Into Laos...

 We decided to take the bus over the border as we had heard dodgy things about the road and so were dismayed as we travelled on a brand new road for a LONG time down hill....anyway, back on the bikes the next day saw us clock up 100km on an amazingly good road. Beautifully undulating and felt like more downhill than up despite the fact we were following a river upstream...! I think we were just happy to be back on our own two wheels! People are super friendly here, but much quieter than Vietnam. The whole country is working on a slower pace, with less traffic, less background noise and less yelling. We have almost felt like we should honk our hooters sometimes and have reverted to just waving and giving the kids high fives and we pedal past. They know Hello! OK! and BYEBYE!

 We have had a few massive monsoon downpours which have seen us pedalling for shelter (this one in a locals house/shop/verandah where we enjoyed a Sprite and a biscuit and had to turn down numerous offers of Lao Beer.This was after 90km and had only 10 to go to our destination so eventually we just set off iin the rain. A good thing as it continued raining for about 48 hours....

 As you can imagine the motivation the next morning was a little think on the ground but we got moving only an hour or two later than usual and hit it. This was possibly the hardest day biking yet - 85km with about 50 of that uphill, mostly in the rain, with mostly contradictary information but we eventually made it to a small town, found a guesthouse and convinced them that US ddollars were real and that we should be able to pay with them (we had had trouble getting enough Lao KIP from the ATMS...)

 2 days of riding past very simple, poor villages but beautiful places to ride through. Life must be pretty hard living here though...

And a wee river in monsoon flood that was stunning. Pic a bit random but...oh well!

We are now chilling in Luang Prabang, on the banks of the Mekong, enjoying some variety in our diet! There is truckloads of good food here so we are making the most of that! Also enjoying the company from other travellors and just generally exploring a new place and taking a few dyas to fix our bikes, order parts and refresh for the next leg!