Vientiane and 4000 islands - Laos

February 19 - March 2, 2009

The distances between cities in Southeast Asia don’t look very far on a map, but the roads in this part of the world can be in quite terrible shape so we took yet another flight on Lao Airlines between Luang Prabang and Vientiane – the flight was only about 50 minutes – the bus ride would have been 14 hours!

Photos Above: Sunset over the Mekong River

Vientiane is the capital of Laos. The “backpacker” section of town was quite cute, with some very good restaurants in town. The river was also lined with what looked like almost identical cafes, one after another…the food at these smaller restaurants never looked quite up to par so we generally just stopped by the riverfront cafes to have a Beer Lao and watch the sunset over the Mekong River.


Photo: Patuxay

While in Vientiane we hired a tuk tuk driver to take us to see Pha That Luang, considered by many to be the most important monument in Lao. The giant golden stupa was beautiful and we stayed at the site as long as we could, but the 95 degree heat and humidity cut short what may have otherwise been a longer visit.





Photos Above: Pha That Luang

Our second stop of the day was the Buddha Park about 25 kilometers out of town. We rode the whole way in the back of the tuk tuk, which strangely started to feel normal after spending so much time in SE Asia! The Buddha park was pretty impressive and contained hundreds of Buddhist and Hindu statues. While we were there two monks approached us and wanted to practice their English. This has happened quite often as we travel the world (for instance in Chiang Mai a police officer stopped us – we had absolutely no idea what we might be in trouble for and it took about 5 minutes for us to realize he just wanted to practice his English skills!)….We had a nice chat with the monks. Apparently in Laos, it is quite common for young men to become monks for a couple of years, even while studying another field. Many monks decide to continue as monks as they get older but many return to what we might consider more “regular” types of jobs – for instance one of the monks was studying to be a lawyer.





Photos Above: Buddha Park

After a few days we’d had enough of Vientiane and wanted to fly down to Siem Reap, Cambodia. We went to a travel agent, but the only Lao Airlines flight was full for about a week. He suggested we take an overnight bus to a town called Pakse and try to catch a flight from there. We took his suggestion and the following evening were on a bus, complete with actual BEDS! Not that the beds were all that comfortable, but both T and K had a better sleep that night than we would have had if sitting in a seat.


Photo: Champsak Palace Hotel

After the 10 hour ride we checked ourselves into the Champsak Palace Hotel. This is by far the nicest hotel in Pakse. In fact, it was really the only nice thing about Pakse (the town was rather dirty and boring)….sadly we could not get a flight out of Pakse for almost another week! Having decided after only a few hours that we could not spend another night in Pakse unless absolutely necessary we booked a ticket to an area of Laos called 4000 Islands (Si Phan Don).



Photos: Sunset views of Pakse from the Champsak Palace Hotel

We initially were reluctant to go to 4000 Islands. Many people seemed to like it, but Don Det, the most popular island, does not have any electricity (though every guesthouse and restaurant on the whole island runs a generator from 6-10pm) and it was almost 100 degrees outside and quite humid….however, once we got on the bus it appeared that everyone on the bus was going to Don Det so we took the plunge and went along with it. Don Det was quite a pleasant surprise and a very interesting experience. We took a bus to a boat which took us to this remote island and then walked around looking at rooms, many of which cost 30000 to 60000 Kip per night (this is equivalent to about $4-7/night).


Photo: Boat ride on the Mekong to Don Det


Photo: Our hammocks and view at "Mama's" guesthouse


Photo: Sunset on the beach - Don Det


Photos Above: Don Khon

Everything on the island was quite basic and we took one of the more expensive ($7/night) rooms with a private bathroom, mosquito net, and two hammocks overlooking the river. The guesthouse is run by a woman who insisted we call her “Mama” - she took care of us and made sure we were happy enough and her husband “Papa” fixed one of our hammocks when it fell down. For the next few days we took it easy on the island, ate (pretty remarkable food considering the island does not have electricity), relaxed, and hung out with fellow travelers – it was really generally too hot to do much during the day, though one day we rented bikes and rode them over to the next island Don Khon (Don Det and Don Khon are connected by a bridge). The ride was nice and we had a fun time riding bikes and hanging out at the waterfalls on Don Khon.



Photos Above: Waterfalls on Don Khon



Photos Above: Don Khon


Photo: Our guesthouse on Don Det




Photos Above: On the boat from Don Det to Don Khong

After about 4 days on the island we hired a boat to take us on the two hour ride down the Mekong to Don Khong the only island with electricty (and much missed air conditioning). We spent a night there and wished we had a couple more days as it had a relaxing, yet different (slightly nicer) vibe than the backpacker hangout of Don Det.


Photo: View from our guesthouse on Don Khong


Photo: K after breakfast on Don Khong

We booked a bus ticket back to Pakse (had to spend one more night so we could catch our flight the next day) and the travel agent booked us on a “VIP” bus.... This bus certainly would not make any VIP happy – they packed a bus meant for 12 people with about 18…..everyone was extremely cranky about the situation and we all gave the guy who shoved us into this bus (for a 3 hour long ride back) a nasty look as he smiled and waved us off……On the way back to Pakse we encountered a huge rainstorm and the bus had to stop for about a half hour as it was raining so hard! It was not the best way to end our time in Laos, but overall we had a great time in the country. The people were generally very relaxed and friendly, the food good, and the scenery beautiful. We left Pakse the next day bound for Siem Reap, Cambodia and the great Temples of Angkor.


Photo: View from our middle seat on the VIP bus


Photo: Rain storm on the way to Pakse