We met the rest of our group (10 in all) at The Gibbon Experience office at 8:30 ish for a brief video about the project and where the money goes. It’s a forest and gibbon conservation project funded by silly tourists on zip lines – so we have made a hefty donation to the Bokeo national protected area and I can now print as much as I like without the guilt 🙂 We were then all bundled (along with some guides and staff) into a converted double cab land cruiser for the 1.5 hour drive to a small shop on the side of the road incredibly well stocked with chocolate and munchies. A short walk over a rickety suspension bridge with broken boards and through some farmland and we were waiting for our next ride. If there is rain you stand a good chance of having to hike 6-9 hours to get to the zip lines but we had good weather and before long a mud splattered Toyota pulled up and we assumed our positions again. V and I joined the group on the back (4 other tourists and three guides hanging off the back). The road was a ball. Wet, thick and sticky red clay had us fish-tailing all over the place spewing mud as the driver battled to navigate the hacked-up roads. Steep hills proved interesting and twice we had to get out and push a little but thankfully we made it to the small village at the start of the trail after two hours of excellent off-road. It has to be said that the driver was brilliant.

From the village it was a 1 hour muddy (very) walk up to the Gibbon Exp’s HQ in the jungle. The terrain was far easier than our trek in Luang Namtha but the trail was in bad condition – no one cared – the zip lines weren’t far off ! The guides issued us our harnesses and divided the group (8 to one tree-house and the birthday couple to their own one) before leading us off again onto the muddy trails. A short climb uphill and we reached the first zip line. I could not resist being first – 300 odd meters of serious fun. The speed you get on a stretched steel cable is awesome (pretty high on the hotdog scale). The entire operation was setup by a French company in 2005(ish). The area was surveyed and zip paths planned before the steel cables were hauled into the jungle. The longest line is 500m and some look like they are over 100m off the deck at the highest point spanning huge valleys.

We took another 5 zip lines to get to our tree-house stopping en-route at a smaller tree-house to take in the impressive views. Jungle in all directions as far as we could see. One thing we did not expect were the long, sometimes steep, muddy and slippery walks between zip lines – but we admit they were worth it (Think more Indiana Jones, Less Medicine Man). We eventually zipped into our tree-house around 4. What a spot ! Around 35m up in a monster tree it had two floors (the top one just big enough for V and I), comfy sleeping mats, ‘kitchen area’, running water and a bathroom with an open shower (spectacular views across the jungle and straight down through the slatted floor). I have to admit the loo was cool – no plumbing, just a straight drop into the jungle 🙂 As we were dumping our gear we heard the unmistakable sound of a zip line as our cook (a very sweet middle-aged Lao lady) came flying through a side entrance carrying our dinner. Again just very cool – we felt like spoilt kids.

A small group of us decided to keep zipping and we managed a couple of loops on the four lines around the tree-house before heading back for a shower. Dinner was good if a little bland (rice and various veg dishes with tiny little bit of chewy meat). Done with dinner we were left with nothing to do but get to know our group. A great bunch of people and with the social glue of Nick (the Belgian) we enjoyed a great evening of games and laughter.

To introduce the group:
– Nick (Richard Dawkins) from Belgium
– Arna (Batman) from USA
– Gerlinde (The Queen of England) from Austria
– Liz (The Pope) from the UK
– Jonny (Homer Simpson) from the UK
– Jacob (Arnold Schwarzenegger) from Australia
– V (Bugs Bunny)
– Me (Hitler)
In the other tree-house (couple hours away)
– Jessica and Christian from Canada

The odd names above were from our first game of ‘guess the name stuck to your forehead’ which took ages without any alcohol. Gerlinde won. Nick did incredibly well to get the difficult one I gave him. V and I were both shocking. I think we lack a mis-spent youth ! In spite of the large and plentiful spiders on the roof (looked like rain spiders) we had a great time.

[Pictures: V on the bridge. V dropping out of our treehouse]

– Posted from my iPhone via Wifi