Leave It All Behind
Posted by Jaime Dormer on
LAOS (OCT 2011)
I planned yet another bike trip travelling around the northern parts of Laos, the trip would last about two weeks and cover from Vientiane upto the Chinese border and back down to Luang Prabang, during the trip I had planned for our group to spend two nights & one day in a tree house in the middle of the jungle forest with the Gibbons. As part of the trip we had to take a ride in a four wheel drive for about 1.5hrs, to a small town, then cross a flooded river and proceed by four wheel drive another hour up into the mountains, bumping and bogging our way to what they called base camp.
At base camp the end of the road, we were required to carry our gear and walk the rest of the way, which was about an hour & half walk to get to the main camp, so off we went. In my backpack I had several lenses and cameras, and few cloths, probably 15kgs, no worries off we went, up & up & up, stinking hot & humid with no breeze, because of the jungle & foret, by the time I got to the main camp, I can honestly say I was very tired and glad to be there, I was just glad that there was not another hill to climb, I was ready to lay down, however unbeknown to me, this was only the main camp no where near where we were staying, surprise, I’ll say.
After a short rest we then had to put some “zipline” gear on, as there were a number of ziplines, “flying foxes” that we were going to go to get to our treehouse, this was another hour and a half further up, so off we went, up hill down dale, I just could not understand why we would struggle up that hill only to have to struggle down it again, this went on & on forever it seemed, with the ocassional releif of a zipline ride, where you would latch onto a steel rope and traverse across the valleys, sometimes 300 meters, and about 100 meters above the ground, but the cool wind while you were zipping accross was a great releif, then you would unclip and start climbing up the next hill, this went on for an hour & a half, and I remember when climbing one of the last climbs, I was seriously considering LEAVING MY GEAR THERE, I was prepared to loose it, I will buy it again I thought, I had had enough, I couldn’t climb another step, I was exausted.
Well a bit of a rest, and some very slow steps, got me through, just as well because I can honestly say this was the first time I had ever considered dumping my gear, I am glad I didn’t though.