Surprisingly Fascinating Lao

Sabadi my faithful readers!

It was not that long ago when we met for the last time, but every time I leave a country I would like to post a blog. So right now I’m waiting for my flight to Hanoi, Vietnam from Vientiane, Laos (the capital). I arrived one week ago in Laos, and it has been a very relaxing and lovely week.

On Monday I took the bus from Thailand to Laos. After waiting for almost 6 hours at the bus station, the bus would finally depart. I was literally the only tourist. Most of them took the slowboat, but it was still kind of weird. The journey would be up to 12 hours, including the night. During the daytime I had my first glance of Laos. I think a lot of people would agree with me when I say Lao offers one of the best sceneries through SEA.. Everywhere you look you’ll see enormous green mountains.. When the sun starts to set, it glows very beautifully down in the valley. But unfortunately this means the roads are not that great! There are a lot of curves and you see some car wreckages next to the road. So when it got dark, and there was no illumination expect for the bus lights, I decided to stop looking outside. The time passed faster than I expected and I got at Luang Prabang at 5 am. I had made a reservation for this night, but when I got to the hostel it was full. Nice. So I had to wait until noon for my bed to be available. I had no idea what to at this time of day, so I chilled a little bit in the reception and I went to get some breakfast. At 11 am I decided to apply for my Vietnam visa since I had nothing to do, but I was feeling quite tired. You can also do it at the capital, but I rather wait for it to be ready at Luang Prabang then at Vientiane.

Luang Prabang is so nice!! If I wanted I could have stayed here for a whole week. It’s a village next to the Mekong river, and it has a kind of very relaxing beach atmosphere. There is one street where there are lots of restaurants and locals selling sandwiches and fruit shakes. During the night it turns into a big night market! So after taking a nap, I went to explore this village. I walked besides the river, had a lovely watermelon shake and took some nice photos. I loved walking around here. I found the contrast between the local houses and the modern restaurant and hotels very fascinating. Next to a big hotel, you'd found an alley were the locals were living their daily life. I stumbled upon a mother helping her daughter with her homework. I thought this was very cute, so I approached them. She showed me the girl was learning the Chinese and Lao alphabet. Impressive! After walking around a bit more, I got to the stairs of the Mount. Phousi. It's a mountain with a pagoda on top were you get a view of the whole village and the river. During my climb I met a local who still enjoyed going up here to see the sunset and he probably liked talking to tourists. He showed me an imprint of the foot of Buddha. After looking at it, I wasn't sure if this had been Bigfoot or Buddha. Afterwards we went to see the sunset, together with hundreds of tourists. But still, it was a beautiful sight to see the sun go down behind the mountains and the Mekong river. Here I also saw a bunch of kinds holding birds in a tiny cage where they have no space to move. Apparently they have a tradition to buy these birds and release them at the pagoda. A bit cruel I'd say.. On the top we met a Czech girl who had some interesting stories and we had dinner together. In an alley next to the night market, there is a buffet street where you can have a whole plate of food (no meat) for less then 2 euros! Yummy. 

The next day I went with a minivan to the Kuang Si Falls, a 30 minute drive from the village. Here I encountered two British girls I had met earlier in Thailand! I also had them on Facebook, so we could meet in Lao, but that wasn't even necessary. Sometimes it feels like everyone is doing the exact same thing. The waterfalls were amazing!! The water was almost as blue as the one I had seen in Costa Rica (Rio Celeste), very beautiful. Apparently the water flows over many limestone rocks. Limestone particles, containing high levels of calcium carbonate reflect light making the water appear the turquoise blue colour!! Especially the big waterfall was stunning. We decided to walk to the top, but it was quite the climb and it was very slippery. The top wasn't that special as I hoped it would be, but It was very quite and calm there. When walking back, we had a swim in the freezing water. In the night I went with Ruth and Amita, two girls arriving a day later than me from Chiang Rai, to have a buffet dinner.  Afterwards we had some drinks at the Utopia bar, a bar were all the backpackers go to. It has a cool river view and they even have a volleyball court if you're feeling sporty. I also met some people here who had I met when crossing the border. (They took the slowboat instead of the bus). 

