Seeing Pictures

Hey all,
I just set up flicker account.  I am still trying to figure out how it works.  I have uploaded a few photos but am not sure if I set them for public viewing.  The link is posted bellow.  Please leave me a comment if you cannot view the images and I will try and sort it out ASAP!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/laurensakin/

Also, become my friend and follow my blog.  This way email notifications will come through when I publish a new post.

Lots of love from a happy traveler :oD

Living La Vida Laos

Less rambling and more updating on all the awesome adventures I have had since entering Laos.

I have traveled from Pakse in the South to the very French capital of Vientiane  to the river beach town on Vang Vieng, to the amazing charming and quaint town of Luang Prabang, and finally to a sleepy and amazing village on the Mekong named Nong Khiaw.
The entire time was filled with amazing memories and new friends.  I think I can count the number of meals I spent along on one hand!  Crazy enough I was begging for some alone time.
For those who do not know, Laos is a communist country.  So therefore there is a curfew.  This is pretty weird. The bars and restaurants close around 11:30 and you are potentially locked out of your accommodation for the night if you do not return home.  Early to bed early to rise is the healthiest way of living?

To narrowing down my time I have put together my top two adventures:

1) In Vang Vieng there are tons of wonderful windy and bumpy roads to bike (or motorbike) down.  They lead to waterfalls, villages, are show amazing landscapes of Karst limestone structures.  I rented a mountain bike for the day.  It, of course, broke about 5 km outside of town!  Luckily a Thai man who taught English at a nearby Mong Village fixed it for men and my a girl I had recently met, Alice, was kind enough to wait with me.  However, I could no longer change gears and it unfortunately was set to the highest setting.  Great.... While he fixed it his 10 day old pet monkey kept trying to jump on me! Either way I made it to a Lagoon where I had planed to meet some friends.  Afterward swimming,  I continued biking to a village and saw women weaving silk scarves to sell at the night time craft market.  By the end my arms were pretty soar from all the bumpy rocks.  The ride was spectacularly beautiful and my nose fantastically red!

2) I traveled for a bit with a lovely girl from Belgium named Olivia.  We decided it would be "fun" to take a slow boat up north to Nong Khiaw.  To ad we pictured a lovely large boat with a toilet and snacks and a break for lunch! Needless to say, 8 hours later and after haggling with our sketchy driver to take us to the actual town of Nong Khiaw (it was only the two of us in the boat and some other random Lao people he had picked up), we stumbled into two cozy bungalows with hammocks on the porch.