I love Laos....
I had the most amazing day ever yesterday! Rach and I rented bikes to ride out to a waterfall out of town. 4 months of not being on a bike is way too long for me. Based on past experiences with waterfalls in SE Asia, we were not expecting much and figured the 32K there journey would be better than the destination. We headed out of town through little villages littered with rice patties. We came across little boys who tried to kick us and then spit at us, and little girls who gave us high fives as we went by...go figure. When we arrived at the waterfalls we were charged 2,000 kip (20 cents) to park our bikes, we found that comical. We met some Laotian Americans in the parking lot and went up to the falls with them. We were pleasantly surprised by tier after tier of falls, and endless swimming holes. The water was the most incredible color blue. Our new friends told us a lot about the history of Laos, and explained how they fled to the US in the 70s when Laos was being bombed during teh Vietnam war. This was their first time back since then. It was a really intense experience, to share a hike with people being reunited with their country after 30 years.
When we got back to town we decided we deserved a treat after a 64K ride, so we went and got pumpkin pie...it was really amazing. We found a coffee shop here that has amazing baked goods and real coffee...it feels good after 4 months of a lot of rice.