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GIBBON EXPERIENCE DAY 3

Day 3 in the tree house, it's 5:15 and Jess is waking Russ up.......

Jess was awoken by the faint, yet distinctive sound of gibbon song, which we were yet to hear. Apparently gibbons are the only animal (besides us of course) which sing duets.

We got out of bed to find Chewie in lively mood. he was jumping around and swinging on us, using Jess'hair as a branch. adorable! (although he did bite Jess once while trying to steal her coffee, (the caffeine sends him a bit loopy!) Luckily no skin breakage tho just a friendly nip, she had a cool mark tho!)

We had some coffee, after water had been zipped in, and harnessed up and headed out on the circuit. Just as we (just me and Jess today) had landed on the platform at the end of the first cable we heard the gibbons singing in full chorus, was such a great sound as we were trekking to the next cable, hard to describe!

After taking shelter in TH2 from a heavy shower, we reached the 400m cable, and my main task of the day, to drag back on the big one. The mist meant that visability was pretty bad (I could only see one end of the cable at a time), but I could see down pretty far!! Hanging in the middle of a 400m long cable 100m from the ground was unreal! Draggging back is alot to do with technique and so after my previous practise it wasn't too hard, but a great feeling reaching the other side. I zipped back down it satisfied and proceeded to drag back along the 2 other 250 cables all the way to the treehouse, tiring to say the least, and all before breakfast. Jess hiked it back and made it back to TH1 just after me, and we ate our last breakfast with our buddies before packing up to leave.

Said a big thank you and goodbye to all the volunteers and guides and did one last cable out of the TH1 before giving our harnesses back. Chewie came to say goodbye from the treetops as we started our hike down to the village. The gibbon experience was truly one of the greatest experiences we have had on our trip if not in our lives, we cannot recommend it enough!!

The return journey to Baan Don Chai was much easier than the way there due to lack of heavy rain and the fact that Jess and me got to sit IN the back of the truck rather than ON the back of the truck. We picked up our big rucksacks from our homestay and got to the Thai border by 3pm.

We crossed the border back into Thailand at Huay Xai/Chiang Khong with ease and caught the bus to Chiang Rai, the differences between Laos and Thailand hit us instantly...

only 2 weeks left to go now

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