Vientiane

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Well we arrived at the world's sleepiest Capital after a long ardous bus journey on extremely dodgy cliff-edge roads on a bus that was pretty much a relic. At one stage on the journey a mongoose got free and we were very curious and worried when all the locals started getting excite about something on the ground amongst the extremely overcrowded bus. When we found out what it was i think we were more relieved that it wasn't a snake! There was on average 3 people to every 2 person seat and i think it was a true taste of Laos' sketchy public transport. But despite all the excitement on the journey i'm just glad we survived as, apparently, many buses have toppled over the cliff edge whilst on this route. Vientiane was nice but also, sadly where we would split from 2 of our travel companions - rob and Ivan - as they were being beckoned by bangkok. we stayed there for 2 nights and on the full day that we had there myself and sarah went to the Buddha Park(on another bockety old bus which we actually had no idea if it was taking us in the right direction) which was beautiful and we even got our very own free(unheard of for tourists in asia)from a local guy who i think was a bit bored...but sure how bad! He gave us a lowdown on some of the history of the park and we were surprised to here that, despite the scultures appearing ancient, it was only 50 years old. Other than that little excursion, we did not do much in Vientiane other than acquire our Vietmanese Visa before heading down to Pakse...

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