VIENTIANNE, CAPITAL OF LAOS

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On our last day in luang prabang we decided to rent a bicycle each for 2.00 to ride around town. we started off going to the bus depot to purchase our ticket for the next day bus to vientiane for 130 000 kip (each including snacks and lunch. we found a map on how to get to the bus depot, while we were looking at the map we notice Thad Sae falls were only 10 klm away, so we decided to pedal there, after a few kilometers , sean said i think were going constantly up hill, after a few more kilometers the hills were getting huge, we were riding up a mountain, then we got to the top, by this time we thought we biked at least 10 klm but no falls yet, the hill on the other side was much steaper but we were going down, the whole time i was thinking we have to come bac this way, on the other side of the mountain still no falls, but there was a village, i ask for direction by pointing at the map, she pointed to where we were heading, another 5 klm and we got there(found out later that it was 15 km from town center and 10 klm from limits.

We had to take a small boat ride to the falls, at the falls you had options of zip lining,elephant riding or elephant bathing. we just walked around and had lunch there contemplating how to get back up the steep long hill with our bikes. We noticed on the way in lots of tour buses/tuktuk waiting . We ended up paying a driver 60 000 kip to take us to the top of the hill.from there it was a breeze getting back in to town. We continued touring the town.

The next moring we hopped on the bus to Vietianne, they said 9 hours, actually took 12 hrs. We had front row seats on the 2nd level above the driver, we had a 180 view. The 1st 6 hrs were very enjoyable beautifull mountain vistas, winding roads, small village hanging on the cliff side but the 2nd 1/2 was very slow and bumby , uncomfortable. We were glad when that bus ride was over, we had only travelled 400 klm.

Today we toured the capital city of 200 000 people and tomorrow we will head out.

Who knows were we will end up.......................................................................................

Sean and Josee

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