Just get on your bike

After a particularly unpleasant bus ride (7 hours sitting on a broken seat that shot me forwards everytime we went round a bend, next to a man who spent the entire journey either spitting out of the window or yelling into his mobile phone [not Adam!] while the teenagers on the other side of the aisle kept swapping places so that they could each ask me the same set of questions where are you from? what's your name? etc) we decided to revert back to our favourite mode of transport so far and hired a couple of motorbikes to explore the Bolivean Plateau (an area famous for lush coffee plantations and beautiful waterfalls). I didn't even take convincing that it would be fun this time, although that's not much of an endorsement for how much fun biking over here is as anything would have seemed better than public transport!

We were only going for a couple of days and as there aren't many roads in Laos we decided that a map was excessive and so just set off. Had an amazing time, although as you can see the roads weren't of the highest standards!

Had such a fun few days. The smell as we rode along through the coffee plantations was amazing (and that's from a coffee hater!) and the views were pretty good too. Riding a bike enables you to just stop and immediately be within a community, children and adults alike crowd around you every time you stop trying to talk to you (very amusing) and children chase behind you as you drive along, reaching out and trying to touch our different looking skin or do a high 5!

The waterfalls were pretty awesome too. Was great to go for a swim in the cool water at the end of a day on the bike. Ad decided that a swim wasn't refreshing enough though and actually got in the waterfall for some kind of power massage!

We've loved our time in Laos - next proper stop . . . Borneo (via Bangkok and KL!).