Vang Vieng: It’s a Party on the River

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Of all the countries I planned on visiting over my vacation through SE Asia, Laos was the one I most eagerly anticipated. Throughout my travels, it is the country I had heard the least about, yet the reviews I had received were unanimously positive, and it has become abundantly clear to me now why this is so. Lush jungles, wild rivers, and colossal mountains converge together throughout this beautiful land making it the perfect place for adventurous travelers the world over. Despite its relative remoteness from some of the other major tourist attractions in Asia, I found it to be well worth the effort travelling along treacherous roads in uncomfortable transportation in order to reach this gem. Something about the secluded beauty in Laos truly touched me in ways I cannot fully describe and my trip there left an impression on me that will surely draw me back to this majestic country in the future.

The first stop on our trip was Vang Vieng. While this small town does compose all of Laos natural beauty both in and around it, it does lack the true “natural” and “cultural” spirit that Laos has to offer. More than anything, it’s a party town; plain and simple, and party we did. From sipping cocktails while watching old American sitcoms, to floating down a river with hundreds of other drunken foreigners, Vang Vieng was incredible and I had some of the most fun I have ever had in my life on my visit.

Border Crossing to Vientiane

The train pulled into Nong Kai station at about 8am and Brad and I hustled to get our things together to get through immigration. Our plan was pretty ambitious yet it seemed possible so long as we moved fast: to get off our 12 hour train ride, hop across the Thai/Laos border, quickly get to the Vientiane bus station, and grab a 10 hour bus north to the small town of Luang Prabang. It was a lot of traveling in a 24 hour period, but we figured that if we got it all out of the way at once, it would make the slow journey back south more enjoyable; so off we were.

We hopped on one of the first tuk-tuk’s we could find who would take us to the border crossing about a mile from the train station. For once, there was plenty of room in our rusted ride the only problem was that it was the slowest tuk-tuk EVER made! Seriously! I saw 3 bikes and 4 joggers pass us in our heap of garbage on the way through town. Not to mention the fact that it was letting out plumes of black smoke from the rear and sounded like a garbage truck driving through a nitroglycerine plant (courtesy of Uncle Lewis). To top it off, the sly old driver tried to swindle us by taking us to some bunk travel agency who promised visas into Laos for the same price as was given at the border. Yea, thanks anyways bub, but if you can just hustle along in your little engine that could and take us to the damn border, that’d be just great.

We reached immigration and checked out of Thailand for what may be the last time for me. I handed in my departure card, looked back once more at the picturesque horizon, and boarded the bus that would take us to Laos’s immigration. And there I was again, driving through yet another “no man’s land” between to land borders. The official border is marked by the Mekong River, which flows under the internationally known “Friendship Bridge” connecting Laos and Thailand. We crossed the bridge and went through our third immigration checkpoint of the trip, paying the $35 visa fee before moving forward. On the opposite side of the border, there was nothing, literally nothing guiding us to our next destination. Due to “pokey the tuk-tuk driver’s” slow approach to the border, we were running a little bit late so we just hopped into the first cab we saw and told him to take us to Vientiane and off we were.

The city was about 20km from the border and from what we saw at first, it didn’t look like much. Like Phnom Penh Vientiane seemed to be lacking a central business district and was not very clean, at least from what we saw. Granted, we were taken only to the bus station so I didn’t get a great first perspective of the city, yet it was abundantly clear why so many people say that it is acceptable to skip this city when traveling; there just didn’t seem to be anything there. The major theme that stood out though was Communism. The red flag with sickle and star waved beside all national flags and everywhere were pictures of President Choummaly Sayasone, head of the Laos People’s Revolutionary Party, surrounded by flowers and propaganda flyers. Despite being a Communist regime, for a tourist in Laos, the fact that Laos is a socialist republic often goes unseen or heard of, but I would hesitate to say that for everyone since I am no expert on the region. For now, let’s just say that it felt much less Communist than China in my opinion. In fact, I felt Laos was extremely liberal throughout my travels, another reason I loved it there so much.

So we reached the bus station and asked about tickets to Luang Prabang. We were too late. If not for our broken down tuk-tuk, we might have made it, but the woman behind the counter informed us that we were out of luck till the next day. Heads hung low, we left the office with no clue what to do next. It was then that we saw a bus filling up on the single lane road across the street. Without thinking, we returned to the office and asked where that was going. She informed us that it was leaving for Vang Vieng in about five minutes. Brad and I had one of our telepathic moments (where he probably tried saying “hey man, we are planning on going there anyways right? Might as well hit that first and then bus it to Luang Prabang in a few days after checking that out,” while I hummed the theme song to Saved by the Bell) and without thinking, we snagged the last tickets and boarded the bus. In retrospect, our timing could not have been better and before we knew it, we were on the road to Vang Vieng: one of SE Asia’s most talked about party spot’s. I… was terrified.

Ross, Rachel, and a Chicken Sandwich

It only took us about 4 hours to reach our destination. The journey north through Laos was beautiful, my first real view of the Laos countryside. The view was similar to that of the beauty of northern Thailand, and it was nice to get out of the cities and see the dark green mountains and flowing streams as we moved along the dirt road.

Once we got there, we collected our things, dodged a few tuk-tuk drivers with our quick spins and jaw dropping jukes, and walked into the town. Vang Vieng was much different than I thought it was going to be. The hype that I received painted a picture of a college-like city riddled with bars and clubs on every street; an adult version of that place the fox takes Pinocchio to in one of my favorite childhood movies. However, it turned out that Vang Vieng was really just a sleepy little town. I doubt a single building was taller than 4 stories, and there were only about 3 main streets in the area. I also did not expect to witness the sheer beauty of the surrounding country; majestic mountains covered in thick green trees, towering cliffs, and a slow flowing wide river splitting the town in two. Lining the streets were various restaurants serving up crepe-like pancakes filled with anything from bananas and chocolate to ham and cheese, and all sorts of sandwiches on the first real baguettes I have seen since leaving home. There was also one thing that all these places had in common: all of them were either playing “Friends” or “Family Guy” on television... I mean all of them. It was odd, and as the trip went on I found it increasingly strange as they continuously played these shows from morning until closing time.

Brad and I stopped into the first hostel we found, “The Vangville,” and were shown to our relatively large room on the second floor. The hostel was pretty great; our room had two double beds in somewhat separate rooms, our own bathrooms, and a TV, and it was in a pretty central location. We unpacked our things and headed out to grab one of those delicious sandwiches that we came across earlier.

Growing up, I was a “Seinfeld” guy (let’s face it we all were), and in all honesty, I have most likely only seen about eight episodes of “Friends” my whole life. But sitting there eating our sandwiches and drinking the first of my 734,975 banana shakes… I got into it; maybe too much. I mean the banter between Joey and Chandler… just hysterical. The show really go to me, so much so that Brad almost had to pry me away with the jaws of life to go do a little sight seeing before it got too late.

As previously noted, Vang Vieng is so much more than a party town, and we took the remainder of the day to walk along the outskirts and take some pictures of the beautiful mountains on the opposite side of the river. We also walked across a bridge that most likely could have been in some Indiana Jones movie. Let’s face the facts; this thing was anything but stable. Tied together and supported by bamboo, this narrow wooden bridge crossed the river about 10 feet off the waters surface. Walking across it, we could feel it wobble and the craziest thing of all was… some people were crossing in motorbikes! Of all the stupid things to do, “oh here Bill here’s a relatively unsteady looking bridge that most likely was built in 1948 and shakes when people walk across it. Let’s take our 400 pound motorbikes over it and really see what she can take.” I was terrified. The three times motorbikes passed me (and by the way 2 people could barely fit side by side so imagine a motorbike) I just accepted the fact that I was about to take a dip into the muddy waters of the Mekong. Luckily, we survived yet another near death experience and continued our sightseeing.

We decided to call it an early night since we were waking up early to do the fabled “pub crawl on the Mekng” and so we wanted to ensure plenty of rest for the event. We set the alarm, watched one of the worst movies I have ever seen on Laos television (Street Fighter… as if you had to ask… the Muscles from Brussels really botched this one up), and slept like babies. We woke up… at the crack of noon.

Boozin (Boozin), Boozin (Boozin), Boozin on the River

Tubing day, the date would live in infamy. I had heard legends from afar of this “Mekong pub crawl” and yet, I shuddered to believe the true mayhem it entailed; yet I soon would. We prepared for the worst, hoped for the least amount of arrests, and departed our hostel to pick up our tubes. It didn’t take long to wait in line and pick up our bunk tubes that would carry us down the river while intoxicated for the rest of the day. The one deal was: we had to return them by 6:00pm. “No problem,” I told Brad. The river section was only 3 kilometers long and we had 6 hours to do it! What could possibly take us so long to not be back in time? I often end up eating my words… but I’ll save that for a bit later.

We boarded a Song Tau (basically a truck with two benches on either side of the bed) with a couple of German kids and headed towards the top of the river. First off, our driver may or may not have been mentally unstable and/or wasted at 12:00pm since he was literally doing circles around the town. I thought the whole affair to be hysterical but zee Germanz were not so entertained with the idea of wasting time and continuously yelled and screamed at the driver to pull his head out. Finally, he brought us to the first bar and then… turned around and started going back. Interesting choice; and this really ticked off the Germans yet still, I thought it was amusing and just sat back enjoying the confusing ride. He did finally bring us down a dirt path, but it was about a kilometer from where we originally were supposed to get out so we had to walk all the way up the trail and back to the beginning. Just a total failure on that guys part. We took the long death march through the heat and finally reached our first bar. First thing was first, Beer Lao. By far, Beer Lao is my favorite of all SE Asian beers and I was stoked to get some in Laos from the trips start. So, I grabbed a few at the first bar and walked out to the waters edge.

The whole pub crawl thing was far different than I expected. They weren’t actually “bars” on the waters edged but more of just bamboo platforms with tables, dancing rugs, enormous speakers, and DJ’s. Each one had its own sort of theme and artwork but essentially, they were all more or less the same as the next. The main thing that caught my eye were the death defying zip lines, rope swings, and slides that flung drunken whiteys off into the muddy water below. There was no telling if these crazy kids were about to fly 30 feet into the air and land safely into the opaque waters below or come crashing down onto jagged rocks twelve inches below the surface. Still, with the music bumping, the beer flowing, and the people dancing… no one really seemed to care about safety. It was our own little island to do whatever we wanted without worry of consequence or harm.

We remained with our German friends for a while just watching the hundreds of drunken foreigners swimming and floating along the river before taking to the muddy water. Later, I would find out that the river was usually crystal clear and blue, flowing freshly down through the bars along it. However, apparently due to construction going on upstream, the water was more of a blood red like something out of Exodus. Despite the lack of clarity, by the time we left the first bar it mattered little what the river looked like since we were beginning to feel a bit off-color ourselves.

So, we boarded our rubber vessels and embarked on the great journey downstream toward the end of our journey. No doubt we would travel far on our first trip out on the water, at least half way downstream when… BAM. A large object landed next to me in the water beside my tube. At first… I thought we were under attack… Charlie was everywhere!! “Get down,” I yelled to my brothers in arms. Soon, it became clear that it was only a bottle filled with water attached to the rope. Holding the rope on the waters edge was a Laotian man waving us over. Another guy through his bottle in the water between Brad and I. Not really sure what to do, we grabbed them and allowed them to pull us to shore not 20 feet from where we had just set off. I soon realized it was… another bar. And so the mayhem began.

As in most of my tales from afar, things begin to go hazy and dim and the details of such stories get all befuddled and convoluted in the process of my recollection. I am sure this is the bar that broke my livers back in that we most likely were there a solid hour dancing, meeting new travelers like ourselves, and of course… drinking beer and buckets of rum and whatever else the were throwing in. Cheers!

At this one particular bar the song “Don’t Speak Americano” got lodged so deeply in my head, I can still hear it now and it makes me want to break out into sporadic hippie dancing motions much like was being done on that day. Listen to it… you’ll be hooked. So the liquor flowed for a solid hour at that one particular bar and the good times started rolling. Of particular humor, a brave girl attempted the zip line during our stay. Standing 20 feet above us, the drunkards below coaxed her into jumping and flying down the line at high speeds. One thing about zip lines; even though they are string from one end to another, there is a nifty little contraption called a “stopper” that prevents the hand rail from moving past a certain point. She did not know this. Once she hit the stopper, her body whirled around in “triple axle” type fashion as she shockingly hit the water with a loud splash. I gave it an 8.3… solid attempt but she really didn’t stick the landing well. Don’t worry I’m not totally heartless, she was fine.

Prior to our embarkation on the river wild, our friend Sessions had warned us of the danger of the Mekong; how he and his friends ended up out on the river paddling for their lives as the sun descended beyond the mountain tops, overtaking the river in pitch black darkness. He told us to take care for this not to happen since it ended in disaster. When we first read the sign that the river was only 3 kilometers long we thought he was mental (had to go a bit British there). How could it possibly take 6 hours to tube down a river less than 2 miles long? We figured him for a moron and that he must have been just being silly. Then, Brad looked at his watch. The time… was 4:00… and we could still see the bar we started at only about 200 meters away. Curse you Sessions and your wise advice!!!

Quickly, we darted towards our sea-worthy ships (I liked to think mine was the Black Pearl… and by then… it was beginning to look like it as well) and started to make some progress. Bottle after bottle flew at us off the shores from anxious bar owners trying to ensnare us like the Sirens from the Odyssey, luckily… Brad and I were too strong for their feeble powers and pressed onward so as to ensure reaching our destination with time to spare. Then… we met the The Leodonites… or is it Leedsians… maybe Leedsestinians… it’s all beside the point! They were people from Leeds; let’s just leave it at that (Leeds is in the UK for all you people who suck at geography…. Sorry. That was mean… but bye an atlas). They were really cool people, don’t exactly remember there names so I’m going with Chip, Betty, and Vivian as their semi-official names for now. Chip and I had a great convo and he convinced Brad and I to make port at the next bar: The Family Bar.

Now how bad could that be, “The Family Bar?” Sounds like a place where maybe they served a half glass of fine wine, perhaps a vegi-cheese platter perhaps. I pictured wall paintings of Irish landscapes and lighthouses from the American seaboard. Plus, they guys seemed like a real straight shooter… family bar… it had to be tame and I doubted it would take too much of our time up anyways so we would surely remain on schedule. Off we floated on the tranquil river sipping Beer Laos while lightly paddling to our next destination, avoiding a few rocks on the way and excited about hanging out with the Leedsman and Leedswomen we had found upon our journey.

A small Laotian the size of that midget who always gets Kramer into trouble from “Seinfeld” through us a line and in we were pulled. As I approached, realized that we had shot our albatross, “The Family Bar” would drag us to the depths of our inebriation and suck out our souls with more vigor and delight than a Death Eater… and it was awesome.

The recollection of the happenings on board that pit of sin and drunken company has no place to be retold in either ink or the spoken word. It was an incredible party, filled with free buckets of whiskey, all the beer we needed, the chilliest bartender on Earth and a rack of spray-paint cans which we used to cover ourselves in resembling the pigmy tribes of Africa. We truly did loose control.

Time stopped at the “Family Bar” yet not on Brad’s watch… it was 5. We had one hour to make it 1.5 kilometers in sinking tubes on a slow moving river with hardly the ability to stand yet sail efficiently downstream. Yet… we were warriors then, and championed on, taking to the water like the Greeks in their preparation to storm the beaches of Troy (though I hardly think that Achilles fell from a bamboo platform, got stuck upside down in his own tube, or thought the waters before him looked more like the chocolate river from Willy Wonka than the Aegean Sea) and on we paddled.

The journey was treacherous; slowly the water became shallower and we found ourselves frequently caught up on the rocks. Many times did we run aground asking for aid from the other as we pressed onwards, and after 20 minutes I came to the realization that we were literally the last people on the river. No joke, the last ones. Fools! The prophesy of Sessions had come true and we were stuck in the middle of the river with no bars, people, docks, or anything in sight for a solid kilometer. To make it worse, the sun was setting below the mountains as blackness began to take us in. Still, what a memory to have: drunk, stuck on a tube in the middle of the Mekong River with nothing but trees on either side, and no clue how much further we had to go. Ah my life… how it makes me chuckle sometimes.

Eventually, we did make it back, 30 minutes late for our deposit yet hysterically laughing about the whole experience in general. Despite our various challenges faced along the way, we had sailed the Mekong River in its entirety (total false statement since…. Not only is it no exactly called “The Mekong River” but it is actually a branch off called the Nam Song river… but the river itself is hundreds of miles long… but come on… you get what I meant) and had won… a massive drunken appetite, the loss of our deposit for the tube, and two possible cases of pink eye; worth it… I think so.

After showering we decided that we had partied enough and it was time to chill and relax a bit for our last night. Now I know I usually interject here and say something like “haha yea right… the night was ours and it was time to parrrtyyy up,” but I’m actually serious. We spent the night at the bar by our hostel and had a few well deserved sandwiches and I probably drank 6 banana shakes while watching what must have been an entire season of “Friends.” Boring, maybe… but talk to me about boring after a day tubing and getting hammered on a river in the beautiful Laotian countryside and we’ll talk.

The next day, we woke up at a relatively decent hour and checked out of our hostel. It was time for Lao Round 2: Luang Prabang. I had been looking forward to this city most of all and was pumped to be back on the road heading north through the country. We boarded our VIP bus (nothing special but at least we got our own seats) and were set for the 6 hour ride to the former capital of Laos.

Vang Vieng could be described as the highlight of party life on my trip. From meeting new friends, to marveling at natural beauty I had only previously seen in magazines, to partying hard while sipping cocktails on a river tube, it was an amazing experience. While it may be a bit of a cliché tourist activity to succumb to while traveling in SE Asia, I don’t really care; it was incredible. The fun and beauty Vang Vieng has to offer should be experienced by all who have the chance and though it was sad to leave, there was still so little of Laos I had seen and so much I had to look forward to

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Comments

[Berger]

you bastard
Don't know where fuckin' Leeds is? Buy an Atlas? Why don't you learn how to spell jackass! Good stuff though, good stuff. Glad to see you're livin large.