Blogs from Vientiane, West, Laos, Asia

Ausing staying an extra day in Hoi An and another extra day in Luang Prabanit and a deadline to get back to Bangkok on the 21st I had little time in Vientiane. And when I say little I mean LITTLE. How little you ask? Just 8 hours. The town seems small and adorable and had no doubt that I could accomplish what I had wanted to see while there. Okay, to be fair I didn't really no exactly what I wanted to see but I'm sure my Lonely Planet Guide would have steered me in the proper direction. However after what may have been the worse bus ride of my life I chose a different route for killing time in Vientiane. Now I told you about my 30 hour bus ride and howwith the the exception ... read more

Vang Vieng was kind of hard to leave. We had such a chilled out time there. On our 3rd day we we hit the tubing place, got our tubes and our hands marked with a number each in permanent marker. We were group 9-13. Everyone in VV wear these florescent t-shirts/shorts/tanks/hats/bags that say "in the tubing"..we don't quite understand this grammatically incorrect phrase, but it works for the farang...and that's pretty much all you can find in any store. When you combine the same articles of clothing, paired with the bright blue permanent marker # on the back of your hand it almost resembles an army of zombies of sorts, especially when there is alcohol/drugs involved! Anyway, they drove us roughly 5 kilometers away from the center of town and we got in our tubes. The ... read more

Overnight train from Vientiane to Bangkok, 4-5 February I've always loved the idea of overnight trains. The whole idea of waking up with the world rushing by and travelling through exotic lands while you sleep reminds me a bit of a fairytale. The last (and only) overnight train I've taken was in Egypt where my friend J and I were ridiculously excited about every little thing, from the train conductor's hat to the belly dancer who came to the 'entertainment' carriage. This time I was just as excited, perhaps even more so to see the look on C's face, my princess of a boyfriend who loves a bit of a luxury. First of all, he couldn't fit into our cabin. He was too tall for the door frame so had to do a comical, John Cleese-style ... read more

This is the first blog I've done in a while, partly because the internet connection in Laos is very primitive and partly because I've been having too much fun to bother spending a couple of hours sat at a computer screen. I think last time I blogged about arriving in Luang Prabang so I'll kick off with that. The first thing we did when we got to Luang Prabang was climb the Phousi Mountain. I say climb, I really mean walk up a lot of steps, but it was really quite demanding given the 35 degree heat. There were various statues of the Buddha in his various different poses dotted around. I'd say my favourite was the one in the cave about halfway up. The respite from the heat might have played a part in this ... read more

HuayXai – Luang Nam Tha – Luang Prabang – Vang Vieng – Vientiane – Tha Khaek – Tad Lo – Champasak – Don Det We had high expectations for Laos and were overjoyed with the consistent warm welcomes, delicious local cuisine and authentic beauty. We started with a night in a border town (Huay Xai) then continued a ways north to Luang Nam Tha where Rebecca did an amazing jungle trek with our friend Paul (Tyler had injured his foot but is now fully healed). While the trek was beautiful, our guide Xay did a fantastic job making the two days as memorable as they are. The bamboo forests, trees hundreds of years old and minority villages were everything we had hoped, but they took a close second to Xays humour and knowledge. Luang Prabang was ... read more

We had, for the first time during this trip, booked onward transport (our five-day train ride to Singapore), so we had to be in Vientiane by the 26th. We realize in retrospect we could have avoided backtracking, although the thought of being on any bus ride for more than 12 hours (thus being able to visit more of Laos, but having then to take the bus from Luang Prabang to Bangkok, a whopping 23 hours, or from Luang Prabang to Chiang Mai and then Bangkok, a whopping 25 hours) made us recoil in dread. So we kept our plans (for once) and decided to visit Luang Nam Tha and Muang Sing on our next trip to Laos, and soaked up the extra days in Muang Ngoi and took the boat ride down in two days, staying ... read more

Luang Prabang (Laos) to Thakek (Laos): 30th Dec 2012 - 10 Jan 2013 Distance covered so far (since 20 Dec): 1361.73 km New Year was difficult this year. Mel was upset when she discovered that Andy had fibbed. The 'mushrooms' in her noodle soup at lunchtime weren't mushrooms - it was stomach lining, and Andy knows that he really should have been more honest with her. That evening, Andy was a little upset when Mel decided that too much money had been spent, and our celebratory New Year dinner would be at the accurately named 'Grilled Goat Restaurant', and NOT at the more promisingly named 'Properly Grilled Goat Restaurant' just next door. Furthermore, New Year was spent doing some of the hardest hills that we have ever had to contend with. A few of the days ... read more