Laos is looking up, Vang Vieng

Bus to Vang Vieng [Enlarge & More]

Towards the end of our stay in Vientiane, things were looking up. Our hotel, LV City Riverine, was a good place to stay for the price (hotels seem more expensive in Vientiane than in many other places in Laos) and we’d put the free Wifi there to good use! We booked a “VIP” bus to Vang Vieng from the hotel – a total journey of three hours. Our pickup arrived on the day we were to leave, at the correct time. Sadly, the bus did not have working air conditioning so it was a stuffy journey, and I got sunburn on my arm from having it out the window! A slight theme here – we don’t seem to get what we pay for when we book bus journeys in Laos!

Tubing, Vang Vieng [Enlarge & More]

As we drove along in the stuffy bus, the scenery got better and better as we went further north. By the time we arrived in Vang Vieng, it was simply stunning – even the weather was one of the most beautiful days we’d experienced in our two months of travelling. We arrived in Vang Vieng, but rather than drop us at the bus station, the driver drove us to a remote part of town and dropped us off at a hotel of his choice – fortunately for us (but unfortunately for his commission), our hotel was only about 100m away so we walked down the road.

We stayed at Elephant Crossing – pricy for us, but an absolutely beautiful view across the Nam Song to the limestone mountains behind. Honestly, I think it must be one of the best views I’ve ever seen, and was worth every penny (the hotel was not bad either!). The good weather helped – in the four days we spent in Vang Vieng, every single one was full of sun and blue sky. That’s pretty much unprecedented for us – we’ve had a lot of cloud in our travels, so it’s been lovely to bask in the sun. It was really hot too – too hot to walk around in, but we both spent some time on our room’s balcony, soaking up a bit of sun and watching the world go by on the river below, and beyond. Let’s hope that as we continue north the weather holds.

View from the Room[Enlarge & More]

Vang Vieng is an interesting place. It’s not like the rest of Laos at all – there aren’t many French tourists for a start. However, there are a lot of British and Australian tourists – hmmm, I wonder why – could it be something to do with the drinking culture us Brits are so famous for?! And Vang Vieng is the place to do it in Laos, it seems. Vang Vieng is particularly famous for tubing – this involves sitting in a large inflated tyre and floating down the Nam Song River, stopping at various bars and restaurants along the way. These bars mainly exist to cater for the tourists’ needs to get drunk – and they cater for it very well. You float along in your tube, and various bar staff throw bits of rope out to pull you in to their bar – some bars are busier than others, but all see their fair share of custom from the hundreds of tourists who ride tubes down the river each day. Many of the bars have added attractions – one we saw had a mud pit, another had a waterslide, and most had zip wires – all of which end up with you ending up face first in the river, or in the mud!

Our tubing stint was excellent – we met a nice Australian couple who were on the same wavelength as the two of us (i.e. sensible), and we had an excellent afternoon. We had a good laugh at all the drunk people making fools of themselves. Unfortunately, we had such a good afternoon that we did not make it back to town until after 6pm – at which point we had to pay a 20,000 kip fine each for returning our tubes “late” – mind you, it seemed like we were some of the first people back, so I’m not sure anyone on the river manages to escape that fine?!

Tubing, Vang Vieng [Enlarge & More]

Tubing was excellent fun, and so the next day we followed it up by booking ourselves on a kayaking and caving experience – neither of us had kayaked before, so it was an interesting introduction to the activity. After some basic instruction from our guide, we were set afloat and we struggled down the river. After a couple of capsizes, we managed to gain some element of control over our kayak, and had a good time – maybe next time we’ll get away with only one capsize? The caving was also a lot of fun, but there were a lot of people doing it. Basically, you sit in a tube (much like the ones we’d been in the previous day), and pull yourself through the cave holding a rope. After a short time, we disembarked and scrabbled around on our hands and knees, crawling through the cave. It’s not for the claustrophobic, but it was a lot of fun – a shame it was so busy!

On our final day in Vang Vieng, we enjoyed some well-earned rest and time on our balcony – on that day it was absolutely scorching, so a brief walk through the rice fields that we’d planned had to be scrapped – shame really, as Mahmoud had not taken a lot of photos (due to the water activities) and wanted to get some of the area. We also went to what we’ve dubbed a “Friends Bar”. These bars exist throughout Vang Vieng, and they all continuously play reruns of Friends (the sitcom). Some also play Family Guy. I like Friends, but just walking past those bars winds me up – it’s so irritating that they play nothing but Friends! Also, apparently they’re good spots to make your shake or pizza “Happy” – quite a regular request in Vang Vieng I understand! Having been to a Friends Bar, I can say that I don’t want to go back – once you’re in there, you can’t stop watching it.

