Luang Prabang - temples and tons of tourists

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It was finally time to leave Vang Vieng and the tubers behind. We booked ourselves onto a bus leaving at 11 am which gave us enough time to pack and order more delicious sandwiches for the journey through the mountains to Luang Prabang. The drive is scenic and would have been comfortable and enjoyable on the VIP bus if we had not had such an ignorant and selfish moron sitting in front of us. He had two seats to himself, acres of space in front of him to stretch out his legs and still insisted on reclining both seats despite being politely asked not to. The journey ended up being cramped and exhausting but we did arrive in Luang Prabang on time, early evening and still with plenty of light to find Sisombath Guesthouse recommended to us by Stefan and Simone.

We took a beautiful room after refusing a moquito infested room. Our room was furnished with dark wood and exposed floorboards. Comfy bed, TV, huge fridge and a beautiful picture of a Buddha on the wall and the shower even had a curtain much to Anna's delight! It is one of the best rooms we have stayed in on our travels. That evening we strolled through the night market and found a place to eat. A buffet of veggie food - 10.000 Kip a plate. After our stroll and with our bellies full we headed back to the guesthouse with a couple of beers before falling into the comfy beds. Just after 10 pm we heared the familiar voices of Stefan and Simone returning home to the neighbouring room. We sat on the balcony with them, drank some more beer and had a nice chat before returning to our comfy beds.

The following day we enjoyed a nice sleep in and planned to move into the room next door for a double bed but it was taking too long so we decided to stay in our room. We spent the day relaxing in our room, reading and recovering from the Vang Vieng madness. That evening we ate pizza and drank some more Beerlao.

After doing very little on our first day in town we decided to have a walk down to the river in search of some temple but we became sidetracked in our bid to find some new books to exchange. We had our new books and so instead of looking for temples we headed to a café by the river to read. The first café was noisy so we moved on to Utopia, a bar overlooking the river. A great place to read but the food there is overpriced and they put mint in their pesto rather than mint much to Anna's disgust. The pesto was mint like, Robert!

That evening we returned to one of the bookshops to watch a movie, Midnight in Paris. Quite a funny movie but it was a bad copy and on a small TV in an overcrowded room. It was an okay way to spend the evening and afterwards we had a few drinks with a couple of Finnish guys then back to Sisombath GH.

Most people come to Luang Prabang for the temples and waterfalls but we found the place overpriced and not as good as we expected it to be. On our third day here we slept late again in our comfy beds. It is great to have a room where you are not woken up early by the sunlight streaming through the windows or noisy animals or people. We had a late, late breakfast at 3 pm and then went in search of a German butcher shop. By the time we found it, it was already closed (even though it should still be open). Never mind, our cravings for German food will have to wait a little longer until we return to Bangkok. That afternoon we also booked our bus from Luang Prabang to Nong Kiaw. In the evening we did a little shopping in the night market, ate food at one of the buffets and then returned to the guesthouse for an early night. The next day we would take the bus north to Nong Kiaw. Our overall impression of Luang Prabang wasn't great, it has a nice location banks of two rivers but it is too expensive for our budget. The nightmarket is great though!

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