Si Phan Don is a landlocked archipelago in the Mekong, just above the Laos border with Cambodia. Its name means 4,000 Islands, a notional rather than strictly accurate indication of the profusion of sandbanks, islets, and full-blown islands in the area. Reaching it was a tedious process. The guesthouse in Pakxe tried to tell us there were no seats available on the minibus, even though we'd booked them. Then we had to pay extra for a boat trip to our island of choice that should have been included in the original ticket price. And then the skipper appeared to be inexperienced at navigating the river, resulting in us running aground several times. Don Khong is the main backpacker haven, but we'd opted for Don Khon (yes, just a g of difference) instead, hoping for more tranquility ... read more

Rather than a straight run through to Pakxe, I fancied breaking up the journey with a couple of days in Thakhek to see some karst scenery nearby. My attempts to obtain info about suitable buses to Thakhek proved highly frustrating, with different sources stating the "only" daily bus was at, variously, 6:30AM, 7:30AM, 11AM, and 8:30PM. I chose to turn up at the bus station at 6:15AM and take it from there. 7:15AM was the correct answer, but even then the ticket seller said it would take 4 hours to reach Thakhek - which would have required an average speed exceeding 90 km/h, which I doubt even Laos Airlines could achieve. The first thing I noticed was that Thakhek was extremely hot. The north of Laos had been getting close to my temperature threshold, but Thakhek ... read more

The bus to Phonsavan possessed that rarest of qualities - it never filled up. This was enough to raise the spirits after countless crowded journeys without the luxury of space. I was sufficiently boosted by this that even the drawbacks of the guesthouse in Phonsavan - a flexible wooden floor that nipped the skin of one's feet painfully and a hot shower that only lived up to its name if the flow was a trickle - seemed inconsequential. Phonsavan is the main base for exploring the Plain of Jars. This stretch of rolling hills takes its name from the clusters of stone containers dotted around it. The jars themselves are about 2,000 years old and the consensus is that they're funerary urns, though local legend states that they're fermentation vessels constructed by a race of giants ... read more

From Nong Khiaw, it was necessary to take another songthaew to Viang Kham, just a couple of hours away. A few ducks in wicker baskets were carried on top of the vehicle and the number of feathers that drifted past during the journey made me fear they might arrive bald. There were 3 other foreigners present. Two were a Swiss guy and a French woman, who I shall call the League of Extraordinarily Miserable Europeans (LoEME for short), as they were travelling together but seemed to derive no pleasure from anything, least of all each other's company. The third person I shall call LA Woman, for various reasons including factual accuracy as regards gender and city of origin. With so few transport options in this region, the 4 of us inevitably ended up seeing a lot ... read more

After the disappointment of the slow boat, Louang Phabang (spelled in many different ways) proved to be a great place to relax. There was a general air of serenity and quiet about the town, an atmosphere reinforced by the presence of many saffron-clad monks and novices. The colonial French heritage extended not just to baguettes being on every menu, but also to architecture - the whitewashed walls and coloured window shutters some of the few European remnants of Indochina. Numerous restaurants overlooked the Mekong and provided an ideal venue for afternoon dozing, the puttering of the riverboats a lullaby in the lazy heat of the sun. However it would be wrong to represent Louang Phabang as some sort of Shangrila. One thing I'm already noticing in Laos is that it's very different to the untouched image ... read more