Vang Vieng was excellent – the locals were nice, but I felt a bit sorry for them to be honest. Lao culture is often being ignored there by the young, drunk tourists. Signs in shops saying “Please cover yourself”, or “No bikinis” are largely ignored, as nearly-nude foreign youngsters parade through town in an inappropriate fashion. Saying that though, the amount of money that comes through town has to be good for the community – they have a big new hospital in town, and I imagine that a lot of families must be making a lot of money from tourism, giving them many opportunities. Furthermore, the scenery in Vang Vieng and the surrounding areas is breathtaking. I knew northern Laos had some lovely scenery, but I never expected it to be so beautiful. I understand that our next destination, Luang Prabang, is even better – looking forward to it!

Laos has been a dissapointment so far

Vientaine [Enlarge & More]

There’s been something bothering me since arriving in Laos. I’ve been trying to put my finger on it for a while now but just can’t work it out.

The capitol of Laos, Vientiane, was a big disappointment; it had none of the charm of Phnom Penh and was really expensive. It’s a small capital and does not really have much to see or do. What there is to do you can walk to which is a bonus as I had no intention of paying the over-inflated prices charged by the Tuk Tuk drivers. I wouldn’t mind it if that was it but they are humourless and on occasion rude. I’m sure there are exceptions but I wasn’t giving them a chance to find out. Most of them also offer you first of all Hash, if that does not get a reaction then the drug becomes increasingly stronger ending in Opium and I’m sure if you hang around enough it would become crack cocaine.

Buddha Park [Enlarge & More]

Laos has definitely not lived up to any of my expectations so far; apparently it’s a lot about being in the place. Which is all well and good but the people you deal with on a day to day basis have to be nice.

Having said all that I did enjoy our day out to Buddha Park, a few kilometres out of the city. It’s the brainchild of an eccentric and the park is full of statues combining Hindu and Buddhist beliefs. It was a real mix and I found it fascinating. You can also climb on, in and around a lot of the statues and I loved that, it always brings out the big kid in me. We decided to take the local bus out there and it really showed the contrast for me of what Lao people are really like. We were unsure as to which bus to take and it showed, so you had the scam artists who were trying to ‘help’ by offering to take you in a mini van for an extortionate price. Then you had the local lady who was happy to point you in the right direction with a smile.

Crazy Buddha Park [Enlarge & More]

I’ve just worked out what’s been bothering me, I think the Lao people are genuinely lovely and honest but the ones dealing with the tourists are dishonest and out to make a quick kip. It’s not at all what I expected. There are many places in the world that are the same; I’m disappointed Laos is one of them.

Pakse to Vientiane - What went wrong?

Laos Tuk Tuk Driver [Enlarge & More]

After much deliberation as to where we would go after Pakse, we eventually decided on Vientiane, a ten hour bus ride away. Our other choice was the town of Savannakhet, five hours north of Pakse by local bus. Our choice was made based on the lack of sights in Savannakhet, as opposed to north Laos, where we expected to spend a fair bit of time sightseeing. Oh, and also the bus ride to Savannakhet sounded like it would be a lot of hard work for little payoff, given it was a free-for-all local bus, whereas the bus to Vientiane was V.I.P (air conditioned, goes when the seats are full).

Having made our choice, we went to book our ticket the day before our intended departure. Unfortunately for us, we discovered that the only buses leaving Pakse for Vientiane were sleeper buses – even though the journey was only ten hours, and you could easily arrive by 5pm if you left at 8am, every single bus in Pakse left for Vientiane at 8pm. Okay – unlucky, but that’s just the way it goes, right? We accepted our fate to spend a night on the sleeper bus, but remembering our Indian experience of taking a bus from Ooty to Chennai, we were sure it would not be too bad.

After taking it easy the following day, we waited at the Pakse Hotel for our arranged pickup from Pakse Travel (who we booked the ticket through) to arrive at 7:30pm and take us to the Pakse Northern Bus Terminal (everything in Pakse is so thoughtfully named). Ten minutes passed, and the clock edged closer to 8pm, the departure time. So we were last on the list for pickup to go to the bus station – fair enough, someone has to be. However, ten minutes later our pickup still had not arrived, and given the bus station was at least a five minute drive away we decided to act. Mahmoud got the hotel receptionist to phone Pakse Travel, who eventually answered the phone. They were apparently surprised, and sent someone around to get us in a minivan – they arrived at 7:56pm. The driver apologised profusely – at least he was honest, and told us we’d been forgotten rather than the dog ate his passenger list or something. We sped off to the bus station, amidst promises we’d make our bus on time.

