G&T and the Outdoors

Team Laos traveled via minibus and the windiest roads towards Vang Vieng the home of the hideous tubing boozing phenomenon which just screamed Brits abroad! Oh dear. Vang Vieng is set in the most lovely and impressive of scenes with karsts and rivers and greenery galore.

Team Laos went on a cave tubing (floating on the river in a huge inner tube of a tyre) and kayaking expedition. For the cave tubing we sat in our tubes wearing hazardous head torches with the biggest battery pack just casually sloshing about in the water. Trying to forget about the obvious water/electrical hazard we pulled ourselves through the cave by ropes attached to the cave walls as we bobbed along in our tubes. It was an impressive, surreal, and fun activity.

After our stream-side lunch we went kayaking down the river which was chilled and beautiful and the weather was perfect (well maybe a bit too sunny and bright for my pasty skin so out came the factor 50 and a long sleeved top to protect me from the rays!). We paddled through minor rapids and past a herd of water buffalo chilling in the river until we reached the tubing stretch. Urgh! Such a horrifying contrast as we turned the river bend! Cringey and tasteless dance music thumped out while teens boozed about looking a mess. We paddled a little further downstream to stop for a Beer Laos or two, jumped off a high platform into the refreshing river, with a few of the braver Team Laos members swinging from a high trapeze and then flinging themselves into the river below.

One of our guides setting up the top rope with ease on Sleeping Wall

The next day saw the Team Laos girls rock climbing on Sleeping Wall. Lots of jugs to grab onto and occasionally dodging the odd spider and spider web inside the holds. It was lots of fun, of course, and it felt great to be able to complete most of the climbs set up for us. I didn't manage one where you had to sort of shimmy and sidestep a big tree trunk but got up pretty high so I was happy and proud of my climbey achievements. Half a day of this was enough for my feeble guns! To reward ourselves we sipped on a G&T (so British!) bucket with lots of fresh lime (of course) as we sat on a bamboo raft that hovered over the river.

Confusion with drinks orders so this little old lady wades back to shore and picks up this huge drinks menu and wades back across to our spot out on the river to clarify our G&T bucket. Hilarious!!