[2Pac vs. Predator: It's Super Effective!]

For the last couple of days, we've been traveling around Laos in jeans and hoodies, sheltering from drizzle and nursing colds. In complete contrast to the start of our week, which was as hot as the rest of the trip had been, Laos suddenly went very 'England' on us. We celebrated the fact by finding an incredible English pub in the capital and took our new Canadian friends out for their first bangers & mash and steak & ale pies.

Due to our common desire to visit Kong Lo Caves, in the last week we've become a group of eleven. Rory, Arun and I are now convinced that Canadians are some of the best folk on Earth as the dudes we've hooked up with, Steven, Graham and Bentley are amongst the coolest people we've met out here. Steven has joined Rory and I on bar-propping duties, us three usually being the last out. The Canadian girls, Roxanne and Lindsay, as well as our Brits - Harriet, Luke and Sarah - make up the rest of the huge ensemble cast. The chat is hilarious and has helped no end on the three long bus journeys we've suffered through this week.

The first bus, an uncomfortable ride after a big night out on Don Det island, trudged through southern Laos until we finally arrived at a little town called Tha Khek, the stomping ground of those tourists wishing to visit Kong Lo Caves. The bus ride became ridiculous. Every time Rory and I jumped off to grab a quick cigarette at some tiny little shack selling Lays and Coke in the middle of the countryside, we were ushered back on, only to wait a further 10 minutes for the thing to start up again and stop about 50 metres down the road. Shithead got us through this one, Rory Bentley and I battling against the darkness to keep on playing, darkness that had only arrived because the trip took double the expected time and dropped us off at 1 a.m. We bedded down, hoping to get some scooters and head to the caves the next day, writing off any chance of an interesting night in the knowledge that all but the most underground places in Laos close at 11 p.m. When we woke we moved ourselves across town to be more central, we discovered that scooters were impossible for that day and we'd have to leave the trip until tomorrow. "So, what do we do in Tha Khek?" one of the boys asked. The riverside bar was the answer and we took a slow stroll down through town, passing the same three shops dozens of times; liquor and food shops, clinics, and garages. That is all there is to Tha Khek until you reach the Mekong River at the edge of town where you can sit in one of three or four bars, get a cheap beer and look across the vast water at Thailand on the other side. At this stage, the sun was still bliazing down on Harriet's, Bentley's and my back as we sat on a wall. In great spirits, we staggered in threes and pairs back up to our new guesthouse, arriving just in time to see the start of the bonfire that they set up each night.

With the BeerLao and Lao Lao vodka flowing back at our place and all eight boys squashed in to one dorm room together, the night got rowdy. By the end of the night we were slurring hilarities at one another on the balcony, the kind of comments that are forgotten forever the next morning.

The following day proved to be both inspiring and challenging. We all woke up feeling awful, especially Arun who'd been on the wrong end of five bodyslams the night before. One by one we all left the room to shower or ablute and one by one we all returned, stunned by how cold it had gotten. I made the mistake of persevering with only shorts, flip-flops and a t-shirt and developed a nasty cold as the day wore on. We stuffed ourselves in to a minivan for the three hour drive up to the caves, most people not getting a proper seat but working out some strange leg and arm arrangements for napping. As we stopped at a small shack for lunch, the rain began to pour and we became increasingly cold. It stayed like this until we reached the entrance of the caves where we not only got shelter but all felt a sudden warm breeze. Literally every one of us celebrated. "Cavemen had it sorted! Central heating and everything!" It was extreme relief.

You walk down into the mouth of the caves, perhaps three stories high, and get in to a longtail boat three-by-three that sits just above the floor of the river which runs the entire length of the cave. After thirty seconds zipping along with that warm air blowing in your face, everything becomes pitch black and only torches can illuminate the huge hole in the Earth in which you find yourself. Each of our minds were blown; we heard distant echoed cries of "ho-ly shit!" from the other boats when someone turned a corner and entered an area even more massive than the last. Kong Lo Caves is unlike anything any of us had seen before with its giant stalagtites hanging precariously above your head and little, perhaps unexplored caverns going deeper in to mysterious places. After the 7 mile trip one way through you turn back on yourself and do it all in reverse, realising that the place is equally as fascinating the second time round.

Despite being enlightened and revitalised by the experience, we all found the minivan ride home punishing. Again it was dark when we got back and this time the bonfire was roaring. We all sat around it to warm and dry ourselves, accidentally re-introducing ourselves to people we'd met the night before in a stupor, none of us able to handle more than a couple of beers before crashing in the dorm.

Our final bus ride of the week, VIP all the way to the Laos capital of Vientiane, was by far the least punishing. The chairs, which had awesome headrests, reclined; the TV played Ong-Bak; we got given free water. The only problem was the A/C which blasted the bus into a freeze which made at least half of our colds much worse. We all passed around paracetemol and codeine and valium to try and fix ourselves but i found thta the best cure was empathy as i had a great talk with Bentley most of the way about our plans, how we should hang out in Canada and what to do in a zombie apocalypse. The rain got worse as we went north and was torrential by the time we reached Vientiane. After treating ourselves and the Canadians to the aforementioned British food we started the drinking. "There's only one thing for this cold," I said to Rory, "tequilla!"

The night out was fantastic, finished in style by the usual threesome of Rory, Steven and I in a dreadful Laos club located on the third floor of a plush hotel. It was all businessmen indulging in the so-called "karaoke" booths and the DJ hammered out obnoxious pop music. We had an incredible laugh. The three of us had had great practice at this ever since we met in beautiful Don Det the week before. There'd been more than one night that we'd all been sprawled across our balcony on the river playing those last few rounds of cards, delicately finishing that last big BeerLao and laughing non-stop. This was how the first night in Vientiane went too, except minus a balcony we were forced to wander the town.