Vang Vien

Disaster. My phone has gone missing. If I didn’t have so little trust in my memory of late, I’d kick up a real fuss, convinced that t has been stolen from our room. Everything else of any value, apart from Will’s wallet and my Ipod were in the safe. But we’ve packed everything and it’s nowhere to be found. No matter, maybe it will turn up in one of the bags when we get to our next destination.

We board the bus and it’s packed to the rafters with students from Singapore who have been volunteering and have just built a woman’s toilet at one of the schools in Vientiane. They’re very excitable and we spend most of the journey listening, unavoidably, to the music emitting from one or other of their mobile phones/mp3 players. Very Euro-pop and inoffensive and it seems to calm Harley down as he manages to sit quietly (for him) on my lap for the journey which takes us through stunning scenery, past numerous waterfalls, a Hmong village, kids sitting in the road, young kids on bikes with friends on the back, cycling up steep hill with an umbrella in one hand, past cows wandering across the road and we very nearly run over a dog just the once.

Vang Vien has a pretty terrible reputation as the place to hang out getting stoned and watching back to back re-runs of The Simpsons whilst eating crap food, so it was number one on my top 10 list of places to avoid. Except that you can go tubing here, which sounded like a lot of fun, so something told me to give it a chance.

We decided to stay at the Thavansouk Resort, partly because it was a little distance out of town, although Will’s still convinced that I chose it purely because the Footprint guide book we have tells us to look out for “local, home-grown pop star Alounak, who runs the place”. I can’t tell you how beautiful this place is. Not only Ban Lao, our “traditional Lao house”, but the stunning view both from the picture window and the balcony. We’re right next to the Nam Xong river; fishermen wading knee high in the water, casting their nets over and over and over again, with the most amazing views of the mountains on the other side. Sheer, jagged rocks covered in thick forest, flocks of white birds flying over. None of us can believe either the view or our luck at stumbling across such a gorgeous place, especially when we had such low expectations. A short walk along the road, we found a great little restaurant where we were the only customers. I ate an excellent vegetarian Lap, the local Lao dish made with tofu, beans, chilli, garlic and loads of mint (normally also with meat or fish, but since I don’t eat meat and Will previously told me the fish tastes of river water, I’m now a tofu convert. I’ll be wearing hippy clothes next), the kids find three healthy looking kittens to play with and Will’s tucking into Ruby’s apparently delicious organic pork.

We go back to the room to read up on the tours available, and I decide that I want to book with Green Discovery as I’ve got all on my high horse since we’ve been in Lao about Eco-Tourism (see, I warned you about the hippy thing) and these people give 34% of their profits back to the local villages, employ Lao people and generally ease my conscience about tourism destroying Lao the way it has Thailand. I find it really sad that we’re part of the cycle that is destroying the cultures of these countries. We sit in a restaurant in Lao asking for pasta (for the kids) and then moan when we go to a place like Vang Vien that cooks more Western than local food. Supply and demand. And we’re unfortunately demanding it. I want to beat the kids over the head and force feed them Lap, but Will won’t tell me where he’s put the handcuffs or the whip.

So the little morning foray into town was not too shocking. We find the offices of Green Discovery, talk to them about tubing, they convince us that the kids would be much safer in a tube with us and we set off to the Luang Prabang bakery for some breakfast before heading off on our trip. Tubing is very simple. You take one mother of an inner tube (a tractor tyre maybe?), inflate it to within an inch of its life, hop on it and float down the river. Until you hit the fast flowing bits then you bump and grind over them. Sorry, no, not grind, I’m still thinking about those handcuffs. A very relaxing 3km with Ruby on my lap, Harley on Will’s, accompanied by our lovely guide Ola. We all agree that we’ve had so much fun, we’ll head back into town later and book another trip for a longer distance in the morning.

That’s when we get the shock. It really is like all the guide books, except it’s Friends on continuous loop, not Simpsons. In every restaurant, people are sitting stock still, drink on the table, staring at a TV which dominates the whole restaurant and cracking the occasional smile. We head into one of the only restaurants which seems not to be showing anything and, as soon as we sit down, they switch on the TV. No matter, it’s a cartoon, for the kids we imagine, and the kids haven’t seen any TV for nearly two weeks so it’s not the end of the world. I’m about the order a vodka and tonic when Will notices that, for not much more than the price of four of those, we can order 8 vodkas plus 2 cans of pepsi, tonic or red bull. Fine, we’ll have that then, with one red bull (for Will) and one pepsi (for me). Five minutes later and an ice bucket arrives with all if it mixed in together. Absolutely foul. Then the food arrives. Foul. Then I look up from my booklet I’m reading (probably about Eco-Tourism or how to be a self-righteous prick) and see that the kids cartoon is not that at all but some adult Simpsons-style cartoon talking about masturbating and according to Ruby, “using the swear word which rhymes with duck”. Will’s chuckling away and drinking from the ice bucket so I decide to show my disgust by seeking out my Eco-Warrior Green Discovery comrades and then going to the internet café. I book a trip for the next day, 9am start (oh dear, sorry family, that means you have to leave this godforsaken excuse for a restaurant RIGHT NOW in order to be up on time in the morning. Control freak? Me?).

