The Wat is cool, rest of the town is...relaxing

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Upon leaving Pakse for Champasak, we had are only real frustrating experience with the local transport. We all got on a tuktuk, negotiated a fair price to the bus station, and were dropped off only 2 out of the 10ks into the trip at a market, where we were told the bus would pick us up. There were many sawngthaews (big tuk tuks) leaving the area, so we got out, paid the driver and went to wait for bus. No sooner did our tuktuk pull out than other tuk tuk drivers come up offering to drive us to the bus station. Growl. We decided to wait until the bus should have come, and then negotiated a price for a tuktuk to just take us all the way to Champasak. I was done waiting for buses by this point, and so were Simon, Lisa and the French Couple. Only, as soon as we agreed on a price in the negotiation process, the driver started going up again. At this point, I went ape shit at the guy (which, he deserved. Never in any of my other travels have I encountered a guy who, after negotiation, offered a price, had it accepted, and then tried for more). After letting him know in no uncertain terms that crap was going nowhere, he went back to his original price. Another traveler had joined us at this point (Lam from Hong Kong) and we set off for Champasak. No further drama. My theatrics were starting to pay off, I had been awarded with a beer from the Malaysian guys back in the capital for negotiating a discount for the tuktuk, Lam thought I did ok so he bought me a beer, and Simon was just the kind of guy that seemed to give me beers anyway. So, for a budget traveller like myself, I was doing ok in the beer department. Note to self: next time, bring T-Shirt "Will yell at Tuk Tuk drivers for beer" in addition to my T-shirt for the city "NO, I don't want a freakin motorcycle ride." Hmm, with a 3 t-shirt travel wardrobe, that does limit my non-transport fashion. Oh well, problem for a different day.

Champasak was the former Capital of the Lao Kingdom. As you may have guessed, with a current capital that was a sleepy little town, the former one was a handful of cardiac arrests

away from being a ghost town. Lonely Planet does not even bother giving a population estimate. However, it was a cool place to lay my head for two nights (yes, all these two night stops have meant that I was starting to get behind schedule, but such is the compromise one makes in order to keep good company). The first night, we did nothing, and we even ate dinner separately. Well, started to at least. I sat down at a guesthouse, was by myself at the time. I ordered, then invited a guy who had just walked in to join me. Peter was his name, and he hailed from Harlem in the Netherlands. 15 minutes later, Lam joined us, and then Jo from Australia sat down with us as well. We ended up staying together in Don Det. The next day, we biked over to the Temple at Champasak (which is rated as the 2nd best in SE Asia). We had a great time checking the ruins out, but were starting to feel the squeeze from the earthquake. In addition to cutting the internet off, the quake also disrupted Lao banking. No exchange was possible. Several people where having to wait out the year while running a tab at their guesthouse. Me, being the paranoid type, had enough cash to last me though March, but we did what we could to keep everybody taken care of. After the temple, we biked back and then just kept on riding around the town taking in the slow town atmosphere. Funny note about my guesthouse. I was the only person staying there when I checked in, Lam took a room there as well, but when I got back, there must have been 40 people having a party right under my room. It really cracked me up, there where no problems of course. Lao parties wind down by 11pm, so I just went out and joined Lam (who was now in the full habit of making sure that I had a beer every time I sat down) *(he used to own a bar in Brasil). So, we sat down at a bar next door, joined to police officers for a nightcap, and then headed back once things settled down. A little blast from the past came in the way the cops were armed. 1 with a AK-47, 1 with an M-16. Before heading over to Champasak, I met Nicholas from Germany, and he decided to skip the temple and join us on the way down to Don Det. At this point I realized that I needed to either be more anti-social or start chartering buses. The pic of us leaving (without Lisa and Simon, they had taken an earlier bus to spend a night in Don Khong) is testament to that).

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