Up early for the kayaking. We got to the tour office and were given a breakfast of two eggs and a baguette. The bank is supposed to open at 8:30am, but didn't until 9:30!

Our group consisted of an Australian couple, a Belgian couple, four Israeli girls and us four lads.We were driven out to our starting point and were given a helmet, life jacket and paddle. We got some basic advice and then headed for the canoes.

I was in a single canoe, the canoe being small, hollow, molded plastic which you sat on. On getting in and paddling around against the flow of the river I thought I'd be OK.

I WAS USELESS! For a start I could not get into a comfortable position to paddle, when I kind of did, it had the canoe at an angle which I was always fighting against when paddling. All the way down for the first 2km I was just heading from one bank to the other. I was last in. And of course my end to the journey had to be spectacular. In the last stretch there were two rocks on a bend to negotiate, and as I paddled to get by one the flow just sent me sideways into it, overturning my canoe onto my head. So for the last 20 metres or so I was just floating, holding my canoe and paddle.

Fortunately non of the lads had their cameras with them so there is no pictorial evidence of my undashing arrival at the bank. Unfortunately the cameras were in the back of my canoe (I uprighted the canoe ASAP) but they were in a special dry sack.

Now we were off to a cave. We walked through rice paddies and fruit groves to a pool with a very low cave opening in it. Being wet already it wasn't a problem for me to test the water. We were given an innertube to sit in, and holding onto a line we entered the cave. Most of the way it was like walking a canal boat through a tunnel (done that on an old school trip). After a while we reached a very small sandy shore, and were each given a candle. I looked around and saw no way to go, the guide explained we had to shuffle along on our stomachs through a small opening for 5 metres to get to the next walkway. As I could see the end of the opening I did it (wanting the people in front of me to move bloody faster!). We then waded someway to another crawl way. This was 35-40 metres and ran in a circle. I told them no thanks! I'll wait for you here! The four Israeli girls waited also. I was told that there were some really tight places in the loop and that I definately would not have liked it. When we got back to the inner tubes we found that most had gone, so we swam in darkness out of the cave.

Back at the canoes we were given a luch of vegetable rice, chicken and bananas, before being taken to another cave. The 'Elephant cave' probably would not have fitted one of the creatures in it. It was named after a strangely shaped stalagmite.

It was back to the canoes, this time I chose a double with one of the Israeli girls, Ella, in the front. Because of their size I didn't think my weight would affect this canoe too much. And it was plain sailing (so to speak). Ella and I worked well as a team while all about us overturned. We had two more stops, one to allow us to jump into the river from a 5-6 metre raised platform (good fun!) the next for us to mess about on a big rope swing which we didn't bother with as they served Beer Lao there.

We got back about 5pm, after dodging people tubing down the river and the narrow racing boats practicing for the festival in a few days time. We had a quick beer with the Belgian couple before heading back to the guesthouse.

There was a message from Susanne saying that she'd made it in and that she was out with Berna. We all showered and changed and went out to find them. They were at the only bar without a TV with an Australian couple called Jeremy and Adele, we ordered food and beer and settled in for the night.

When we got back from the bar Dave, Susanne and I made a sign for Dirk who was supposed to be turning up at 2am on the nightbus (My duck tapa and marker coming in handy at last). Heading back into the guesthouse I turned to speak to Dave and he wasn't there ..... neither was Susanne! I threw a few remarks down the corridor and went to bed. Dave turned up later looking sheepish.