Kruger national park

Animals galore, this is where you see all the African animals you want including the big five. The big five are The African Elephant, The African Lion, The Cape Buffalo, The leopard and last but not least the Rhino. We had the luck of seeing them all. The park in itself was amazing the animals were popping out of everywhere and all we had to do was keep our eyes open and drive on the tar road. The only animals we did not see were the cheetah and wild dog. In addition to the big five our favorites were giraffes,zebra,warthog and the guinea fowl. (Guinea fowl are basically a black bird with white spots and a big blue hammer like head. )

We had the luck of seeing these rhinos 10 minutes into the park right on the road.

One of my mothers favorite animals the warthog.

The babies were by far the cutest animals we saw.

This is just one of the pictures that shows how mixed up the animals are.

This is just one of the Hyenas that prowled the perimeter of the camp ground.

There were 2 types of monkeys in the park baboons and these cute guys the vervet monkey ,he was one of the smallest ones we saw.

We saw plenty of elephants and quite a few big groups this was one of the at the river.

We didn't see many crocs but I was dissapointed in their size. 

 

 

HIPPO!!!! We saw an incredible amount of these big guys. 

These two teenage elephants were having a brawl. The bigger one won. It wasn't a fight to the death.

This big guy was swaggering around on the edge of the river. We were amazed by the size of the African elephant  they were at least 1 meter taller than the asian ones.

The guinea fowl a crazy  crazy bird. They like to fight and jump on the road.

Brotherly love.

This was probably my favorite animal. We got to see six of them in total three males three females.

Its hard to believe but these birds are endangered.

SMILE!!!!!!

Look into my eyes.

FIGHT!!! FIGHT!!!FIGHT!!!!FIGHT!!!!

Hut two three four keep it up two three four hut two three four

Slow boat down the Mekong

To make our way from Houay Xai to Luang Prabang we had the choice of taking a 20 hour minibus ride or a 2 day scenic boat ride down the Mekong so we went for the second choice. There was beautiful scenery and lots of cultural and local activity. The little town we stayed in overnight was quite nice but our hotel was very basic. The first day we were on a boat that had too many people and lots of drunks. The second day was nicer because the scenery was much more exciting with more rapids and a cave.

This is what it looked like inside our boat, all the seats were old car seats.

This was the scene when we arrived at a little town for the night. Everyone is trying to get us to stay at there hotel.

This is what the slow boats looked like from the outside.

The Gibbon Experience

The Gibbon Experience is a great place to go if you want to sleep in 50 meter high tree houses and spend the day zip lining. The longest zip line is 400 meters and about 100 meters high. They set up the Gibbon Experience to save the  Black Crested Gibbon which we were lucky enough to see. Our tree house wasn't just any ordinary one, it had more than enough room for eight people to sleep in, solar power,
a bathroom and even a shower. Other than that the pictures will explain the rest.

 

This was our awesome tree house we got to stay in.

We were lucky enough to have four nice people with us in our tree house.

My brother clipping in with his roller. The bike tire is the brake. Thankfully we didn't need to use it often.

This was zipinlining into a platform in a tree connected to 5 zip lines.

Hill tribe trek of Northern Laos

Hill tribe trek's are relatively popular with tourists in northern Laos and Thailand.

After much research my mother chose to go on a very new trek in northern Laos from a small town called Vieng Poukha. We took the option of staying in homestays in small undeveloped villages.These villages were of the Hmong, Akkha and Khmu tribes.  They were undeveloped to the point of having no running water, no electricity and worse of all NO toilet!!!!!!!!! When we asked our guide the typical tourist question "where is the toilet??" He responded by spreading his arms out and saying everywhere. No big deal. However, to make matters interesting, we had to fend off dogs and pigs with sticks in order to "finish our business" before they came to clean up. Poor is poor. Putting aside this aspect of jungle life we found our experience quite rewarding even though it difficult at times. 

This was our delicious lunch served on freshly cut banana leaves. Our guide would cut them down were we had lunch and dumped all the food on them

See, the Canadiens are the greatest team in the world. There are even fans in the jungles of Laos.

This little boy was making these roosteres fight by throwing one at the other.

This is the tiny village that we slept in. We were woken up early by rooster's and pigs.

You might think that this is art, but it's actually a bamboo wall for their huts.

Voilà!!

"Don't play with knives" doesn't apply to Laos children. This little girl was nursing a few minutes before this picture was taken.

We gave the village some books that have Laos and English writing. They seemed to really like them.

This is the most commonly found building in all of South East Asia. The bamboo shack. The thing we were building will be one of those walls.

You cant imagine how much food they can make out of these little kitchens.

This little puppy wouldn't walk so we put her in my backpack until she jumped out.

 Not the Hilton, but it did just fine.

One of our guides making us some bamboo cups.  The jungle has all you need to live.  Each meal was prepared by our guides using vegetables and rice from the jungle villages.  Twice, a rooster reluctantly gave it's life to feed us.

White sand Christmas

We had a pretty uneventful Christmas on the beach except for our little kayak /snorkel trip to the nearby island. Enjoy the pictures.

Christmas picture on the beach.

Our stockings that are hung on a high close line so the dogs can't get in to them.

My Christmas present from my brother. The houses' in the painting are typical Cambodian home's.

My mother and I are winning the race to the island.

Our home by the beach.

Firing off a lucky balloon or as the hotel owner ( the Thai guy that you see) would say a "rucky barroon".

Releasing our Lucky Balloon. 

Christmas dinner with our new friends. (British Columbia and Sweden)

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Our beautiful little Christmas tree/branch. 

All these presents are from the local market in Siem Reap, Cambodia, bought especially for the Corbeil's and Degerstedt.