Welcome to week sixteen of the backpacking diaries. Where I’ll be updating you weekly on where I’ve been, what I’ve been getting up to, and most importantly, how I’m really feeling about this insane decision I’ve made.
As you probably know, I’m currently backpacking through Asia after quitting my job and leaving London for good.
I want to remember every moment of this experience, and document as much of it as I can, just like I’ve documented everything else in my life post-18 on this website.
You can keep up to date with my travels on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube but for now, enjoy week sixteen of the travel diaries!
If you missed the first fifteen weeks of backpacking diaries, you can catch up here.
Top tip: for mobile data around Asia, we used the Airalo eSim which was super handy and easily installed onto our phones as soon as we arrived in Vietnam!
Day 106: Monday 1st July 2024
Location: Luang Prabang, Mekong River & Pak Beng, Laos
Dear travel diary,
Today was an experience to say the least.
We were up bright and early at 6.30am as our taxi was coming to get us at 7am to take us to a boat.
We were heading down the Mekong River from Luang Prabang, Laos, taking us all the way into Thailand. The boat would take two days in total but was meant to be a fun way of crossing the border and travelling out of Laos.
The tuk tuk pulled up just before 7am already packed with other backpackers. We quickly made friends with the others inside since we were about to spend two full days on the river with them. There were two Welsh girls travelling, so himself at least had people to understand him for a change.
We piled onto the boat and set off around 9am.
And good God it was long. Between napping, reading, playing cards and games with the others on the boat, we spent a total of 11 hours sat down.
Yes, 11 hours.
The views were pretty incredible though. From seeing small villages along the sides of the river, water buffalos, goats and cows, and other boats passing by transporting all kinds of animals.
Not to mention a little girl that got on our boat with a live chicken in a bag that was sat a row in front. The chicken surprisingly stayed quiet for the entire duration and the little girl provided some funny entertainment.
The boat finally pulled into the halfway point of Pak Beng at 7pm.
We arrived at our guest house and headed straight for dinner as we were starving. Himself had some buffalo curry and I had chicken curry. It was probably our favourite meal during our entire time in Laos, so if you’re taking the slow boat, make sure to eat here!
We called it a night early and managed to catch up on Love Island even though it felt we were in the complete middle of nowhere.
Day 107: Tuesday 2nd July 2024
Location: Pak Beng & Mekong River, Laos & Chiang Khong, Thailand
Dear travel diary,
Another day on the river. It was up at 6.30am once again to head down to the boat for 7am.
The boat took off at 8.30am this time, with a lot less passengers than the day previous. We were sat with the same group as yesterday but the energy was a lot lower with a lot of napping in the morning and then some card games in the afternoon.
Time seemed to pass a lot quicker on the second day thankfully, and we crossed the border into Thailand around 4pm.
Once you leave the boat, you get on a tuk tuk that takes you to the Laos border point so you can exit the country.
After this, you have to take a shuttle bus to the Thailand border (where the road criss-crosses as both Laos and Thailand drive on opposite sides of the road to each other) where you finally arrive in Thailand.
Since it was after 5pm by the time we got to the first border point, the Laos office like to charge overtime for them to stay open (even though the boat gets in at this time every single day). It’s only around $2 so not much at all.
We chose to stay in the border town of Chiang Khong in Thailand, since we’d be arriving late in the evening and all buses to Chiang Rai had already left for the day.
We took a tuk tuk to our guest house and headed for dinner a few doors down and I had my first massaman curry in months and it was so tasty! I’ve missed Thai food so much.
Back at our guest house for an early night again and we lay in bed listening to a huge thunderstorm outside to welcome us back to Thailand.
Day 108: Wednesday 3rd July 2024
Location: Chiang Khong & Chiang Rai, Thailand
Dear travel diary,
We had a nice lie in this morning, waking up around 9am and enjoying not having an early alarm. Or having to get on another all-day boat.
We were catching the public bus to Chiang Rai this morning, aiming for the 11am bus. We weren’t able to flag down a tuk tuk from our guest house. So set off on foot until one passed us by.
We arrived at the bus station at 10.30am just as a bus was about to take off, so we had to hop on and off we went.
This meant we weren’t able to go to 7-Eleven to grab coffee, our first ham and cheese toastie that we’d been craving, or get money from an ATM. But we were on the move.
The bus got into Chiang Rai around 1pm and had around four other passengers in total during the two and a half hour drive, so was pretty pleasant.
Once we arrived in Chiang Rai (ravenous and thirsty) we dropped our bags at our guest house and set off for the 7-Eleven across the street to grab a ham and cheese toastie and our first 7-Eleven gyozas that had been recommended by the Welsh friends we made on the slow boat.
