Dave's birthday... Koen, Stepan, Susanne, Berna, Dave and I met up for breakfast before we hired some bikes. The bikes were basic old fashioned, and had a basket on the front, but at 50p a day we didn't really care (mountain bikes were a pound!)

We headed off to a large cave just south of the town through a hotel resort. We had to pay extra to get the bikes through before we had to abandon them at a bridge over the river. As usual the cave was at the top of a large flight of steps!

After the cave we fetched our bikes and crossed the bridge to go 'off road'. We didn't get very far, but with two fences and an oxen in our path it did take a while!

We went back to town and crossed over the river where a bridge used to be by small river boats, two people and two bikes to a boat. Then we had to wade the bikes through part of the river to dry land.

We were going to Poukham cave, a cave with a lagoon to swim in. If the roads were bad in town they were terrible here, and we had 6km of it, on crappy bikes, and hardly anyone had decent brakes. On the way there were two streams, both had bridges, but at the first one two enterprising old ladies were trying to fleece/charge 5000kip to cross, so we waded through instead.

There were a few hills to manage, the downhills as bad as the uphills due to the terrible brakes and ruts, potholes, stones, bricks, rocks, chickens, dogs and cows in the road.

When we got there we went straight for a swim, after biking in the early afternoon sun the water was great! We got in a couple of bottles of Beer Lao to celebrate Dave's birthday before deciding to see the cave.

The cave was high up in the side of a cliff, up a steep, steep rocky climb. As we climbed higher I started thinking "I'm not going to be able to get down from here!" I took it very slow and was feeling very uncomfortable. Susanne noticed and tried to reassure me (It didn't work, In fact it made me feel worse. Sorry Susanne). I carried on up to the cave and headed in. This was a natural cave, with no flat floor and we had to do more climbing to see the reclining Buddha inside. I would of enjoyed it more if I wasn't thinking of the climb down. By now I was feeling really terrible.

We took the climb down very slowly, with Koen showing me the best foot and hand holds and Susanne (bless her) keeping a running commentry of reassurance. When I got to the bottom I knelt and kissed the floor! (The only other thing me and the pope have in common is that we used to be half decent in goal!)

We went for another swim before getting on our bikes for the ride home. This ride was a lot easier, probably due to it being in the late afternoon and the journey being on a road Koen called 'false flat'. Across the river (three to a boat this time) we dropped the bikes off and headed for the guesthouse to get ready for the night out. Dirk had got in that afternoon (not seeing our sign) and so he would be out too.

We went to the bar with no TV (and therefore no 'Friends') and ordered food. Dave tried to order his usual of Chicken Fried Rice with Cashew Nuts. The poor Lao bloke had no idea what a cashew nut was. 'What you've got no nuts?' cried Dave, which had us all laughing. He then tried to describe a cashew nut as a 'small kidney shaped nut' which had Dirk and I in stitches. The Europeans didn't know 'kidney shaped'. Apart from that little disaster, much alcohol and merriment was had by all.

When we returned to the guesthouse we said our goodbyes to Stepan, as he was off to the plain of jars early in the morning. Team Beer Lao was breaking up :-(

I left the door open for Dave and went to bed.