... I'll miss her! She tried to take me home with her in a tuk tuk but I escaped, I do want to travel a little more before I go back...



We were in such a rush today, doing as many things as possible in the little time that was left, I still can't believe how she managed to get on the shuttle bus on time

Have a good trip Johanne!

Bisous
Melanie

We spent the last ten days in Koh Tao, learning how to dive. It was fantastic! We just couldn't stop and did the advanced course as well. With all the diving, studying and going out, I didn't event take time to write on my blog, oups...



Tomorrow we will be back in Bangkok already. We will spend two days there, visiting a few things and doing some shopping. It will be a big change compared to the 21 sq km island of Koh Tao!

This morning was bitter as of 4h30 am local time...

We started yesterday in the early evening with some drinks at the Mellow Mountain Bar. It is a place at the far end of Hat Rin Nok Beach, about 30 meters above the sea level, famous among the party people and with a breathtaking view over the sea and the beach. We intended to take pictures of course, but we started chatting with two German guys, and when we thought about the pictures again, it was too dark and there was nothing left from the beautiful view... After dinner and a walk in the crowded streets of Hat Rin, we went back to our room to get some rest... We set the alarm clock at 1h30 am so that we wouldn't miss the game. And there we are, both of us with our glasses since we had slept so tight and just gotten up, but ready to celebrate what we thought would be a victory!



We watched the game on a big screen on the beach, with the usual party going on next to us, dance music coming from everywhere. There were not many people watching the game since it was 2 am and everybody was dancing, drinking and more. But we did find some compatriots! Here we are on the beach, with people from Zurich and Geneva. The picture could have been better, but don't forget that it was 2 am, and the photograph didn't look like he had been drinking only soda and mineral water all this time!



After the game, we sadly took the Swiss crosses off our shirts. No use for them any more



We stayed a little longer on the beach, trying to forget our deception while speaking about islands with the guy from Geneva and watching the sky find its colours back. Afterwards we went to get some breakfast. David from England joined us for a while (you would bet he is Swiss with his red shirt, wouldn't you?).



David managed to take this picture of us, I still wonder how after the night he must have had... I was quite nervous for my camera!



Meanwhile, the party was coming to an end on the beach.



We went back to our bungalow in order to sleep a few hours before taking the boat for a trip around the island.

Today is very cloudy in Ko Phangan. We cancelled the boat trip around the island that we had planned and decided to spend some time on the internet instead, so let's go back to Luang Prabang!

On our second day in Luang Prabang, we hired a boat together with two French girls, an Israelian one and an Australian guy, to go to the caves at Pak Ou. The trip took two hours each way on the Mekong River. We had the entire boat for ourselves.





On our way, we stopped at Ban Xang Hai, the so called "Whisky Village", up above the river.



We could see how the famous lao-lao whisky and sweet rice wine is made. Cooked sticky rice is kept in big jars together with water and yeast to ferment.



After eight days, the rice starch has transformed into alcohol. This is the sweet wine, or "lao kham-kham".







The lao-lao whisky is made by distilling this sweet rice wine. We tasted some. The whisky is really strong but the sweet wine is quite good. We thought about trying some snake-lao-lao, but thought it was a little bit too early, not even noon



This little guy had been watching us the whole time, peeling his papaya. He was very proud to pose for a picture.



A few more pictures, and then it was time to go back to the boat.







Our next stop was at another small village, where they make paper.







Both villages are now tourists-oriented, but it is still nice to see how the local people live and work.

After some more time on the Mekong River, we finally arrived at the caves.



There are two caves, one in the lower part and one in the upper part of the cliff. Both caves are full of Buddha statues. Every year, new statues are brought there during the new year's celebrations. Some say that it is a kind of graveyard where unwanted statues and images are brought.



When we got back to the boat, it started to rain. We crossed the Mekong and had lunch in a restaurant above the river. The rain stopped just as we were finishing. We returned to Luang Prabang, taking a nap on the boat, and ended the day with a real good Kamu massage. I still don't know the difference between this massage and other ones, but it doesn't really matter since all of them are good.

Right now, we are in a paradisiac island in the South of Thailand, Ko Phangan. We love it! Spending hours at the beach, shopping, eating delicious sea food... Today we registered for four days of scuba diving in Ko Tao, starting on June 28th. We will do the open water Padi, I am thrilled!

We had to leave Laos a few days ago because our visa expired. We enjoyed every day in this beautiful country, except for the ones we had to spend in bed or looking for bathrooms in Pakse because of an intoxication we got in an Indian restaurant

I enjoyed being in Laos a lot. Already from the plane, you can see that nature is everywhere. You arrive in a sea of greens! Only a few houses show that Luang Prabang hides there. What a difference when you come directly from Bangkok! And at the airport, you notice with surprise that the guys taking care of the visas on arrival are eager to offer you their most beautiful smile while explaining how to proceed with the immigration formalities. How nice to be here!



On our first day together in Luang Prabang, Johanne and I took a tuk-tuk (an open-air taxi, something between a motorbyke with a trailer and a mini pick-up) to the famous Kuang Si waterfalls that are located near Luang Prabang, a 30 minutes trip on a bumpy road. It was fantastic! An impressive scenery of waterfalls building pools along their way. We could hardly stop taking pictures!











We went up as far as we could, following the water. We got a little bit lost, but who cares, it was a nice hike in the tropical forest, with thousands of different noises and so many plants and flowers that we didn't know.



We celebrated these beautiful sights with a nice dinner at Nazim, an Indian restaurant next to the Mekong. It felt like in a dream.

When we turned up in what seemed to be the only open-air bar in Pakse where you can watch football on a big screen, there was no table left for us two sole Swiss girls in town. While we were looking around, hesitating in which company we should enjoy the game, some nice Corean guys invited us to join them. They were sitting at a huge table with one Corean side and one Lao side, with a Thai lady on the Lao side. They had just finished an important business dinner while watching Corea win against Togo and were of course very happy! They made room so that Johanne and I could sit down and promissed to be on our side and support Switzerland.



From then on, our glasses were diligently filled in as soon as they were empty...



We learned how to say cheers in Corean and had to practice every 5 minutes!



The Corean people left at the break, making sure that enough bottles of Beer Lao were on the table. We finished the night sharing our beer with two French guys and enjoying the game with them as peacefully as possible

Ok, I will try and write something about Luang Prabang tomorrow. But for now, we have something more important to do with Johanne! Hop Suisse!!!

Starting in Luang Prabang, Laos, on May 30th 2006, and heading for many places that I have only heard of until today or that are still totally unknown to me yet, I will resurface in a little bit less than three months somewhere in Indonesia probably.

In the beginning, I will be travelling with Johanne, the sister of a good friend of mine in the Romandie. Johanne started her trip in Asia on March the 7th, in Vietnam, and had been travelling through South-America during 5 months before that. How nice to start on a new continent with a friend who already knows so much about travelling! We will do Laos together, then the South of Thailand (some nice islands) and Bangkok, and on July the 9th Johanne will go back to Switzerland and I will continue on my own.

When I come back, my heart and my head overwhelmed with memories and emotions, I hope that my family and friends will be able to understand how I feel and share this new passion with me. And of course, publishing my journal online is easier than writing individual e-mails in French, German and English, which would take me hours! This is why I would like to share my experiences and pictures with you on this blog. You can follow my trip if you want, and communicate with me by inserting comments. So let us start, follow me to beautiful Laos!