Change of Plans :)

Good Morning All,

Well what an eventful few days we have had. After our interesting border crossing (which took about 5hrs), We finally made it into Laos pirched on the back of a Ute from Thai Customs (Thank goodness they felt like helping us out). Arriving in Thakhek was surreal, the last time we stayed here was almost 5 years ago and we remember this town being very quiet with very little to do. As it happens at the moment the Lao Traditional Long Boat village races are happening all across Laos so Thakhek was full of life! Markets, Rock Concerts, wow what an experience! Certainly not the Thakhek we remember.

In the morning we headed north on Route 13 towards the turn off for Route 8 and the Sainamhai resort. Whilst the weather has been threatening to rain on us for a few days, we have been so lucky to avoid getting drenched so far! After a brief stop at the intersection for a recharging Chicken Noodle Soup, we were off on the 40km ride down Route 8 into Na Hin. Such a beautiful ride up to and into the Limestone Mountain ranges of Khammoune Province.

We made good time and arrived as planned at the Sainamhai resort (Heaven on Earth) where we were warmly greeted by Uncle Vongsamay and Auntie Thippaphone :) So good to see them again and instantly felt right at home!. Here is where the plans change :)

We had originally planned to stay 4nights at the Sainamhai Resort before heading to Vientiane to see cousin Angela (Vongsamay's oldest Daughter) who with her husband Bou, was expected to give birth to her first baby girl, when we arrived at Sainamhai we realised Angela had given birth to a  beautiful baby girl at 11am (About 3hrs prior). Mr and Mrs Malibayphit had waited at the resort just to welcome us as they had not seen us for so many years. (The resort is closed at the moment with the baby expeci ted).  They informed us that the baby had been born and they were going to go to Vientiane for a few days to be with Angela, Bou and their first grandchild. We were blown away they waitied for us, and quite overwhelmed with emotion. After bidding them a safe journey we sat down and relaxed at a resort we had all to ourselves.

Whilst sitting we pondered the coming days plans and quickly decided to head for Vientiane early to see Angela, the baby and family and spend some time with them in the capital. Vongsamay had planned to return after a few days to be with us at the resort, but now they will stay with Angela until after the weekend. Such a beatiful and amazing family! So blessed! We retired shortly after an amazing dinner cooked by Nana (Vongsamay's youngest daughter who they had arranged to look after us at the resort).

Vongsamay has arranged for us this morning to visit the Ban Oh School nearby where we held our last Book Party and to see the new Water Well that was built at the school after we last left. Im writing this just before we head to the school to visit them for a short while before we head back to Sainamhai to load up and ride to Vientiane.

Apologies there have been no more videos as yet and not many photos on the blog but the plan was to update the next posts and vlogs at the Sainamhai. This will now be when we arrive in Vientiane. Sooo many photos and cool videos to share in the next update, i wish i could just beam it all online without all the editing, such an amazing experience and can't wait to share with you all.

Thanks for staying tuned and the next posts in the coming days will have lots of amazing pics as well as our many exciting moments captured enroute. So much to share but will try to condense into a small package of awesomeness for you to enjoy.

Time for breakfast at the Sainamhai prepared by wonderful Nana. Stay tuned for the next posts which will be a super huge posts with tonnes of pics and videos and shenanigans for you to enjoy.

Crossed the border

Just a quick note to say that we are now in Laos. Sorry must eat before entering diabetic coma as haven't eaten in about 8hrs. See video or unorthodox border crossing which took 6hrs....

More to come very soon, stay tuned 😀

Udon Thani to Thakhek and the Third Thai/Lao Friendship Bridge

Sabaidee!

Thanks for being patient and staying tuned for the few days we weren't actively blogging whilst we crossed into Laos. We hope you enjoy episode 2 of our Holiday Vlog, more riding in this one, we also got stopped by police at a checkpoint which was interesting, normally they just wave foreigners on but we must have looked interesting.

