Travel Plans DO change...

Ra:

Hmm, shall we go to Vientiene first, than 4000 islands, and then Angkor Wat?

Perhaps Vang Vieng, which my sister Yael wanted us to go to, then Vientiene, and then Angkor Wat.

And after that? China? Malaysia? Indonesia? and what about Australia and New Zealand?

Before we started traveling, Sasha made plans. Now, I was consulted regarding said plans, but most of the time, I looked at these plans and I told her that once we start traveling, the plans will be just that... plans that might change. As any traveler worth his salt will tell you, part of the fun is to go with the flow, and simply travel wherever you feel like. This obviously works best when you don't have a time table to follow - which we (luckily) don't. 

And that's the way we've been traveling for the past 6 months. We'll (really, it's Sasha that will) make all these plans, and have them change a 1001 times. Luckily, she enjoys the plan making research and she doesn't mind.....

Yesterday morning we had to change our plans once again. Sasha and I were biking to a waterfall that's about 30Km away from Luang Prabang. we had spent all morning walking around town looking for the best bikes and the best deal for said bikes. We then waited around for our food to be cooked and put into a container so we could have a picnic once we got there. I also downloaded a program called "everytrail" onto my iPhone with which you can log your hike/bike rides onto a map, and was happy to try it out. We finally left around 11am(ish).

The first 4-5 Km were quite lovely. Those bikes were the nicest bikes i've been on in years, and the ride wasn't that hard - fairly gentle up and down slopes, meandering Loasian villages, etc.

After battling a relatively easy hill, I looked back, and realized that Sasha wasn't behind me. I waited a couple of minutes, and when she didn't show up, I turned around and rode back over the hill to find her sitting on the side of the road, next to a small stall. This was not a good sign, and as I rode closer, my fears were confirmed - she had some scrapes on her arms. As I rode even closer I saw it was actually much worse than that, and that she had taken a pretty nasty spill and scraped her arm and leg pretty bad. 

I flagged a Tuk Tuk and told the driver to take her to the hospital - which we had passed a few miles back - and that I would meet them there. I realized at this point that my lovely day of biking is over, and enjoyed the last few kilometers back to the hospital - by this point I knew it wasn't anything serious so i wasn't worried, but we both wanted it to be cleaned professionally.

Once I arrived at the hospital, I walked in to a team of two nurses doing a pretty good job of cleaning the muck and asphalt off of my wife. I immediately took out my camera and took some shots of the injuries - a tradition with the two of us when one of us (usually Sasha) gets hurt. This of course made her laugh, and we got some quizzical looks from the nurses, but they eased up when they realized it was OK to take the photos and that Sasha was not going into shock.

Cleaned up, and bandaged up we paid our bill (250,000Kip, which is $31) and grabbed another Tuk Tuk back to the bike place to return them and back to the hotel. At that point, I also turned off everytrail, being fairly certain that no one is going to want to follow this particular trail any longer....

So, just like we've heard from several people, we are now "stuck" in Luang Prabang. Not a bad place to be stuck at per-say - this town was occupied by the French for a long time, and you can see their influence all over town in the architecture and food. We are paying about average for our nice, ACed hotel room (about $10 a night), but the food here is almost in American prices, which is killing our budget. 

Sasha is somewhat bed ridden - not because she can't move - she can, we walked to something called big brother mouse and chatted with Laos teenagers this morning (in case you're wondering, I had to find ways to explain how the internet worked, and what is radiation to someone whos English... wasn't awesome. It was a fun challenge...), so she CAN walk. but the walking wasn't great for her leg, so, we came back here, to the hotel, took off the bandages, and let the wound breath all day, and will probably do the same for the next few days until it's better.  I'm happy to say it's looking much better now than it did this morning. Both of us can't stop staring at it. ;)

And our plans... have changed again. Now, we will attempt to go to China from here, skip Vientiene altogether and from China's Tiger leaping Gorge fly down to Cambodia and Angkor Wat, Then fly to Malaysia, Indonesia and then... (if you've made it all the way down this post you DESERVE to know!) WE ARE COMING BACK TO THE STATES!

We've decided that we really REALLY want to go to Burning Man this year, and build some art, burn some shit, etc. so, come August, we are coming home!

However... we currently have no home. Everything is in storage, and we both know that if we unpack, that's it for traveling - we're too lazy to pack everything back up again... so, we're not sure what's gonna happen after BM. If you don't understand how we can say that and be so calm, look at the subject header of this post. ;)