Laos – Let’s Throw in Another Country

Day 1 – Another Bus Journey

As we had gone through Thailand quicker than we thought, we had decided to check out Laos as it was one country in Asia that we hadn’t visited yet (It was on our original plan but we had discounted it).

We were picked up by a mini-bus around 10.00 and we were then driven to the Thai border of Chiang Kong, the journey was pretty uneventful apart from Shell feeling unwell halfway through (6 hour journey), she did well to get back on the minibus after our lunch break.  Also a few annoying younger traveller’s singing nursery rhymes and talking rubbish the whole way there.

When we arrived and Chiang Kong, we were put up in basic lodgings which were wooden sweat boxes with shared toilets and showers, but it was only for one night so we didn’t mind.

In the evening we went to the restaurant where we had a meal in the price of our ticket and had a couple of beers whilst catching up on our blog.

We had an early night and retired back to our room to read for the rest of the evening, unfortunately two of the young girls from the bus were in the room next door and the walls were paper thin.  Around 11.00 the came home drunk and were shouting at the top of their voices and we really did not need to know their sexual preferences and who they were going to send pictures of their bum’s too!!, however they passed out after about an hour and we could get to sleep.

Day 2 – Long Boat to Luang Prabang

In the morning we showered and surprisingly they were pretty hot before packing and going to the restaurant.  We had a fairly decent breakfast and were then issued with pack lunches for the boat journey (All included in the price of the ticket).

Next we were mini-bussed about ½ a mile down the road across to the Laos border to the checkpoint to get our Laos visa’s.  The system was a bit chaotic you first queued in one queue for around half an hour and then submitted your forms, passport and photo’s and then had to huddle round a second queue where they held up your passport at the booth when it had been processed, you then muscled your way to the front to identify if the passport was yours and paid the visa fee and then you were done (another ½ hour later).

We then were taken by mini-bus to the other side of the border (Hyay Xai) where we asked to wait in a café near the boat jetty whilst other people turned up, it gave Shell and I a chance to check out the new local brew,  Beer Lao – once again fizzy lager but not too bad!

Eventually we boarded the boat but it was not going to be like our nice Mandaly-Bagan journey as they had really packed people in and it was a bit of a free-for-all for seats together.

Also you had to carry your luggage on boat and take it to the back of the boat behind the engine room, which was a bit of a fight as there 80 – 100 people all trying to do this at the same time!

Once seated we were off down The Mekong river and watching the countryside go by which was very pretty and gave us our first impressions of Laos. 

We then got chatting to a couple of the couples from the UK, Chris & Natalie and Steve & Loucie and we passed the rest of the day chatting to them whilst watching fishermen on the riverbanks and long-tail boats going by.

After about a 6 hour boat journey we were then moored up at a town called Pak Beng for the night.  Once again fighting to get our bags back and then realising that we were not moored at a Jetty and had to cross a plank and scrabble up some rocks – not easy when you are carrying two 17kg bags!!

At Pak Beng we had to sort out our own accommodation for the night and we were quickly accosted by a hotel tout, Shell negotiated a decent rate (but said we wanted to see it first) and the other two couples decided to join us and then we were joined by a further 6 people.  We were all crammed into the back of a pick-up truck with us sitting around the edge and our bags in the middle.  The ride was pretty uncomfortable and a bit worrying when taking a corner.

Instead of what was promised, a five minute journey to some bungalows close to the main street, we found ourselves on a twenty minute journey up into the mountains into the middle of nowhere with no sign of life.  Collectively most of us decided this was too out the way so told the owner we wanted to go back to the main street, he tried to convince us to stay but we just stayed in the truck until he gave up and drove us back.

He actually took us back to a guesthouse he ran in town and after checking the rooms were OK we agreed to stay there for the night.

In the evening we went out with the two couples and we found a little restaurant down the road and had some dinner and drinks, a nice buffalo curry for me and a chicken masala for Shell (It’s a bit of a fusion of Asian foods in Laos).  Later we were joined by another couple from Manchester (Can’t remember their name’s) and had a couple more beers until we were told the restaurant had shut (apparently everything shuts down a 10.30 there), so at that point we headed home for the night.