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Published: October 28th 2006
The Bus to Vang Vieng
Not going anywhere...Jen and I are on a public bus headed for Kek Lok Si when the bus breaks down. The driver chokes a dying engine for a while then gives up. The passengers file off and wait for the next one. The incident is quickly forgotten about.
Scene: The stretch of water between the east coast of the Malay Peninsular and the Perhentian Islands The hot sun beats down on the calm sea. Jen and I are on the slow boat back to Khota Bharu when the boat breaks down. The drivers choke the dying engine for a while then opens it up. Him and his mates fail to find a key piece of equipment they need to fix it. Calls are made from mobile phones and they break out some fishing lines. I watch them pull fish out of the water with surprising regularity for an hour or so until another boat arrives. The passengers take their luggage and transfer to the new boat, which leaves the slow boat behind, along with it's drivers. The incident is filed under "interesting experiences" in my memory and
Working on the Engine
"It's the carburetta!"
"Nah it's the radiator!"
"Let's just take the whole thing apart and see what happens." not quite forgotten about.
Scene: The Nam Ou, between Nong Khiaw and Muang Ngoi The hot sun beats down on the calm river. Our boat stops at the water's edge near a group of villagers to let some of the locals off. Jen and I watch the women washing clothes and children playing naked in the shallows, performing backflips and somersaults. One little girl in a dress stands on a tethered boat, being pushed by a couple of the boys, looking regal for a brief moment before jumping in and splashing around with them. The boat breaks down. The driver chokes the dying engine for a while, moving the rudder to clear it of debris before giving up and opening it up. I have a sudden superstitious moment and wonder if I've been wearing the same t-shirt each time we've had a breakdown. In 10 minutes the engine is running again and we're on our way. The incident is filed under "yet another breakdown" in my long-term memory and remembered for anecdotes, to be cross-referenced with the others.
Scene: The Nam Ou, between Nong Khiaw and Muang Ngoi Three days later. The warming sun burns the last of
the morning mist off the surface of the river. Our boat stops at the water's edge near a group of villagers rendezvous with the locals. Jen and I watch them load some goods onto the boat and pay the driver. The children and washer women aren't here this time. The boat breaks down. The driver chokes the dying engine for a while, moving the rudder to clear it of debris before giving up and opening it up. My sudden superstitious moment returns and I wonder if this location on the river has been jinxed by our last breakdown there. At least I'm wearing a different t-shirt this time. In 10 minutes the engine is running again and we're on our way. The incident is filed under "does nothing in southeast asia run properly?" in my long-term memory and remembered for anecdotes, to be cross-referenced with the others.
On with the entry... After one more night in Luang Prabang, we got up early the next morning, packed our baguette sandwiches and set off for 6-hour bus ride to Vang Vieng. This time we decided not to go through an agency. We canvassed the agencies asking about the bus times (they
The Pickup Truck
Jen's so hungry she's eating her torch. rarely seem to agree with each other, so we went with the times that correlated the most). The tuk-tuk driver deposited us at a little minibus station in the south of the city. A minibus stands, about to leave for Vang Vieng, almost full. The ticket man directs us to his "office", which consists of a picnic table in the corner of the parking lot. We ask how much the ticket is and he says "19 thousand kip" or something similar. I check: "Nineteen? One-Nine?" Holding up one then nine fingers as I do." Yes, he replies, and print our names on the tickets. when we start dishing our money out, it's suddenly 90 thousand (US$9) for this minibus. Surpised, Jen says "you said 19, one-nine." His reply was something like: "Yeah, well, you know..."
Mainly because of his attitude, there was no deal. Tickets are torn up and we keep the money. We ask about cheaper and he points at the terminal across the road. These things look like parking lots here - you really can't recognise them.
These buses are like a dingy cross between the public city buses back home and the comfier long-distance coaches.
David and our AK-47 Toting Friend
He's always your firend if he has a weapon that big. Here, I think the constitude VIP class. They were a little cheaper, too. $7.50 or 75000 kip. It's a 2-hour wait, but that seems to pass quickly enough. I fill in the corners from breakfast with a locally made sausage and some sticky rice from a stall while I wait. We befriend a Frenchman called David who's taking the same bus.
When we climb onto our bus, we realised that these buses also constitute freight services as well: I counted no less than 18 full sacks in the aisle, each about as big and heavy as a small Lao person. We had to walk on top to reach our seats. One of the sacks near us has a tear in it. Inside, I can see peanuts.