We arrived at the Border early afternoon but it took quite a few hours to get across given we had to arrange a lift across for the bikes. (Motorcycles aren't allowed to cross the bridge unless on another vehicle at this crossing).

We arrived in Thakhek for our overnight stay enroute to Sainamhai resort. We didn't realise it was the Annual Thai/Laos Boat festival on the mekong so Thakhek was absolutely packed with thousands of people everywhere partying until the early hours.

The next morning we loaded up and headed for Na Hin and the Sainamhai resort. Will publish the next video of that ride and the ride to Vientiane later today hopefully :)

Having a blast and hope your enjoying the journey via our blog :D

Thanks Chris & Dave :)

Preparations in Udon Thani

Sawasdee Krab!

Thanks for tuning in all, we have had a great couple of days in Udon Thani and have spent most of today preparing for our ride and border crossing about 260kms east of Udon Thani. We are planning to cross into Thakhek from Nakhom Phanom  tomorrow, with our papers in hand, we will head to the border through a few morning thunder storms and patchy rain.

As i mentioned in a previous post, if we are turned back from the border it will mean an additional 500+km's to reach our ultimate destination, the Sainamhai Resort in beautiful Khammoune Province, Laos.

Only a short post tonite as we are still busy packing and such. Have some great footage from today to share on our next video in the coming days when we arrive at Sainamhai and can relax and put it together :)

That said, we were at the hotel restaurant for dinner this evening and the singer in the band requested a performance....... Being the Extrovert I am, of course couldn't resist. Thought I would share with you all, audio quality not great but hope you enjoy :)

Kop Kuhn Krab (Thankyou very much)

Arrived in Udon Thani :)

Sawasdee Krab!

We made it to Udon Thani! After a quick and sweet 1hr flight from Bangkok to Udon Thani, we were greeted by our main man Amarin (aka Mr Moto) who chauffeured us to the Centara Hotel and Convention Centre where our bikes were parked in the VIP spot awaiting our arrival :)

So good to be back in Udon Thani, last night we decided to have Sizzler for dinner (Go figure, we fly thousands of miles to eat imported Australian Beef at an American fast food chain in Thailand :P Nevertheless steak was great and it was off to bed for some well deserved shut eye.

This morning we headed over to Mr Moto's shop to fill in all the transport and customs forms to export the bikes from Thailand in a few days time when we head for the Thai Lao Friendship Bridge No. 3 in Nakhom Phanom Thailand. Whilst there have been many reports of Bikes not being allowed to cross at this point, we are confident that all is now OK so we will head east for the border on Tuesday (With Fingers and Toes crossed). If for whatever reason we are turned away, it will mean riding approx 600kms additional via Vientiane to get to our favourite place in Laos, the Sainamhai Resort and Mr Vongsamay and his wonderful family. (Please make sure many spring rolls ready for our arrival Mrs Malibayphit)

If all goes to plan, we will cross at Nakhom Phanom enroute to Sainamhai Resort

If it all goes wrong, we will have a 592km trek back to Vientiane then east to Sainamhai Resort.... Fingers crossed!

We headed out for a Roast Pork lunch at the T Bar (Awesome Restaurant on the outskirts of Udon) before fighting crazy traffic and a few police escorts enroute.

Oh well its off to the pool for now to cool off and enjoy the rest of the day relaxing.

We hope you enjoy the first of our vlog videos below, still practising so hopefully will get more polished in time :)

Thanks for tuning in and feel free to leave a comment and subscribe to the blog so you don't miss a thing!

Regards Chris & David

Arrived in Bangkok waiting to board to Udon Thani

Happy to say we have arrived safe and sound in Thailand :) After an exceptionally long day of travel from the Gold Coast yesterday morning, we arrived in Bangkok at approx 3am AEST after leaving at 9am the previous morning.

We had a 7.5hr stopover in Singapore which was sped up by some time relaxing in the Ambassador Lounge at Changi T2. (Best Showers EVER!)