We ate our breakfast and lunch (I wouldn’t quite call it a brunch) at the guest house while we waited for our room to be ready. The gyozas were a hit.
We’re staying at a coffee shop and guest house but it doesn’t seem to be an operating coffee shop unfortunately. We have an entire flat on the first floor with a living/dining area and bedroom with one double bed and two single beds, so it’s pretty spacious.
For our first tourist spot, we headed to the Blue Temple. It’s free entry and there were quite a lot of tourists around. It was cool to see, and different from other temples we’ve been to since everything was blue, but definitely worth seeing since it’s a free activity.
We came back to the guest house to cool off and chill out for part of the late afternoon, stopping in 7-Eleven for some refreshments first.
For dinner, we headed to the Big Noodle Cafe, a bit of a gimmick if you will, but it’s a convenience store filled with pot noodles from around the world. You pick which one you want, any toppings as extra and then cook it yourself.
Like I said, it’s a bit of a novelty really but quite fun all the same. Poor Steff emptied the entire packet of spice in his so he was sweating and shaking after his fifth bite.
After this, it was an early night back in the apartment to catch up on more Love Island.
Day 109: Thursday 4th July 2024
Location: Chiang Rai, Thailand
Dear travel diary,
We had another lovely lie in this morning which was well needed. I think I’ve just about caught up on sleep now after a few early mornings and long travel days.
We woke up to some rain this morning but it had thankfully cleared by 10am. Our first stop was the 7-Eleven across the street of course to grab some cheap coffee.
The lady working there recognised us from yesterday (we did venture in on three separate occasions so I’m not surprised) but she knew our coffee order from yesterday and then asked if we wanted a ham and cheese toastie again – so cute!
I’ve honestly missed Thai people so much while we’ve been travelling around other parts of Asia, they’re the best!
We ordered a Grab to the White Temple, a famous spot here in Chiang Rai. It was very crowded with tourists as we expected, but it was incredible to see.
It cost 100 Baht to enter, but was definitely worth it.
This was our sight-seeing done for the day, so we headed to a coffee shop with our laptops to get some work done. I scheduled my Bucharest vlog (the first of the travel vlogs!) which you can see below:
We ate lunch here and it was delicious. Both having chicken sandwiches with some home fries. To cool off, we headed back to our guest house to get some more work done in the air-conditioning.
For dinner, we headed out to a place called Barrab which served tapas-style Northern Thai food. It was delicious, but the plates were on the smaller side (due to the tapas style) so we did leave still feeling a little hungry.
We had our first taste of Khao soi since we last left Thailand and I was in heaven. This is a curry dish with hard and soft noodles and was my favourite meal when we were in Thailand previously.
We headed to our local 7-Eleven to grab some chocolate to watch Love Island and ended up being followed by a dog back to our guest house.
I haven’t had many friendly experiences with the dogs out here in Asia. Give me cats any day.
Day 110: Friday 5th July 2024
Location: Chiang Rai & Chiang Mai, Thailand
Dear travel diary,
I struggled to sleep last night as my mind was buzzing with ideas for content and Instagram. My following has grown over 1.5K in the past few days so I’ve been thinking of ways to keep this momentum going.
I got to sleep around 2am I would say, so enjoyed waking up at 9am this morning.
First thing we did was watch Love Island. It was the recoupling after Casa Amor, so great TV as always.
Then it was time for us to check out of our guest house which was an apartment bigger than the one we lived in, in London.
Our bus to Chiang Mai wasn’t until 2.30pm so we headed back to the same coffee shop as yesterday to hop on our laptops and grab a hearty brunch to keep us full for the three hour bus journey.
The bus journey was very pleasant. We had lots of room, reclining seats and were even given a bottle of water and some snacks.
We left at 2.30pm and arrived in Chiang Mai around 6pm. So headed straight for our guest house and checked in. We were staying in another guest house coffee shop where the coffee shop was no longer operating.
However the receptionist was so lovely, and took us up to our room on the top floor. At least we can get some training in for Mount Fuji.
The room reminded us so much of our Bread & Breakfast in Bar Harbor, Maine with its paisley quilt and cute decor. It was like going to stay at your grandmothers, put it that way.
We headed out for dinner to Dash which was a little on the expensive side for us, but we had spent most of the day on a bus so hadn’t spent too much today anyway.
We had hamburger gyozas which was something we had never heard of before, but also had to try. They were exactly as you’d imagine and strangely worked quite well.
For our main we both had Khao soi which I’m probably going to be eating every single day while we’re in Northern Thailand.