On my third and last day I decided to rest. Sometimes you need to slow it down a little bit. I went to pick up my visa and in the night we had, yes you guessed it right, another buffet dinner! We had an interesting talk with a Lithuanian girl who worked in Iraq doing humanitarian work.. Wow! After strolling down the night market, we went back to the hostel and I booked my transport for Vang Vieng the next day. 

Vang Vieng is a village south from Luang Prabang. It was quite the scary ride.. A lot of mountains and our driver of the minivan was kind of crazy. Halfway he told us that one week ago he had an accident where 10 people died and he was the only survivor.. I could see everyone thinking, "what the hell?!" We weren't sure if he was joking or not. "You have to be thankful for every day" , were his words. After 10 (!!) minutes he told us he was kidding. Weird. Asian humour is weird. The whole journey I was pretty freaked out, his driving was crazy, so this is when I decided to fly to Vietnam instead of taking the bus. Vang Vieng is kind of a party town, although a couple of years ago the party scene here was way bigger. 'Tubing' is very popular here, you sit in a tire and float down the river while having a beer at the bars build next to the river. It sounds like fun, but only in 2011 27 backpackers died because of drowning or hitting a rock when jumping from a swing etc. This is when the government stepped in and shut a lot of illegal bars – now there are only two left. It's safer now, but we didn't do it because it's quite pricy. In the night we had dinner at a Friend's restaurant. It's very random, but here there a lot of restaurants where they play episodes of Friends the whole day long. It was quite fun. The hostel I stayed in was a party hostel with free whiskey from 5 to 10 pm. For one night it was ok, but if I want to party I go to a bar.

The next day I decided to change to Ruth and Amita's hostel together with Andrea, the Colombian girl from the border. So for the following two nights we stayed at Pan's Place! It was meant to be of course, hence the name. Andrea and me decided two rent bikes and ride to the Blue Lagoon. We weren't that well prepared, so after taking a shitty road (with a beautiful view though) we got to a view point. The guy told us it was " just a 10 minute climb ", so yeah why not. It was quite the opposite, there were no real stairs.. Only ladders and rocks. When we were at 70 % we decided to go back because we were not feeling that adventurous. We had a nice view from there as well. We were very exhausted, but still wanted to go the Blue Lagoon. Most people take tuk tuk or motorbike.... Before starting the journey we wanted to have a meal in our stomachs. So we had some pad thai at a restaurant where a little girl was helping her mum. Before we wanted to leave, some friends of her arrived to go back together to school. We were trying to talk to them and having fun with the bubble blower. Two of them didn't have a bike, so before we knew it they jumped on the backseat. It was so funny, they didn't speak any English but we understood each other perfectly. We took them to school where all the children started giggling when we arrived there. It was a very special and memorable experience! And then finally we could start our journey to the Blue Lagoon.. I really liked the fact that we took the bike, because we could stop whenever we wanted and you get to see the surroundings much better. It seemed like time had stopped around here, the people here are self sustainable and live from their own cows, chicken, vegetables etc. I don't think they even realize how lucky they are to live here surrounded by such beautiful mountains! So we finally got to the Blue Lagoon, where we chilled for a couple of hours and watch a lot of Koreans having fun at the swings. Andrea also took a jump from the tree into the water and then we went back to Vang Vieng and saw the sun setting down the mountains. In the evening we enjoyed some free drinks at one of the biggest bars in town. I really enjoyed watching Asians party. For one girl it was the first time in a bar I think, because she was recording everything with her GoPro.  

After chilling for the whole day, the four us took the bus to Vientiane, the capital. We met another Dutch girl on the bus and went to have some Indian food together. In the night we walked down the biggest night market I had ever seen, but unfortunately it was not really meant for tourists, but more for the locals. On Monday I had to catch my flight to Vietnam. It was the smallest airport I had ever seen, with only three gates in the international terminal. But I enjoyed my flight with Lao Airlines and I arrived safely in Vietnam :) But more about tis country on my next blog!! 

Kop Chai Lai Lai for reading this one and I'll post my Lao pictures soon! 

Love, Amanda