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So here is the gist, I don't like Valentine's Day. I don't like how the US markets this day, as if you don't do anything then you are this horrible person. I don't think girls should expect something on this day nor should guys feel the "need" to do something. I don't this what you do on this day should be the measurement of a man. My roommates, both who love this holiday, said I am over reacting! We had this huge long discussion on it. Well, Thursday morning I woke up and headed down to make coffee. I opened my door and there leading from my door to downstairs was a trail of cut out hearts.

Soft Frank Sanataria was playing from down stairs! I made my way down and the table was covered in tea candles all lit up with a pink teddy bear on the table with a valentine's card for me.

I shock my head with a smirk on my face "oh goodness." I went able to make coffee which I found a pink bow on the handle of the coffee maker.

I turned to get the water for the coffee only to find out the girls had died all the water pink!

I then went in to the bathroom and on the mirror was written in red lipstick funny comments I had made about the holiday.


The toilet had red die in the bowl. Wow...they went all out. I poured my bowl of cereal only to find out they had put pink confetti in it.

Brooke woke up and yelled Happy Valentine's Day! She wondered if I was going to take a shower. I said no since I had done it last night....come to find out they had put balloons in the shower and put red die in the shower head so the first seconds of turning it on it was just red! Kind of creepy....



So that night we went over to a friends house. She had planned a Valentine's Dinner since the girls were already on a roll with it. It was fun though....I sure do love my roommates. They made me laugh....





I found out later that Brookie stole all of my black clothing out of my closet...cuz I had said I might wear that on V-day.

Luang Prabang, Laos

Long weekend in sight, what do I do? I start planning for a trip! I needed to a border run again and figured I might as well go to Laos since we had extra days off of school.

So we headed off....

Me and Krista Excited!

Jake's Excitement 

Our plane was quite small, probably only 60 people capacity. Time to our destination, one hour. Upon our decent, I could see the landscape was extremely mountainous and jungle like. The little plane that was taking us to Laos seemed to go to and fro with which every way the wind might have it go, causing me to feel somewhat ill. I was glad to set foot on land!

At the Luang Prabang airport we stood in line to receive our tourist visas.  Then we pointed to a spot on our map and had a driver take there.  There, being the main strip of this little town.  From there we set out on foot looking for a place to lay our heads at night. 

Le Tam Tam Garden...our "home" for the next 3 nights.

After paying for our room, we headed out to stretch our legs and see the town alittle before supper.  We made our way down to the road overlooking the Me Khong River and sat a while.

After supper we looked into different day trips that we could do on the following day.  We signed up for the Kuang Xi falls which are located 30 kms outside of the city.  Our guide picked us up the next morning at 9 and we headed our for our trekk.  

Resting point after the first steep hill we climbed.  An added note, I was the only to bring a back pack so I was the one carrying the extra water, which was around 15 lbs.
Lunch time

After our three hour trekk we make it to the top of Kuang Xi Falls

The water was freezing so I didn't get in

Shots I took around town: Luang Prabang

Night Market

Washing our feet after a day of walking through Luang Prabang

We headed up the Mount Pi Si which is right there in the city.  It is a look out point of the Luang Prabang as well as the Me Khong River with the mountains in the distance.  I believe we climbed something close to three hundred steps to get to the summit.  There we found many other tourists, all of us waiting for the sunset.  

Our trip for the next day was to kayak down the Nam Khang River.  We were all pretty excited to do this.  The river was clam and led us through the jungles of Laos.  I was amazed at my surroundings and took everything in!

It was pretty chilly starting out in the morning but it soon began to warm up



Lunch Break!


Vang (our guide), Me, and Krista


After kayaking a long boat took us to a point to meet up with our ride home.

Our last night in Le Tam Tam Garden we had to switch up rooms.  This time we didn't have a bathroom connected to our room so we had to use the community bathroom...not the funniest experience!  Flip flops are needs in order to shower in these kind of places!  It was probably the most coldest shower I have taken in my life!  Apparently the hot handle was stuck....

The flight home the next afternoon was quite interesting. I took meds so I wouldn't get sick from the turbulence and I am glad I did. It was probably more bumpy this time then arriving in Laos.

Our landing was the sketchiest I have ever experienced! I really thought that we were going to die even Krista was worried next to me. As the pilot was descending, we were going really fast, faster than I think is normal.

But against all the odds we landed, a little bumpy and bouncing from side to side on two wheels, we made it!