We meet up with Ola for a trekking/caving/ tubing adventure that Gabby and family have previously enjoyed so much, only slightly deterred by the fact that, unless Harley’s less than 10 feet from water, he’s suddenly decided that his legs don’t work. To make his point, his falls to the ground declaring that he has no legs, which doesn’t bode well for trekking. So no points for guessing that Harley spends most of the day on Will’s shoulders whilst we explore; firstly, down a track to a boat which takes us across the river, through rice paddies, past bananas, beans and sweet potatoes growing side by side, to the Elephant Cave, so called because it contains a completely natural stalagmite in the shape of an elephant, complete with tusks and big, flapping ears. And if that was completely natural, I’m Jim Royle. My arse. The interesting thing about this cave is that it contains a bell, which, if struck hard with the right instrument, can be heard up to 3km away. The bell is, in fact, the casing of an old US bomb, dropped during the Secret War between 1964-1975, which Ola assures us is now safe, or, to paraphrase him, broken.
Next up, we attempt to climb up 20ft bamboo ladders, into a dark, muddy cave with miners lights strapped to our heads but it’s way to steep, dark, slippery and (with Harley’s OCD about dirt) muddy for our little bundle of dynamite, so I take the executive decision to take him back the way we’d come and let the rest go on. Will and Ruby apparently had a great time whilst Harley enjoyed collecting rocks and I eavesdropped on the backpackers discussing which countries they’d “done”. I’m far too old and cynical to be around backpackers.

The troops returned muddy but still smiling and we join them for a short trek to Snail Cave. Named because of its shape, we’re certain it’s also something to do with it being so slimy. I repeatedly get my Havianas stuck in the mud and almost knock Ruby flying several times as I slip and slide my way along.

Another short walk through the fields and we arrive at a beautiful pool of water, albeit with a super-strong current flowing out. I peel off my dress and dive in, eventually convincing everyone else to join me in the freezing but refreshing water. We watch a group of Japanese tourists squeeze through a tiny hole, into a cave beneath water level and Ola confides that he doesn’t think Will could fit. Will overhears and, either furious or embarrassed, decides that he won’t be beaten. So as I struggle to stop both kids being swept away, he plays macho-man and duck-dives into the cave. I video the kids gleefully waving their last goodbyes to daddy and we all get dressed. Five minutes later, a totally exhausted, but somewhat puffed up (with pride, some may say) Will emerges from the hole of holes, hauls himself out of the water and collapses as Ola does 2,000 sit ups (ok, I made the last bit up, but you get the picture). Will now has to bargain with Harley to walk as he can hardly stand up himself and certainly is in no fit state to carry Harley. So we do a bit of left-right, Top Gun style marching, “I don’t know what’s been said, but I see a tuk tuk up ahead”….and manage to get everyone down to the river for a final descent by tube. Ruby’s delighted to have her own tube and we float on down the river. During which time I interrogate 23 year Ola and discover that his father was killed 23 ½ years ago when he was digging in a field and stuck his spade into an unexploded American bomb, killing 5 other people with him. 10 years ago, his mother re-married, to a man who had been married before and she had been ill ever since, until she died an unexplained death 2 years later. Lao people have a strong belief in black magic and Ola believed that the mans ex-wife had put a curse on Ola’s mother, making her ill and causing her death, although he was unable to explain why the husband was still alive and healthy and had gone on to marry for a third time.

This explained why, age 15 until 19, Ola had become a Buddhist Monk, something he described as “wonderful, since you get to live with the monks and get a good education”. He left 5 years ago, when he’d had enough, joined the army for a year and then come to Viang Vien as a tour guide, His brother was also here, as a pancake seller in the street. Which would be a bit like having one son as a lawyer and one as a dustman, I guess.

So we float on down the river, past high swings set up, little bamboo bars pumping out house and trance music and decide to stop at the last bar on the river for a reviving drink. Will challenges the local shark to a game of pool and wins so, buoyed up by his testosterone, decides to show the kids who’s boss and bounds (ok, it’s Will. He doesn’t bound, but he’s looking over my shoulder right now, ok) up the rickety wooden stairs, one at a time, and takes the leap of death (aka a trapeze which swings you out into the middle of the water, you let go and then swim back in). We watch a guy do an amazing triple back flip with double hand flying somersaults and then we watch Will do an amazing belly flop into the water. Everyone’s having a good time and it’s nothing to do with the advertised £1.50 Happy Shakes – banana, milk and weed. Floating back by 6pm, we’re all too knackered to go anywhere and room service is the order of the night.

We’re meant to leave today but, too tired to move very far after yesterday’s adventures, we book another night in our gorgeous house. Will gets a haircut, then we head off to the only hotel in town with a pool where we spend the afternoon. Only one chore to do before we leave in the morning - I have to unpack and then repack all the bags again to try to find my phone.