I look forward to posting some pictures and videos in the coming days once we have arrived in Udon Thani. Can't wait to see our Awesome Honda CRF's and of course Mr. Moto who looks after our bikes so graciously, we love you Mr. Moto!

Can now officially say it feels like we are on holiday. In just a few hours we will land at Udon Thani where we will be picked up by Mr Moto to chauffeur us the Centara Hotel where our prepared our bikes ready for our arrival.

Thanks for tuning in to the blog all, we love sharing these adventures with you all.

Nearly time to board :)

Thailand and Laos, Here we come! again:)

On the 29th September 2017, David Burrows and Christopher Jilley will be reunited with our awesome Honda CRF 250L's for another hoot around Laos. We have not arranged a fundraising campaign this year for another book party as the timing wasn't with us this year with many exciting things happening with us and our extended family.

It's been almost two years since we were last in Laos, alot has happened in that time but you get the feeling that when you get back, the pace will just slow right down again. Kind of like stepping out of the crazy hectic western world into an Oasis with the wonder of nature all around and a beautiful people for the most part not distracted by the unimportant.

For 3 weeks in Thailand and Laos, our route will be approx 1700 km's and will take us East through Isaan to where we hope to cross the Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge No 3 at Nakom Phanom (Thai) into Thakek (Laos). We have heard there have been issues in the past with this particular bridge crossing into Laos not allowing motorcycles due to a band of rogue Thai riders that avoided Laos police by darting across the border some time ago. We crossed this bridge in the other direction from Laos back to Thai almost 5 years ago not too long after the bridge had been built. I vividly remember the Laos official saying "Maybe you not go today, if he say no, you not go".

FB3 Border Crossing from the Lao Side.

Photo from 2012 Trip - On the rented Kawasaki KLX250's

After some polite and friendly patience and pleanty of Wai's. we were off on our merry way across the bridge, apparently both David and Big Chris forgot that the bridge was Thai and didn't observe the clearly marked flow of the road and signs showing the change in direction and rode half way across the bridge on the wrong side of the road. All good though, we avoided a 300+kms trip back to Vientiane's Friendship Bridge No 1 (The Main Land Crossing for Thai/Laos).

We are planning to cross at FB3 this time so we can head straight for Na Hin and the Sainamhai Resort to see Uncle Vongsamay :) where we will enjoy 4 glorious days and nights  relaxing in the beauty of Na Hin and Khammoune Province, but most importantly in the company of some amazing people. Can't wait to see you all soon!

The Road to Paradise (aka Sainamhai Resort)

We then make our way West to Vientiane and then north to Vang Vieng en route to Luang Prabang where many more amazing friends await us to spoil us with their hospitality as always. :)

Last year we were a bit dissapointed that we had tried to reach Long Tieng (South west of Phonsavahn and North east of Vang Vieng. We had attempted to approach from the North which apparently wasn't the way to go so we were very politely turned back around and told it was best to go back to Phonsavahn. Long Tieng was long regarded as one of the most secrect places on earth due to its geographical military use during the Vietnam war. We hope this year to get a glimpse of Long Tieng in its current untouched form before the area opens up to tourism which may occur in the very near future.

We will then head back to Vang Vieng and then a leisurely ride back down south to Udon Thani where we end our tour and our very good friend Amarin (Mr Moto) will look after our trust Honda's until our next visit. We are so blessed to have met so many wonderful and helpful people through our many trips to Thailand and Laos. Look forward to seeing you all again very soon :)

WOOHOO, 17days till take off!!! :D

Some things we will be attempting not to do on this trip! Enjoy the below

Dave on a wet and oil covered Route 8 in 2013 :)

Chris on a dry road with no oil cover in 2015 :)

Chris gets rear ended by an Isuzu with a Bull Bar when little Laos lady steps into the road in front of us. Bike was 3cms shorter after this incident.