That’s about as much of Chiang Mai as we’ll see this time around as we’re up early tomorrow morning and heading to Pai before coming back to Chiang Mai in a few days.
Although I’m not looking forward to the drive as apparently it’s incredibly windy and a lot of people get travel sick. I’ll report back tomorrow.
Day 111: Saturday 6th July 2024
Location: Chiang Mai to Pai, Thailand
Dear travel diary,
We were up bright and early this morning to catch our mini van to Pai. Thankfully the mini van was collecting us directly from our hotel, so we didn’t have to head to a bus station.
The mini van arrived just after 9.30am and already had a few other passengers inside. We collected the final travellers and then made our way to Pai.
The first part of the journey was fine, but then the windy roads started. It was incredibly steep and bendy the entire way and wasn’t the most pleasant.
I wasn’t able to read for the majority of it, keeping my eyes closed and focusing on not being sick. Although it wasn’t the worst travel journey I’ve experienced and we also stopped halfway to grab drinks and snacks.
We made it into Pai around 2pm and made our way to our accommodation. First impressions were a lot of backpackers, nice shops and relaxed vibe.
Pai is known for being a bit of a hippy town and that’s definitely the impression we got.
Our accommodation was a courtyard of individual bungalows surrounding a relaxing garden. It was so cheap, but the room is beautiful with even a little decking with chairs to relax in.
I’m actually a little gutted that we’re only spending two nights here as I could have spent a bit longer.
We headed to a dumpling spot for a snack that ended up being closed, so made our way to a samosa restaurant that was also closed. Strange for a Saturday, but onwards we went.
We finally came across Charlie & Lek where we had some spring rolls before heading to the pub across the street to watch rugby for the afternoon.
After this, we walked down Walking Street which was full of food stalls, bars and fashion shops – even a bookstore! We grabbed some gyozas from Gyoza Queen and looked around.
We bumped into the two Welsh girls from the slow boat who had been here for a few days. But they didn’t sound too enthusiastic about the touristy things there are to do here. So we might actually give some things a miss tomorrow and just relax instead.
Steff grabbed a massive sandwich from the banh mhi stall. Then we made our way back to our accommodation to catch up on more Love Island.
Day 112: Sunday 7th July 2024
Location: Pai, Thailand
Dear travel diary,
We had a lovely lie in this morning, making the most of the fact that it’s Sunday today.
We stayed up late to watch the last ten minutes of the England game and the unfortunate moment the team went through on penalties. It was bittersweet since Trent Alexander-Arnold was the one to score the winning penalty.
We left our little bungalow around 11am, heading to 7-Eleven for breakfast. Yes, we’re back to doing that again to help save the pennies. So expect me to mention it just about every morning for the next four weeks or more.
After our 7-Eleven toastie we headed to a coffee shop next door called The Pedlar. And sat here on our laptops for the afternoon, enjoying their tasty coffee.
My first proper travel vlog of the backpacking trip went live today. I know we’re a little behind since we’re three months in now and I’m only just posting the Bucharest vlog. But expect a lot of videos to come the remainder of this year.
After sitting here for a while, it was time to give our eyes a rest and head out around Pai.
We went to see if the dumpling restaurant was open today. It was, but the only thing not available on the menu today was… dumplings.
Next we went to check if the samosa place was open today. It was firmly shut.
So, we headed to the Aussie bar we were in yesterday and played a few games of pool instead.
For dinner, I had the spiciest meal of my entire life. We ordered spring rolls which were lovely, and then one of my favourite Thai dishes, massaman curry.
I think they forgot to add coconut milk into mine. Steff had the same thing but after scoffing the entire thing, said it wasn’t spicy. Meanwhile, I couldn’t feel my tongue, had sweat dripping off of my forehead and my hands were even starting to sweat.
Besides that, the strangest (but incredible) thing happened after dinner!! I went outside to film the sign of the restaurant (for YouTube) while himself paid for the meal. And the next thing a girl comes out of the restaurant, over to me and says ‘Sorry, are you Orlagh?’
Needless to say I was a bit scared how anyone would know me in the middle of Pai in Northern Thailand. But then she said she follows me on Instagram and even listens to my podcast!!!!
She works in PR and is from Wicklow and it was the most amazing but also surreal, feeling ever.
I’m definitely someone that would see someone I follow in real life and not say anything. But I think I’ll have to change that from now on. It’s such a nice feeling when someone comes up to you and says how much they enjoy your content.
Crying.
Make sure to check back in next week as we finish up our time in Northern Thailand and head to Bangkok!
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