We started off waking up around 530 in the morning and got picked up a little after six by a bus to take us to the hot air balloon launch location. When we got there they were unpacking and starting to inflate the balloons, it was so interesting to see!
We were in the second balloon so we got to watch the first take off before we left. The take-off was the easy part, the balloon slowly ascended above the tree line as we started to cruise over the town. It was awesome, so calm and peaceful floating above everything. That is besides the roar of the flamethrower every so often to keep us up. Although it was cold out the hot air balloon was...well filled with hot air...which kept is pretty warm which was nice! The balloon ascended to 550m which I think is around 1800 ft! We were really high! 😝
We were up just in time to see the sun rise over the mountain which was awesome! After floating around for about 30 min we began to descend. Then came the hard part, the landing. The balloon pilots have very little control where the balloon is going however at different altitudes the wind blows different directions, so they use that to somewhat steer the balloon back to where they want to land. I'm not sure how experienced our pilot was but we started heading for the middle of this random farm field. We saw the landing crew drive their truck through the field and rush out of their truck in order to secure is when we landed. This didn't go as smoothly as it could have. When we hit the ground we were still moving sideways fairly fast so when the crew tried to hold us down they got carried a ways with the balloon. To make matters worse the field had a some big bumps that we managed to hit which made everyone in the basket bump around. The landing was rough but we survived! We loaded up back onto the truck which took us back to our hotel.
Once we got to the hotel we rested for about an hour and then moved our stuff to the hostel we had originally booked (5min walk closer to town). Once we got our bags situated we went to the bike rental place about a block away to get some motorbikes for the day.
We got the bikes around 9am and headed to Poukham cave and blue lagoon. The cave was approximately 8 km away and to get to it we had to drive the motorbikes over two brides and a 7 km on a really bumpy road. The ride was somewhat uncomfortable on the tiny scooters but it was much better than walking! When we arrived we parked the bikes and went to the cave. It was a short but very steep hike up the mountain to the entrance of the cave.
After the 15 min hike we finally got to the cave. It was ENORMOUS! It was really cool and filled with big rocks. You had to have a headlamp since the farther you went it became pitch black...my dad's headlamp finally paid of mom :P!
It was tough to get good pictures inside the cave. To get to the main area of the cave required some climbing over rocks that really weren't all the difficult, but of course my dad complained and said it was too tough. After about 20 min of convincing he finally agreed to move on. We explored the cave for about 40 min and I went off on my own to climb some of the bigger rocks that were in the cave...it was awesome!
After we finished exploring the cave we hiked back down to this lagoon (more of a river in my mind but whatever). The water was an awesome turqouis blue and there was a large tree overhanging the lagoon with a rope swing and branches to jump off of.
The jump was pretty high I'd say 25ft at least! It was tons of fun! I even convinced my dad to do the rope swing and jump off the smaller branch.
After we were done messing around in the lagoon we ate lunch. I had the beef laap which was tasty! After eating we went to her on our motorbikes and head back to town in order to go tubbing, but there was a problem...my bike wouldn't start, it didn't even make a sound like it was trying to start. We messed around with it and tried to kick start it with no luck. So we thought we might have to double up and ride back on the bumpy road to the town to let them know. Luckily however, we were able to get one of the locals to help us. He quickly called over some of his buddies and after chatting in indiscrenable Lao they were able to get it started! So we started back to town! However the bike I had was really crappy (as you might have guessed) and the key would fall out of the key slot when riding (it still ran without the key in it). This wasn't a problem when we were riding earlier since the key was tied onto the bike, however I untied the key when we were planing on leaving the bike at the lagoon and forgot to tie it back on after we got it started again. Well sure enough after about two minutes of riding after we left I remembered this and looked down and sure enough the key was gone, it fell out on the bumpy road (just my luck!). So we decided to drive back and look for it...nothing. 'Alright let's just get the bike back and explain what happened' we thought, so we left again. However, This time on the way out my dad spotted the key on the road and was able to pick it up! So we got the bike back to the rental shop as quickly as possible and got another bike! We were really lucky everything worked out!
After getting the new bike we went and changed and got ready for tubing. The tubing rental was in town and they would drive you out with your tube about 5km upstream on the river. Once you started tubing down the river there were 3 bars (really close to the start) that would throw a rope out and pull you in. It was really cool. My dad definitely felt out of place since he was probably the oldest one there haha! We stopped at each of the bars and had a beer.
Unfortunately I didn't take many photos with my phone so you'll have to look on Facebook for the rest. After the three bars we got back on the river and headed toward town. Well it turns out that it's the dry season right now and there's not as much water in the river (only 4ft deep at the most) this meant the trip into town would take 3 hours instead of 1 hour (during the rainy season). This is due to the fact that the current is slower with less water. Well we didn't know this prior to leaving so we left the last bar around 3 and figured we had plenty of time to make it back in...we didn't...not even close! The temperature starts to drop around 4pm as the sunsets, at this point we had been tubing for a good hour (and not just lazily, we were full on paddling and kicking to try and speed up!) with no end in sight we saw a random latter with a sign saying tuk tuk service to town, we jumped at the opportunity to get out of the cold water and get back. Of course the tuk tuk riped is off and charged us double what it should have cost, but we were in no position to haggle being sopping wet and cold! Such a scam! It still only cost about 4 dollars for the 5 min ride, it was totally worth it! We got the tubes back just as the sun was setting.
After returning our tubes we went back to the hostel and decided to ride the motorbikes around town for a while before we had to return them. After an hour of ridding we went back and returned the bikes then went looking for a place to eat. We settled on a place down by the river. The seats were kind of bed like so I hopped on up and noticed they had wifi so I went to grab my phone but it wasn't there!! I panicked! I had no idea where it could've been! My whole life was on that phone pictures, books to read, texting, Skype, email, blogger, music, the thought of losing it made me absolutely sick! I figured it must have fallen out while we were riding! We decided to check back at the hostel to see if I left it there...no luck. We went back to the motorbike shop to check..nothing. We searched everywhere and asked shops if they had anything. After an hour and a half I figured I'd never see it again. We happened to be by the riverside restaurant again so we decided to go back there again. Thoroughly depressed I walked into the restaurant and headed towards the same booth, I say down, and sure enough MY PHONE WAS SITTING IN THE BOOTH!! It must have bounced out when I sat down, I felt like a complete idiot, but I was a very happy idiot! :) we ordered and ate and the food was delicious!
After dinner we walked back to the hostel. I chilled in the lobby for a while to use the internet and got to Facetime with Rachel :)! It turned out to be someone's birthday and they were celebrating in the Libby and have me some cake and ice cream! My day got so much better! Around 10 I went back to the room and to bed. Tomorrow we go dirtbiking!
Well that was a long post! Sorry I was late too post it, super busy lately! Thanks for reading! I hope my rants aren't to confusing!
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