Advertisement
Published: December 11th 2006
Edit Blog Post
Avenue Lane Xang
This is the Champs Elysees of Vientiane...Not quite so busy! Who'd have thought the soundtrack to my travels would have been Guns N Roses. . .
While trekking through the dense forests of Northern Thailand the theme running through my head was 'Welcome to the Jungle' and last night (for the second time) I took the 'Nighttrain'. I've nearly found 'Paradise City', but Koh Pha Ngan didn't quite cut it! At least it's too late now for 'November Rain'.
Anyway, back to the point. .. .The night train from Bangkok to Nong Khai was great. It may be expensive travelling first class in the UK....I should know, I set the prices, but here it's dirt cheap!! So 1st class it was, up to the Laos border, besides, you save a night's accomodation costs anyway. It's a great way to travel...the problem is, I still feel like I'm travelling. The first time I took a night train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai I felt dizzy for several days after. I thought that it may have just been the effects of a few too many Chang beers on the train...and as Chang gives nasty hangovers, I could expect to feel a bit odd for a few days. However, last night I
Patouxai
And at the top of Vientiane's Avenue Lane Xang, we have Laos' Arc de Triomphe!! didn't touch a drop and yet I'm still swaying all over the place now. It's horrible. I'm gonna stick to buses from now on!
So, I arrived at Nong Khai, in north east THailand, took a tuk-tuk to the Thai border, got my passport stamped and then took a bus over the Friendship Bridge to the Laos side of the Mekong to get my visa....without any money! I changed a travellers cheque and got given a huge wad of notes. Just one traveller's cheque nearly made me a millionaire...However, the Laos Kip is all but useless and the guy at the visa office merely laughed at me when I begged to pay for my visa with several hundred thousand of the nasty notes....so back to the money exchange place I went, to beg to have dollars instead. Typically, he had to buy the kip back at a different rate to what he gave me them for. Have no idea how much I lost in the deal. The figure was huge, but in GBP or USD it was probably very minimal.
Eventually, I got my visa. Wasn't too much of an ordeal, but it was certainly easier popping over
Menu In Vientiane
OK, so it may be cheap and it may be western food, but I'm a little worried about the chef's whereabouts! to Burma/Myanmar than Laos.
In Laos, it appears that taxi drivers do not have to pass an equivalent 'Knowledge' test, like London cabbies. My driver feigned ignorance when I told him we weren't where I'd asked to go. He then claimed that he didn't speak English and that I should go in and ask the hotelier where we were. I guess usually people just decide to take that hotel, but anyway, I asked where we were and found out it wasn't on my map, i.e. it was miles out of town. Despite having a map and pointing a number of times at my destination he still proceeded to take me to another Guest House he wanted me to stay at. I was fed up asking him to take me to where I wanted to go and as this place was mentioned in my travel book I thought it must be ok. Although it was just off the main map, Vientiane's so small, that it is still pretty central.
Thankfully the guy had rooms... He also had something else for sale but I didn't quite catch what it was he was offering. But by the way he pushed the door too and winked as he offered whatever it was in a hushed voice, I guessed it was either drugs or a prostitute. Either way, I declined. Only now am I fearing that it he could have been offering alternative services and so when I get back to my room I'm going to fasten all bolts, wedge a chair up against the door handle and lock the windows too.
Anyway, as for Laos. . . it's amazing! Well, amazingly different. It's quite an experience being here. Very different to Thailand. I can see what people mean when they say it's how Thailand was about 20-30 years ago. OK, so I never saw Thailand then, but I can imagine that'd be about right. There are similarities but everything shuts at 4pm. It gets dark early too and without electricity (or much of it) and street lighting there's very little to do at night. Everything is very basic. This is what I expected travelling round Asia to be like. Thailand was a bit cushty in comparison. Still loved it thuogh (except Bangkok, if you hadn't guessed by now!!).
Advertisement
Tot: 0.137s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0763s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb