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Published: April 9th 2010
(If you just want to read about my impressions of Laos, skip down about a dozen paragraphs...I wrote quite a bit about our adventurous journey travelling into Laos, mostly just to maintain my own memory of those 3 days...but my descriptions of Luang Prabang and Vang Vieng are here eventually!)
Ahhh, Laos. We had not planned on going to Laos when starting this trip. We thought it would be too difficult to enter, Nate was worried about the lack of internet access, and we just didn't think we could squeeze another country into our jam-packed schedule. However a window of opportunity came up, and after reading more about the country we thought "How hard can it be??" Haha.
Laos is a country snuggled between Vietnam and Thailand, with Cambodia nestled along its southernmost tip and Myanmar and China hugging its Northern borders. It is a communist country that continues to have occasional uprisings of violence in the mountain villages. The tribal H'Muong people have frequently been forced out of their familial villages, some in on-going resentment for their part in the US-led Secret War. Laos bears the fame of being the most-bombed country on earth. As the US scrambled to stop the spread of communism after backing out of Vietnam, they turned to Laos as the next threat. The US failed to make the daily bombings an official declaration of war, therefore keeping it secret from the war-weary public. The countryside is still ridled with UXO's, unexploded bombs that make off-course exploration and farming virtually impossible. Laos is attempting to rise above being one of the poorest countries in the world, but unfortunately they are ruining some of their pristine environment in the process. Slash and burn practices occur all over the countryside, and impart a thick haze of smoke over many villages and towns. The black charred mountain sides significantly detract from the obvious beauty beyond. Laos is a rugged country, only recently realizing their cash-cow tourism opportunity, and therefore they are still in the early stages of development...which is both its blessing and its curse. The lack of Westernized tourist-focused resorts and easy-breezy travelling gives Laos a special feeling of authenticity that is often lost in the better-travelled Vietnam and Thailand. But...when time is limited and you just want to freaking get to the next destination, Laos is just not going to accommodate. So you just have to hold onto your battered bus seat, dust the dirt off your bag, and dive right in...and find that Laos is totally worth it.
We started our journey into Laos from Sapa on Sunday 3/21. We were travelling to Luang Prabang, a town in the middle of the northern part of Laos. We were crossing the border at Dien Bien, the Vietnam border town that was only recently opened in 2007. Nate's Lonely Planet SE Asia guide was written in late 2007, so their information on the border crossing was very limited. So we gathered what info we could and forged ahead. We were picked up at our Sapa hotel on Sunday morning, the last to board a jam-packed mini-bus that would comfortably fit about 12 but was pushing about 20. I was squashed in a row of 4 people in front with my knees hiked up to my chin. My knees would cramp so badly but with no place to stretch I just had to let the pain turn to numb. And the roads...oh the roads. All through mountains, bumping and swerving and winding the entire way. Nothing was paved, so the dirt would cloud up and we were forced to shut all the windows, leaving us in stifling heat until the dirt clouds would dissipate. Even still our bags, clothes, and bodies were absolutely covered in brown dirt by the end of the trip. We were told it was 8 hours from Sapa to Dien Bien (p.s. this is only about 200 km), but it took over 10 hours.
We were finally dumped in Dien Bien, expecting a decent-sized town being so close to the border. But all we found were the bus station, a few cheap guesthouses, and a few food stalls. We quickly booked the next day's 5:30am bus on to the Laos border town of Muang Khua, which was a cheap 88 dong, but later found it is only 44 dong for locals. We found a $5 per night guesthouse with a bed that was more wooden plank than mattress, and were so tired we just passed out.
We got up early Monday morning believing the worst was behind us...we were almost in Laos!! Yippee!! And as we approached the bus it looked so much nicer than yesterday's...it was an actual bus, with plenty of seats for all passengers. Not so bad!! We were even able to snag the seats in the back, along with a German couple, all of us thinking we were soooo lucky to have the leg room and even feeling a bit guilty about the other passengers cramped in seats with little leg room. This is gonna be a great day!! The bus began to pull out of the bus station, drove about 25 feet, then made the first stop of the day. Not even out of the bus station. To pick up a woman and her HUGE MOUND of crap. She had bags and bags of fabric and watermelons and god knows what else. They were piled under our legs, in the aisles, and under the seats. Then we drove about 1/2 km, made another stop where we had to get out of the bus so they could squeeze in more locals with more of their huge bags. And so it continued, stopping 4-5 more times before we were even out of Dien Bien. Starting to get a bad feeling about this trip....
So those seats in the back that we felt so lucky to snag?? We failed to realize in our seat selection process that those seats rode directly above the rear wheel bar. So every bump sent us airborne out of our seats. All day long. And the dust just got worse, the bus conductor yelling at us every 15 minutes to shut the windows which left us to sit in stifling heat for even longer.
We eventually arrived at the actual border crossing by about 10:30am, got our official Vietnam exit visa stamp, then were driven about 5 km to the Laos visa building. Was a $35 fee for US citizens, a little more or less for other countries. And of course there was an administration fee, which only turned out to be about $0.20. Our bus driver had offered a pretty good rate on exhanging Vietnam Dong for Laos Kip, which was very helpful as there were no ATM's or currency exhanges in either Dien Bien or at the border crossing, and the visa officials kept upping their exchange rate (very sketchy). It took until after 12pm for all the bus passengers to get their visas, and as we got back on the bus we were told it was another 4 hours to Muong Khua. After such a long morning and such a rough bus ride, we were just anxious to get there. So 4 more hours...ha.
The "road" conditions just got worse after we entered Laos. I put "road" in quotations because they weren't really roads. They were dirt paths along the Laos mountain sides that were literally being dug and bulldozed as we were driving through. This huge bus would putter up moutain sides and barrel back down, teetering oh-so-close to the rocky dirt path edge. (mom, don't read this...) At one point a British girl who had joined us in the back said, "Those stories about tourist buses plummeting down mountain sides...this is how that happens!!" And as I said, these "roads" were still being built...so we had to stop about every 5 km because either a bulldozer was in the process of digging the path that we needed to use, or our bus was too heavy with fat-ass Western tourists to haul over a rocky un-dug mound, so the conductor would make us all get off and walk over the mound (the lightweight Asian locals were allowed to stay on the bus). At one point the de-touristed bus couldn't even make it over a mound, so a bulldozer rammed up the back of the bus and pushed it over the hill. Quite the sight...Caterpillar was well represented! (Go Ribneks!)
So the ride would go like this....drive for about 10 minutes over bumpy, windy, dusty roads whizzing dangerously close to the mountain cliffside. Then stop because a bulldozer is shoveling. So everyone gets out off the bus and stands around for 45 minutes, staring at the bulldozer working. Then when the mound looks a little flatter, the bus conductor tells us to get back on the bus. The bus attempts to drive up the flatter mound, but can't make it so 30 seconds later we are told to get back off the bus...we then climb over the mounds of watermelon and fabric bags in the aisles, and then walk for 10 minutes through dirt and rocks to the other side of the mound. We pile back through the aisle to our seats. Then we drive for 10 more minutes, and do it all over again. This, my friends, is travel through Laos. I'm sure in 10 years that "road" will be a ROAD, beautiful and paved, and travellers will be able to go from Sapa to Muong Khua in one day. And all of us who endured that Dien Bien border crossing will say "I remember back in 2010 when there wasn't even a road here, and we had to walk half the way there, you kids these days are so spoiled in Laos!!"
So that's the bad part of the story...oh, and the story ain't even done!! But we need a little positivity here. We stopped in a few small villages along the way for snacks and occasionally because the bus was breaking down. The people in Laos are so kind, not looking to hassle us or stare at us like we are Western freaks. They are just laid back, quick to laugh and to offer a sip of their famed Beer Lao. The children are beautiful...we came upon a group of them on their way to chopping bamboo. The children were pretty shy and even scared of us at first, but an Israeli couple had balloons that quickly broke the ice, and after Nate passed out his candy they knew we were a-ok. They got a kick out of looking at pictures of themselves on our digital cameras, and the girls hid shy smiles when we complimented their nice jewelery. Their parents came down and joined in the laughs, but eventually told the children to move along to their chores. The children raced after our bus as we drove away, yelling "goodbye" and furiously waving their tiny brown hands, huge smiles plastered on their faces. Absolutely heart-warming.
Also met some very nice people on the bus, had a good time swapping travel stories and sharing perspectives on our homeland politics. Many Europeans were very interested in our opinions about the US getting nationalized healthcare. Had good talks, never heated or aggressive. Was great to laugh together at our ridiculous journey. Most of them were much better travelled than myself, and I felt so much better when they all said this was the worst border crossing they had ever experienced! Those laughs eventually turned into all-out exasperation though....as the journey continues...
So as the "4 hour" mark came and went, we quickly realized this was going to be a much longer day than we anticipated. As dusk was approaching and we were literally within 10 km from Muong Khua, the bus that had sputtered and coughed the entire journey decided it was done, and the engine completely died. There we were on a cliff overlooking a beautiful river below, 4 or 5 tiny huts perched on the mountainside across the river, sun slowly setting...in the middle of nowhere. We were too far to walk with all our bags, it was getting dark, we were all painfully thirsty and completely filthy...and the bus conductor up and left on a truck. (Bus driver was still with us, along with the huge-bag locals). Nobody spoke English to explain what was happening, so we just sat on the side of the road for almost 90 minutes. Early on the conductor returned with a pick up truck, taking only the locals and their huge bags. If you're going to save anything it must be the fabric and watermelons right??!! Finally around 8pm the conductor returned and said "you get on new bus". Yay!! We're saved!! We stepped off the bus with a spring in our step, and were greeted not by a bus, but a pick up truck with a huge metal crate over its top and sticks and logs covering the floor. We were told to get in. Had to stand on those logs, the metal bars had spaces just wide enough for us to squeeze through. And riding in that pickup truck, we towed that huge bus down the hill, up more hills, across a couple streams, and past a village with locals racing outside to gape and laugh at the sight we made. At first is was hilarious, this ending to such a journey...but after banging my spine and ribs on those metal bars a few dozen times it was just plain painful. And then...of course...the truck just stopped in the middle of the dark road. The conductor told us to get off, grab our bags, and walk the rest of the way. WTF???!!! He said it was only 5 minutes, but sorry if we didn't quite believe him. But what to do, didn't have any options. And sure enough, it was only about 5 minutes, and at the bottom of that last hill we came upon the little town of Muong Khua...which lay across the river, with no bridge. So we all filed into little boats, which of course we had to pay for, and were paddled across the river. We found another $5 guesthouse, and without knowing where the bus station was or how we were getting to Luang Prabang, we could barely muster the energy to set an early alarm and just pass out. The journey from Dien Bien to Muong Khua is about 110 km. It took 15 hours. I just earned my road trip badge of honor.