Unfortunately, just as we pulled up to the station, a large shiny new looking V.I.P bus pulled out and drove away.
“Was that our bus?” we asked.
“No,” our driver responded. “There are other buses.”
That was fine, but as we pulled up we noticed the other buses were not quite so shiny and new looking. As we pulled up, our bags were extracted from the minivan and rammed into the already stuffed undercarriage of the bus before we could argue. However, argue we did, and Mahmoud in particular was adamant that we were not getting on the bus. The driver admitted it was not the bus we’d booked, but insisted it was a good bus. Eventually, we relented and got on, not willing to spend another night in Pakse.

The bus was hot – the air conditioning was a bit hit and miss, sometimes it was working and sometimes it was not. Worse though, was the size of our berth. It was roughly the size of a single bed, with two small pillows on it, and about the right height for a 5’6” tall person. I’m 5’10” and Mahmoud’s 6’3”, so imagine the two of us crammed into a single bed made for two small, slim Lao people. Oh, and we also had to fit our day bags in with us, and the temperature on the bus when we boarded was around 28 degrees Celsius. Wonderful.

Needless to say, the night’s sleep was not great, but we managed to arrange ourselves into positions which sort of worked. The sometimes-working air conditioner was blowing on my feet which was great, but it soon became apparent that something was wrong, because the hot air from the back of it was blowing onto my head. Eventually, I managed to stuff the vent with a sheet which worked wonders, and hoped the air conditioning unit would not catch on fire.

Sadly, the bus also had a toilet. I was sad about this, because the toilet was in front of our berth. Therefore, we had every person who couldn’t be bothered to hold their bowels and bladders until the next stop going back and forth, creating nasty smells near us. Nastier still was the air freshener the attendant used to “disguise” the smells emanating from the squat toilet, and pouring bottled water down it to “clean” it, owing to the flush not working (or possibly not existing). This resulted in a foul, flowery, shitty, air conditioned but still hot smell that lingered all night. With sweat running down the back of my neck, I contemplated ramming the air freshener into the squat toilet and disabling both sources of the problem. I’m not joking!

However, we DID make it to Vientiane in one piece, arriving at some remote bus terminal at 6am. Nothing’s quite as fun as arriving somewhere at 6am having had no sleep. I just love the adventurous aspect of travelling. No, wait, I love the fact that in Laos, you have no choice but to accept overpriced transport fares working on poor timetables and you have to like it!

We jumped on some shared transport into the city. There were no tuk tuks around, but in hindsight that’s probably a good thing as you’ll see shortly. We arrived at around 7am, and wandered off to find our hotel of choice, where we left our bags until our room became available. We then got some breakfast, and decided to get to the Thai embassy to sort out our Thai visas straight away. We knew it would be difficult to do on almost no sleep, but we were confident our tempers could withstand the strain.

Well, that was before we spoke to our first tuk tuk driver in Vientiane. We’d spoken to a couple of people beforehand, but no one seemed to know quite where the Thai embassy was – apparently, it had moved in recent months and wasn’t on any of the printed maps. Therefore, we’d have to rely on someone to take us there and back, as we did not know the layout of the city at all. We approached a tuk tuk driver, who presented us with a laminated card of fares. 40,000 kip to the Thai embassy! That’s around $5 – and that was only one way! We knew the embassy was about 2 or 3km away, we just did not know where, so we knew that was extortionate. Eventually, after some haggling, we settled for 50,000 kip return. Still a lot of money, considering we’ve spent $10 on a day’s sightseeing in Cambodia. Despite this, we decided to take the hit once.

We arrived at the Thai embassy – accosted by touts, trying to sell us the visa application forms (which you receive for free inside the embassy). Ignoring them, we walked up to the front gate – only to find it closed, locked, and bolted. The embassy was shut for the day due to a Thai public holiday. Too angry to look at the driver (who clearly had known all along it was closed), we got back into the tuk tuk and were driven back to our hotel. After we arrived the driver pulled me aside for a private word:
“You want fun with Lao women tonight big titty?”
I snarled at him and we stomped into the hotel to get some sleep.

Our windowless room was decent, if expensive (all of Vientiane is), and we decided to have an hour’s nap to recuperate after all the stress. I had a shower and settled down. Just as I closed my eyes, the power flicked off – off went the air conditioner, off went the lights, up went the volume from outside, and wide open my eyes flicked. Out of the room we stomped, to find the power up and running in the rest of the hotel – a fuse had blown. The man on reception assured us it would be fixed “within an hour or two”. Giving up, we went out for the rest of the morning - cursing Vientiane, tuk tuk drivers, tour companies, touts, horizontally challenged bus berths, squat toilets, the electricity, and Thai public holidays (how dare they!).