Scene: the Mountain road between Luang Prabang and Vang Vieng We're 3 hours into our journey and the hot midday sun is cooling off now - the sun sets at around 6pm in these parts. There are no highways in Laos - the roads meander around the steep mountainsides. Consequently, every journey is the scenic route. This stretch of road is shaded from the sun. A way back, we picked up a
couple of guys with battered AK-47's on their backs. I'm not entirely surprised, as I've read blog entries on this site about the buses travelling with armed guards. Apparently, the bandits in these parts have all but disappeared thanks to this. Jen and I joke that if they did hold up this bus, they'd get peanuts.
The bus breaks down. The driver chokes the dying engine for a while and then gives up and opens it up. He speaks in Lao. David goes and speaks in french with one of the older Lao people who work on the bus (older, educated Lao people speak french, as it was a colony until about 50 years ago). He tells us the engine needs to cool down. I'm not surprised, considering the slopes it's carrying all these extra peanuts up.
We get off in time to watch the locald draining the water coolant from the engine. One of them yels and runs back as a cloud of steam nearly scalds him. Boiling water runs onto the road and down the side of the mountain. Our armed guard spull down some branches from the roadside vegetation and put them on the road
Our Caving/Tubing Group
L-R: Jen, Guy, Aryan, The Guide, and, um... Thingy (oops! Sorry!) at the bends, to slow down oncoming traffic.
Hours pass. I'm glad I had the sticky rice this morning, as it's still sitting in my stomach, digesting nice and slow. Jen and I play Backgammon, and Draughts, to the fascination of the locals (they's never seen backgammon, but they all know draughts well). Jen feels a bit humiliated as I trounce her both times. A pickup truck arrives. The driver leaves then comes back on it later. The engine is taken apart. He leaves then comes back. It's getting dark, and cold. We get back on the bus.
David tells me they think they've fixed it. The pickup leaves, and after a little sputtering the engine is running again.
We've made it a whole 10 metres before it gives out again.
Switching tense... So we stood around for a while in the headlights of the returned pickup truck. We'd taken our bags off the bus when someone informed us that a more transport would be arranged. After about 10 minutes, the pickup driver offered to take the remaining passengers on to Vang Vieng. We piled on, along with our luggage.
We spent nearly 3
Me on the Rope Swing
"HolyJumpingCrikeyZoiksAlmighty!"
Or words to that effect. I got a bit excited up there. hours on the back of a pickup on switchback mountain roads with the wind in our hair. Jen got a bit cold, but I was loving it. It was a clear night, and there's no light pollution out there. I talked to David while I watched the stars. I could see the milky way clearer than ever before. I'm sure I saw a meteorite shower. After an hour or so, Orion climbed over the mountaintops to watch over me. There was a real sense of adventure.
Vang Vieng itself was a lot less interesting than the trip there. In fact, it's pretty awful. It's crammed with bars dedicated to the US sitcom,
Friends. Yep, you can come out here to Laos and sit and watch pirated
Friends DVDs while you drink your BeerLao. It's actually hard to find a bar without it.
We did nothing for a day - got up late, then found a nice corner by the river (no
Friends) in hammocks, where we stayed until it got dark. The next day we went out for a short trek. Saw a few caves. Seen one, seen them all, unfortunately. I prefer the mountains from the outside. We had fun though, and some were quite big. We went down the river (a cleaner one) in rubber tyre tubes. Tubing's very popular with the tourists in Vang Vieng. There are bars along the river, which on the one hand are quite fun, but on the other tend to spoil the scenery a bit with their loud music. Some of them have erected huge swings over the river. You swing out from a height of 10 metres then drop into the water (usually at the low point). It's great fun, and Jen even relaxed enough to take photos of me the second time I did it.
The trip down the river left me feeling clean and refreshed after my travels. Last night we went for a Lao massage, which is like a Thai massage, excpet they use more tiger balm and it's a bit more bone-crunching. Left me invigorated.
Today we've come to Vientiane and I've spent a very long time online updating my blog. Expect another update in a couple of days.
Love to all,
Sam
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Helen
non-member comment
Great to read abut your interesting journeys and finding a little piece of heaven. We have just come back from s weekend in the Dales. Lovely hotel with great food. Lot more expensive than we usually go to but I think it was worth it for a birthday treat. Weather was aweful yesterday, rained all day so it was good to have a nice place to hang out. Today we woke to beautiful sunshine that was warm too, and had a little walk up the dale and back. Dad is still not right, we had a walk on Friday too,about 6 easy miles but it wore him out completely so its a good thing we didn't do one saturday. he just about managed today, and intends to go to school tomorrow so we will see. Strahge thing happened when we got home. I had 2 cards that I hadn't opennned waiting for tomorrow on the kitchen table and they have gone when we got home! Drew who was feeding moses says we left the door open but we don't think we did, nothing else seems to be missing though! Hope they turn up as I won't have many tp open Anyway loeds of love, and Loas looks lovely Mum