Nate and I woke early the next day, early enough to watch the village monks receiving alms from the locals. We searched for a bus station or someone who spoke English, and were eventually able to piece together that the bus station was 2 km "that way". So we strapped on our bags and started walking "that way", and sure enough we eventually came upon the bus station. And was just our luck that the next bus to Luang Prabang was leaving in less than an hour!! The end was in sight, and sure enough after an 8 hour bus ride that was free of any break downs or unpaved roads, we arrived in Luang Prabang!
OK...At last...Luang Prabang!! Luang Prabang is a town situated on a peninsula with the Mekong and Nam Khan rivers merging at the NE tip. There are monks in bright orange robes padding through town, and ornate gold and emerald temples seem to pop up on every street corner. In the center of town is Phu Si, a large hill with a white magnolia-lined stairway leading to a gleaming gold temple at the top. The main street is Th Sisavangvong, which holds dozens of inexpensive guesthouses, restaurants, and handicraft shops. There is a large market place, and the riverside has its own action of guesthouses, bars, and restaurants. It's surprisingly modern, there are plenty of ATM's and internet cafes. This is all in stark contrast to the rustic towns and villages we saw along our journey! There are lots of tourist attractions including Pac Ou caves, several waterfalls, and dozens of temples. I chose just a few of these attractions, preferring to wallow in my non-bus days and wander the streets at leisure.
The highlight of Luang Prabang was definately the elephant riding. We got a tuk tuk driver (tuk tuks are pick up trucks with wood planks on each side and a metal crate over top...just like our final transportation into Muong Khua, only smaller and with seats!) Cost $30 USD to ride the elephant, and was worth every penny. There were no other tourists there, just Nate, myself, and the elephant guide wandering through a stream in the jungle. Was an awesome way to spend my morning!
The other highlight was renting a bike and riding through the countryside. Found a small waterfall near a tiny village on the outskirts of town, and thoroughly enjoyed the peace and quiet of riding a bike down a forested dirt path.
We ate some great food and found a couple fun bars in Luang Prabang to provide some great Laos nightlife. However, everything in Luang Prabang shuts down at 12am. The bartender kicked us all out a little before midnight saying she would get in trouble if we stayed. We arrived at our hotel at 12:10am and found the front door boarded and locked...had to pound on the door to be let in!
All in all, Luang Prabang was definately a beautiful town. My expectations were pretty high, Lonely Planet guide had listed it as "possibly the most photogenic town in all of SE Asia"...it didn't quite live up to that in my opinion. But its a town well worth seeing, and if I had more time I'm sure the other tourist attractions would have added to my feeling of the town.
In keeping up with our fast pace, it was time to move on...so on Friday 3/26 we made our way by bus down to Vang Vieng. The big thing to do in Vang Vieng is tubing down the Nam Xong river and hitting up all the bars along the way. And so this is what we did, and had a great time doing it! Such a scene... local kids swinging from ropes and pulleys overhead, bars offering cheap cocktails and free shots, kids tossing ropes to us trying to pull us into their bars as we floated by, mud wrestling and beer pong tournaments beckoning from the riverside. Just a great time. And the town is totally catered to the young partying tourist...cheap guesthouses and bars serving greasy Western food and playing non-stop episodes of either "Friends" or "Family Guy". This town was built to party, and that's about all it does. We had a blast for 2 days, and then it was time for our exit. I overheard a few 20-something aged kids saying they had stayed in Vang Vieng for 2 weeks....god bless them and their livers.
The original plan was to leave Vang Vieng and then spend a few days in Vientienne, the capital of Laos. But the beaches of southern Thailand were calling my name....and so we skipped Vientienne and opped for an island escape. It took 3 days to get into Laos, and we only stayed for 5 days!...But the memories were well worth the journey. 30 hours on buses from Vang Vieng all the way to Krabi was ahead of us, but it would be easy compared to our Laos journey! Up next....Thailand magic and island fantasy!!!!!!
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Amy
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what an adventure
I should say that you earned your road trip badge! It sounds like all of the trials and tribulations of the road into Laos were well worth it, if for the elephant ride alone! I didn't realize that you and Nate were the only tourists there - what an amazing experience!! I can't wait to see your pictures. Have fun!!