Laos

From Dien Bien Phu we went into Laos. More mixed riding and mixed weather. Right now we're in Vang Vieng which is a touristy town filled with restaurants playing reruns of 'friends'...strange. Luang Prabang was touristy too but at least there was a little variety in the traveler demographic. From here, B and I will split and go to the plain of jars and then meet back up with Peter and Monica in Vientiene in a couple of days. Yes, we are now 4...Kristina took her leave in Luang Prabang and is now safe and sound in Vancouver. She can relish the fact that she just missed 3 days of cycling in cold and unrelenting rain!

Traveling lameness

Sometimes I feel really lame when I travel. It's hard to put my finger on why but I think it has something to do with exactly what I'm doing right now. Hanging around in a little touristic spot doing nothing but leisure while the world goes on around me. Laos, a very poor country, has most of its people working hard to barely scrape by...and here I am swinging in a hammock or blogging...being so utterly bourgeoisie. I feel a little sickened with myself. Maybe that's why I don't like rest days and why I like suffering in the heat and dust all day in the saddle. Maybe suffering a little bit makes me feel a little better about being here...like I'm earning my distance and experience or something. I have felt this way before...and always in poor places where a bunch of other travelers are. We all stroll around with our sunglasses and sandals and little shoulder bags in a semi-random pattern looking for something or nothing.
The locals around here are not suffering, however. But they do have a hard life...harder than anyone reading this.(which isn't very many people!)

Mongolia and Europe map

This is a test post of a map generated by google fusion tables that I made a while ago. Fusion tables allows you to create maps based on lon/lat coordinates.



This is a 'my maps' google map of my Europe trip fall 2010. We're taking a rest day here in Laos and I'm bored so I'm internetting.


View Euro 2010 in a larger map

Vietnam

I've been a really lame blogger lately...as in the last 6 months. I still plan to retro-post some fun Euro-traversing but in the meantime I'll fire off some pics of Northern Vietnam and Laos. A brief description is that we had a stop over in Hong Kong, landed in Hanoi, trained to Lao Cai and then cycled through Sa Pa and down to Dien Bien Phu and on into Laos. It's hard to pick a favourite spot so far as they've all been pretty unique and new. The cycling has been mixed with some hot days and good climbs. Peter and Monica are blogging too: http://twomelovelos.blogspot.com/ and they're carrying a 'spot' that tracks their location...see their blog and click on the "where are we" tab. For the time being, were they are is where I am.






















Hong Kong