Our Great Adventure: Day 73 30/11/14

After breakfast at the hotel we headed off to Green Discovery. There were ten of us on the tour in total, a French couple, two French girls, a Brazilian couple, Australian girl and Scottish girl (who lives in Abu Dhabi). We headed off north of town in a remorque (think tuk tuk with trailer) for about 15km and then crossed the river by foot to reach Tham Sang cave. It's a small cave with a Buddha, a Buddha footprint and elephant shaped stalactite that gives the cave it's name. From here we walked (what we later came to realise was actually part of the trekking) to reach our second cave, Tham Loup, which we entered by climbing down bamboo steps. It was extremely dark, slippy and uneven inside however the stalactites and stalagmites were extremely impressive and worth the effort to avoid falling over. We walked through three caverns before reaching the end and returning back to daylight. We then headed to Tham Hoi cave which winds it's way through the mountainside for c45km. The going was easier in this cave although very hot and not surprisingly extremely dark. From here we went for lunch near Tham Nam cave. This cave is full of water and you enter on rubber tubes, pulling yourself through the cave system using a rope. It was a strange thing to do but enjoyable although we didn't really see much of the cave and you spend your time focused on staying in the rubber tube and not dropping the rope! From here we walked (more trekking!) through paddy fields to meet our remorque and then headed downstream a few kilometres to start the kayaking on the Nam Song river. We set off through a number of rapids which although probably relatively tame certainly got the adrenaline pumping. The kayaks were New Zealand fibre glass models and much easier to steer than the ones we'd been in at Cat Ba. The black karst landscape was particularly impressive and the river was extremely tranquil until after about 40 minutes when we reached the part of the river where the tubing starts, passing a number of loud bars. Luckily this didn't last for long and we were soon back in the peace and tranquility. We reached Vang Vieng after about 90 minutes and had to wait for our transport to arrive to collect our shoes and bags. Another great kayaking experience - think we might be getting addicted! Despite the disappointment of the town, the countryside surrounding Vang Vieng is impressive and it was good to get out and about. Later in the evening we headed into town for dinner and, after some deliberation over a beer as to where to eat, we did actually decided to go for a pizza. The menu included the usual selection of food and drinks plus three options on joints. From the look of most westerners they'd gone for one of the three. We left full but feeling very old!