Bright and early on New Year's Day, after a few hours sleep coupled with a mild hangover, we boarded the minivan to take us to Chiang Mai. Luckily I slept through the drive, as the twists and turns surely would have made me vomit in my fragile state. We arrived in Chiang Mai after a few hours and boarded the next minivan to take us to the border crossing at Chiang Khong. The bus driver was a funny character and wouldn't stop for toilet breaks for often, but wanted us to spend an hour at the White Temple in Chiang Rai to which a French guy who was with us rudely protested, but we all agreed that no one was interested. We arrived at the border at around 5pm and got stamped out of Thailand. We caught the bus over the Mekong to the Laos border. Border control was very relaxed, and no one was searched - in fact I don't even think there was a place to conduct bag searches. We bought our visas an continued on to our sleeper bus to take us to Luang Prabang. We arrived in the town at a ridiculous time in the morning and so sat on the roadside under a street light reading our books until the guesthouses began to open. We found one fairly quickly, showered and headed out to find some breakfast and explore the town. We quickly realised that Luang Prabang was much more expensive than we had been used to, so many activities were out of the question. After much searching, we found the Ock Pop Tock shop, where we got a free tuk tuk to their crafts centre which offered free tours and taught us about the process of making silk and weaving it into cloth on a loom. 

We would have enjoyed to take a course and weave a bamboo basket or a small piece of cloth, but once again these activities were out of our price range. We relaxed in the lovely cafe drinking the free water and enjoying a beautiful view of the Mekong before taking a leisurely stroll back into town where we decided to climb Mount Phousi. The aim was to watch sunset from the viewpoint, so at 4pm we headed up. 

However it turned out to be more of a hill and took us about 20 minutes to reach the summit, where we found many Buddha statues. We also entered a cave which was absolutely tiny, containing yet more Buddhas, then set off to find "Buddhas footprint". When we found it we were very amused. Buddha is supposed to have been a great man, but a man all the same, not a giant with one and a half metre long feet. It was still only 5pm, and we couldn't be bothered to wait it out till sunset maybe an hour later, so instead we grabbed a few beerlaos and headed down to the Mekong to watch the sunset from there.

After sunset we walked back towards our hostel and decided to go to the Aussie bar for a lamb roast since we had missed Christmas dinner. The meal did by no means live up to our expectations, poorly cooked and with no mint sauce!! The best part about the meal was the mash - the only thing they had gotten right. 

Unsatisfied, we went back to our hostel to crash, it had been a long day for us.

In the morning we went to find a tuk tuk to take us the waterfalls, but the drivers all wanted a ridiculous price of just under £20 so we booked a tour bus instead for £4 each. While we waited for the bus to take us we went to sit on the banks of the Mekong, where I soon threw up the previous nights dinner - the beginning of a four day stomach bug.

Later we boarded the bus to the Kuang Si waterfalls. We paid our 20.000kip entry fee and went to see the bears in the sanctuary, who were sadly quite lethargic that day. 

The waterfalls were beautifully picturesque, though sadly I couldn't swim as my injuries weren't fully healed and I wasn't risking another bout of infection. There was tree to jump from and you could climb up onto the rocks to sit under the waterfall. The water was perfectly clear and reflected back a pale blue colour. Once Dave had finished swimming and getting photos, we headed further up the hill to see the main falls. We then decided to walk off the beaten path and found a huge spider which was larger than my palm. You could clearly see it's eyes and pincers, and we kept our distance whilst trying to get a good photo of the huge arachnid. 

Once back in town we showered and explored the night market for a little bit before getting a tuk tuk to La Pistoche, a bar and swimming pool, which we soon found out had closed half an hour earlier at 8pm. What kind of bar closes at 8pm? We went back into town and found redbul bar, where the cocktails were very cheap, had a few and went to bed, keen to be leaving this quiet, slow paced town for Vang Vieng the next day.