Getting out of the big smoke

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After escaping Vientiene with our Cambodian visas in hand we took a night bus down to Pakse complete with Laos Karaoke at 400 decibels until the early hours of the morning and a dodgy film about a Crocodile man that seduced all the young ladies.

Arriving in Pakse at 6am we were greeted by a torrential downpour that we thought would only write off the rest of the day.

A quick breakfast and checked into a hotel we grabbed a few hours sleep before waking to find that the clouds had parted and indeed the sun shone.

Tracking down a bike rental place we took some dodgy motorbikes out on the road with a view to visiting the Bolaven plateau - the coffee growing region of Laos with the highly sought after Arabica coffee exported to Italy and beyond.

This tour took us to Laos' highest waterfall Tad Fane a 100m cascade of water down into an impressive gorge. Passing through villages and waving to all the smiling children who would rush out onto the road to point at the crazy falang on their motorbikes.

Arriving at the waterfall, tour guide Nunny took over and decided that we needed to get to the bottom of this. The waterfall that is. The treacherous descent involved some near vertical muddy slopes with only tree roots and vines to hold onto. Three kids stared at us in disbelief having just come up the same track. We stopped at a point that we could safely go no further and it was lucky we did as about 10 mins later the water vapour from the waterfall had engulfed the entire valley making vision very difficult. Returning to the top we decided instead to sample one of the fine local brews from the safety of a restaurant balcony.

We then hit the road again, onto the local village which seemed to be devoid of anything in particular bar a few more smiling kids and people fixing their motorbikes by the side of the road, not to mention Chris' favourite animal the Water Buffalo.

Turning around as the sun began to set we made our way back into Pakse before it was completely dark and enjoyed our first bottle of wine since we'd been away, accompanied by some reasonable pasta dishes. MMM.

The next morning we were up early and headed down to the bus station for our connection to Si Phan Don.

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Photos

Pakse and the Bolaven Plateau
On the bikes

Pakse and the Bolaven Plateau
The Tad Fane falls in all their glory.

Pakse and the Bolaven Plateau
As far as we could go on the muddy slopes huddling together to save Ricko from falling down the mountain.