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The Floating Restaurant
A custom built restaurant on the River. Gotta take the dirt path down, watchout for the cow crap! Vientiene is the capital of Laos and would become my base of operations while exploring the Laos interior. As I mentioned earlier alot of this trip was loosely planned and some of it on the fly. Which it turns out is a really fun way to travel. The plan was this, rest for a few days in Vientiene and gather my strength for a 5 day solo dirt bike ride into the back country of Laos. When I got into the city I was overwhelmed by the chaos and confusion, but mostly the dust and pollution. It gave me the meanest headache I have ever had, and a compulsive need to escape the city. My salvation came in the way of the Riverside Eco Lodge and Resort located 40 minutes outside Vientiene.
A beautiful collection of bungalows set along the Nam Song river. Don't let the whole "Resort" thing in the title throw you off, they are pretty loose with the word. At eight bucks a night it wasn't the Four Seasons but it did have a rustic and authentic charm of its own. Equipped with its own Floating Restaurant, built on a permenatly anchored barge on the river; and
My Dining Room
Have a meal and listen to the river flow by its own "swimming pool" a square of wood and bamboo floating on top of the Nam Song. Traveling for a long period of time can be exhausting and sometimes you just need to kick back.
And relax is exactly what I did. With the hostel almost empty, me and the 2 or 3 other westerners had the place to ourselves. The staff had a kitchen that would whip up some mean Lao food almost anytime during the day or night, and needless to say the beer lao flowed freely. I had my favorite meal in Laos here, a BBQ whole fish with fresh garlic, onions, mint, peppers and peanuts. Perfectly cooked and eaten with my shoes off and a dog sleeping at my feet, over looking the river. Paradise.
I would need the R & R because soon I was going to leave Vientiene for a 5 day endurance dirt bike run into the interior of Laos.
The only bikes that are available in Laos are tiny 125 CC Scooters, bicycles with engines, hardly the kinda ride you wanted to take out into the sticks. With most of my purposed route dirt tracks that connect various small
"The Swimming Pool"
They built a border so that the river current doesent carry you away villages I knew that I needed something bigger. So I got in contact with one of the few operators of 250 Dirt Bikes in Laos. A husband and wife team that ran a small business out of their home. The first day I rode around 220 KM to the small town of Na Hin. The road was a small two lane deal that was sometimes sealed but for the main part dirt. Infrastructure is not high on the Laos' gov list of concern so the "road" is unpassable in the rainy season and during the dry season has pot holes the size of swimming pools.
Owing to the fact that 250 Dirt bikes are: Expensive, and basically Illegal in Laos I was alone on the road when it came to the back roads dirt tracks. Sometimes I would go days without seeing another westerner. From little village to small town, nothing out here to draw tourists, and in the vaccum exists exactly what I was looking for: Real Laos. The riding was intense. Everything that I had ever learned or been warned about when I was learning to ride, but had never seen in the states in 2 year
Dinner!
River fish caught that morning, prepaired as requested, for like 3 bucks. I saw in Laos is 2 days. Crappy swerving cars, drunk truckers, tractors and bikes. Dogs, cow crap, broken parts from vehicles, almost every type of animal and livestock in the region. All fighting for a spot on the road. No one cleans the road or fixes it so Its amazing the amount of junk and debris that piles up out there.
The kids in the villages rarely see a westerner and one on a huge dirt bike, forget about it. As I would race past there villages or huts they would stream out and chase me and the bike. Hooting and hollering and waving with giant smiles on there faces. Or they would stand there with there jaws hanging to the floor, not exactly comprehending what they were seeing. And it wasn't only the kids. When I would stop at a little village "restaurant", a few stools and whatever the family was cooking, the adults would come out to examine the dirt bike. The bike is so high off the ground that even I had to kick my leg up to get on, for them it would be next to impossible to ride, and they thought that was
My Ride
My whole life strapped to the back of my bike hilarious.
My halfway point treat were the spectacular Kong Lor Caves. A natural river that ran through the mountain for about a mile, and out the other side. I hired some guys with a boat for about 8 bucks and they took me through the whole cave systems. It was massive. Some rooms were big as cathedrals and others smaller then youd like. All in all a great break from the riding.
It was four days of pure pleasure, and on the the 5th day: Pain. I was detouring around a juryrigged bridge and riding down into a gully when I hit a half buried rock that sent my front wheel into a massive pothole and myself over the handle bars. Since I was riding at about 45km I was tossed about 10ft in front of the bike and skidded for another 15 or so feet. Hyper-extended my left shoulder and cut up my left palm and knee, and lost half a shoe but all and all got pretty lucky. I don't think I realized the extent of my luck until later.
I rolled into the town of Tha Khek about an hour later, battered bike and
Geared Up
Rolling through Laos with Impunity biker. Tha Khek is a semi largish town in southern Laos. After finding a place to stay I hobbled over to the provincial hospital to get the dirt cleaned out of my cuts. Wow, not like back home. Not at all. To say that they are lacking in the basics is not saying enough. People laying on the floor. Dirt and grime and general disrepair. All open air. People in the waiting area passed out with IVs running into them, that sorta stuff. No one in this small "clinic" or hospital or whatever could speak a lick of English so I had to suffice by just showing them my gashes. The nurse pointed me to a room where I assumed I would be met by another nurse or something. I walked into the room and into, I kid you not, an operating room. Where a woman was being worked on by a doctor and two nurses. The staff are standing over her with scalpels in hand performing eye surgery!! As I step in they all look up at me and I was like "wow I am in the wrong room". So I walk back to the first nurse who kinda
Kong Lor Cave
Halfway point, the giagantic Kog Lor shakes her head, and then leads me right back to the O.R.! Sits me down on the operating table next to the eye surgery going on. I am kinda freakin out at this point. Then another nurse comes in and start to clean out my cuts, and I'm trying with all my will not to glance over at this lady getting her eye cut open 2 1/2 ft to my left. Then it starts to get surreal. Both the nurses start to chat me up in bad English: Where are you from? Whats your name? One of them starts pointing at my face and smiling and the others like "she says you are very handsome." Im like hey, look down, eye surgery, pay attention! I gotta tell ya I'm glad that I was not really hurt or I would be in serious trouble!
Life's like that I guess. To get something you want you always have to take a little risk. But out there in the boonies in Laos on the back of a dirt bike miles away from civilization I got what I was really looking for: Real Adventure.
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