Researching

Monday 31^st January 2011

MP3 track of the day: fix you - cold play

Weather: hot during the day though not as cold tonight as previous nights

No moving furniture, no Laos people shouting at each other … just piece and quiet. Well almost piece and quiet, I can hear the traffic outside from my dorm. It didn't matter thought and I managed to sleep in later than yesterday. Once up I got on with my researching activities.

First of all I continued my hunt for accommodation within Shanghai. I pin-pointed the circuit within Shanghai, on my map, and then, using 'Google maps' I followed a metro line that I thought linked the circuit to the city. I then went onto 'hostel.com' and sent five hostels an email on how to get to the circuit from their locations. Whilst awaiting for answers I continued to search the world wide web, for more accommodation information, for my next port of call, Muang Kong.

Muang Kong is the biggest urban area within the '4,000 islands', and so I was a little surprised when not much information showed up online. I continued the search and eventually found some places which sounded very good value for money. However, before I go to the '4,000 islands', I want to visit 'Wat Phou'. As I explained yesterday it isn't the easiest of places to get to and so I was looking at accommodation just encase I couldn't do it in a day trip from Pakxe. Once again information on actually executing a successful day trip was scarce, however I found quite a few nice places to stay in at the nearby town of Champasak.

Now it many have only taken me two paragraphs to explain the above, however this had taken me until 1:30pm. Joe and Rachael had just arrived and so we, and two other guys, went out for lunch. After lunch I popped to the local tourist information office to ask about getting to 'Wat Phou' however they were about as useful as a biscuit. I returned to my hostel to have a think about tomorrow. I do want to visit 'Wat Phou' but just like the 'Ho Chi Minh trail' it seems like it's going to be difficult for me to get there. I got myself a drink and had a think about my next move.

Well three hours later and I hadn't made any real breakthroughs. In fact I had spent most of the time chatting to other travelers and it was soon 7:30pm. Joe, Rachael, Claudia (the girl I met in Georgetown ,Malaysia and Vientiane, Laos … what a coincidence seeing her here), an English guy, an Aussie and I all headed out for something to eat. We opted for Indian and after went for a drink before getting back to the hostel around 10pm. Joe and Rachael had been up since 5am and so went to bed; the others also went to the land of nod whereas I stayed up for a little while checking my emails.

So today hasn't been that productive; sure I've found out loads of information but I still hadn't sorted out a battle plan for the first nine days of February. Still, it's cheap here and I'm enjoying the company of other travelers. Maybe I'll stay here one more day.

Toodle Pip!