Last Days in Vientiane and back to Safari

Our last two days in Vientiane were more or less the same as the first two. We had to pick up our Thai visa, which thankfully was an easier process than applying for it, but this was not until after 13.30. We decided to walk to the embassy, see some sights on the way and stop off at any nice café we spotted. Once we had had breakfast we set off and it soon became apparent we had made a mistake. It was incredibly hot, far too hot to walk in and as we jumped from shade to shade we also realised there were no cafe's in this section of the city either. We did manage to see a sight, a large monument based on the Arc D'Triumphe in Paris. It was a huge concrete square, hollow inside with an arched entrance on each side. From a distance it looks impressive but once you are underneath it is a bit disappointing. It has been took over by locals who run a few small shops inside. At least it provided plenty of shade and we had a drink before setting back off to the embassy.

That evening we decided to have a bit of a luxury night and after our canapés and buy one get one free beer at I-Beam bar we set off to the river. We walked along the Mekong river at sunset, it was a stunning sight, and there are a few higher class bars. The whole place seems to either newly, or soon to be, renovated. We stopped off at a nice bar and had a cocktail while the sun went down. After we walked back up river, through a night market and tried to find somewhere to eat. We settled on a little French restaurant called Le Provence. We ordered two pizzas and they were delicious. Super thin and crispy base with anchovies, salami and mozzarella. The best pizza we have had in Asia.

On our last day before catching the night train, we took advantage of our last lay in and spent the rest of the time in a café drinking chocolate milkshake and chatting before going to the train station. We just missed the first connecting train to Nong Kai in Thailand to where the over night train starts. We had to wait until 5pm for the next one so passed the time drinking beers at tiny shop at the end of the platform. The night train itself was not as good as before, mainly due to the air con being too high and Chelsea did not sleep as she was too cold. We arrived in Bangkok at around 7am and after a quick breakfast, jumped in a minivan that took us to Kanchanaburi.

We arrived back at the safari on Saturday afternoon, unfortunately we did not come back to very good news as one of the puppies, George, had died that morning. Needless to say the whole team was devastated and no one was really working, We decided to get together that night on the river and have a few drinks to cheer everyone up. George has been buried by the river too, with a little cross which has his dog collar rapped around.

Sunday everyone was still a bit down but we had to get back to work. Us two got to go on cubs again. Chelsea was a little annoyed as Tat the tiger was not as responsive as when she left. Probably because the other people looking after her have not been doing it the same way. Liam was with Latte and was determined to get through the whole day without a scratch or bite, that lasted around 30 seconds when she jumped out of he night enclosure and scratched him on the hand. Latte is relentless at trying to bite. and jump at you, she will listen when you tell her off but she seems to forget after 2 minutes and will come straight back at you. Luckily it is just playing so the bites don't do any damage.

Yesterday Chelsea went back on cubs and has got Tat back to how she was before she left, Liam worked on Coffee the leopards cage. It is a double cage that we are planning to use half of for Tat when she is two big for her current one. The first job was to put up a visual barrier so Coffee and Tat would not be able to see each other as this would make Tat uncontrollable. So some of the team spent the day cable tying bamboo that had been split lengthwise to the mesh of the cage. It was very time consuming work but we managed to get in done.

In the evening we had been invited to 'staff meeting' by Joe the boss. The meeting was actually a party and Joe bought in drinks and food for both his Thai staff and us. It was a great night and we all drank way too much whisky and beer. We also got to try Thai white whisky, which is a horrible. Joe was making us shot it every so often and each time is was hard to keep down. Thai people love Karaoke so there was a karaoke machine set up and the Thai's were on it from the word go. It took several drinks before any of the volunteers had the courage to go up and by the end of the night we were all up there killing song after song. After we run out of ideas for songs to sing we sang them twice. It must have been awful for the Thai staff listening to us but it was a little bit of revenge.

Today has been a right off. We have all had serious hang overs. We have looked after the cubs, well Liam has looked after the cubs, Chelsea has laid asleep on the floor all day outside the cub enclosure. Thankfully we have had no customers and the cubs have been amazing, they just both laid in their doorways next to us all day as we recovered so it was not too much of a hassle. It is fair to say tonight is going to be an early one to catch up from last night.