Day 81-4

Day 81 - Beginning of Illness...

Katie, Chris, Sam and I went for a Sauna at the Good Life Cafe, which was awesome, and Emily came in half way through to say that she'd sorted travel for the 7th (the day after tomorrow). I had a shake afterwards with ultra-healthy seaweed in, and was extremely ill for most of the next two days. Like, really ill so that I can't sleep, which is annoying...

Day 82 - Ill waterfall

I slept(ish) early last night having to get up loads in the night, including once when I vomited into the shower because I couldn't make it to the toilet, which was fun to clear up silently at 3 am. In the morning we went to waterfall, out beyond Nancy and Jessie's new land, which Emily may be going into business on (!). The water was freezing, so we all went off to Pailand for dinner, watching the horses wandering through the rice fields. The Pailand guys very kindly cooked us all BBQ pork and rice,m although I felt so ill that I could only manage about half. When we got back I pretty much went to bed, and so I missed my last night in the Irie, which apparently included a moment (while i was spaced out and trying not to be ill) when Nancy looked from me to Emily and said "i want him". Damn, too late...

Day 83 - Off again

I returned my bike at about 8am, having mustered the strength to not stay in Pai. We got the minibus to Chiang Mai, during which I sat in enormous pain and turmoil sit in enormous pain for most of it, having dosed up on imodiums and water. We changed to a worse minibus to Chiang Khong, where we stayed the night at PJ's guest house, dealt with an extremely screechy woman, and got charged 1400 baht for visa services, while it should only be $35, but we had no dollars and so were at the mercy of their ad hoc exchange rates. On the upside, I managed to eat something for first time since friday morning (it's monday today). I slept like a log, although the room smelt slightly of sewage.

Day 84 - Laos!

Ok, note form time... We were up at 7, I managed to eat some toast, then we transferred across the river through the most informal border crossing ever. I exchanged $100 traveller's cheques for about 1000,000 kip, ending up with a massive loaf of cash. We got on the slow boat, and were immediately offered weed by a guy jumping from boat to boat. We settled down for cards and beer lao, but it was really crowded so after a while we moved to the back of the boat (by the engine out of a truck - still had cigarette lighter and dashboard attached!) where we settled among the bags for a few hours of reading, eating and drinking - we gave the engineer a few beers, he shared his food with us, we give him fags and he listens to BRMC. He is then awoken from his beery slumber by the lady from the kitchen, yelling at him to get on top and see the boat in. Oops. We have now arrived in pak ben village, in the Questhouse (that's what the sign says) - we were ripped off a bit, it turns out, but never mind. The room is clean enough, run on a generator so the light flashes as fan goes, and shower stops when the toilet flushes. We were offered weed and opium once again immediately we got off the boat - we politely declined, and are going to the bar for a drink now. Oh, Laos is beautiful by the way, we've been going down the Mekong all day, just greenery, sand and cows all the way. I have only seen one vehicle in 7 hours.