Welcome to the Jungle (Laos Part 1)

Pick of the day: On the road in Lao, somewhere

Style: Hole

Atmosphere: Grim

Extras: This isn't really about additions, more about the absences. Sometimes though you realise why the locals choose to pee in a bush.

 

12/06/13 to 19/06/13 Bangkok to the border, Vientiane and Vang Vieng

After our short stint in Bangkok we took the overnight sleeper train to Nong Khai to cross the border to Vientiene in Laos. On boarding the train we thought that this might be the best yet. As per usual we seemed to have been separated out into a ‘foreigner’ carriage but the beds looked comfortable with curtain partitions for privacy and even an attendant whose job seemed to be to make our beds for us! We settled in for a comfy night only to discover that on Thai trains they don’t turn the overhead fluorescent lights off. Even at 4am. So we spent the night with our faces shrouded in our own T-shirts in an attempt to block out the light and arrived just as tired as usual.

We seemed to be virtually the only people crossing into Vientiene in order to actually visit the country. We shared a tuk tuk into town with a group of westerners who all worked in Thailand and were doing a visa run to the Thai consulate in Vientiene. It struck me as a bit of a pain to have to skip across borders every 2 months especially for those who had been in Thailand for a year or more but I guess some people just love their jobs that much.

Buddhas, hundreds of them in Vientiane

We arrived at our hostel which also seemed a bit of a stopping place for people on visa runs. It had a chilled bar area and a movie room but no-one really seemed to leave except for visits to the consulate and to go boozing at night. We have to admit to joining them for one night but for the most part the other travellers in the hostel were not really the kind of people we socialised with at home and being abroad didn’t seem to improve them. We discovered that home counties accents become even more grating away from home (I mean is ‘sooo emosh’ really a normal way to express yourself?). Added to that were the usual hippie travellers who went everywhere with guitars and thought it was cool to travel with no shoes and even a guy who claimed to have visions of the future. There were even a few who were clearly used to a different sort of lifestyle as I was in the bathroom on the third floor one day and actually heard a girl call down the stairs asking for someone to come and carry her bag down for her. People who are used to having staff should not slum it in hostels. Needless to say we were not too impressed with the non-resident inhabitants of Vientiene and spent most of our days out and about sight-seeing and consulate-visiting.

Nagas, temple guardians

That Lat, A big gold (not solid) wat. Its on all the money, so we paid a visit

We managed to get 60 day Thai visas (at least we hope we did as they didn’t bother to actually date it) and had a look at the classic golden Wat that is on all the Laos money. We didn’t really sample any Laos food as the hostel only served western food and the night market appeared to specialise in pancakes but we did get some great French and Japanese food. Strangely the people of Laos don’t seem to be as resentful of the French for being colonised as the Vietnamese. They still have most of their road and tourist signs in French as well as Laos and lots of people still speak French. They also make awesome baguettes which is obviously most important.

Not sure if this is about walking on grass or sharing a smoke

Once our visas were sorted we caught the bus to Vang Vieng. The town itself is not much to look at- pretty much two dusty streets lined by guesthouses and noodle shops. The town is bordered by the river on one side and an old CIA airstrip on the other, which remains curiously unused. This old “Air America” airbase is a frightening reminder of the horrific things the Americans did in Asia through a fear of communism.

The old "Air America" base. Now a local hangout

*FACT- There was enough ordinance dropped on the country to be be equivalent to one bombing mission, every 8 minutes, 24hrs a day for NINE years*

MORE karsts.

However it has become famous over the years because of the tubing scene there. For a long time the main thing to do in Vang Vieng was grab a tractor inner tube, get a lift upriver and float back down stopping at every bar along the way. Each bar would hand out free shots and the beer was pretty cheap and there were zip wires and massive slides to get back into the water. However recently there were a few deaths on the river (not surprising really if you think about hundreds of blind drunk tourists and a fast flowing river being mixed together). The tubing scene was almost completely shut down and now although you can still sit in a tube there are only 2-3 bars lining the river. To be honest, we preferred it that way. We spent a lovely afternoon floating down the river. We did stop at the first bar (well, got dragged in by the locals who throw lines out for you) and had a beer and a game of petanque (boules) in the sunshine but it was mostly a very chilled afternoon topped off with an excellent 10,000kip (£1) sandwich at the end. The guesthouse we stayed in was one of the grottier ones with no air-con and dodgy bedding but it was pretty cheap so we were ok with slumming it for a few days.

Chillin on the river. The bar is just early enough that by the time you finish those beers have made you well rough!

The next day we avoided the bars playing endless repeats of friends and family guy and hired some mountain bikes to go and visit the local waterfalls. It was fairly hard work in the blazing heat, not least because the mountain bikes aren’t terribly well maintained and so don’t change gear all that well but after nearly passing out a couple of times we finally made it to the top of the hill where the waterfall was. We were really lucky that not many others had decided to make the trip that day and so we had the waterfalls to ourselves. There were two actual waterfalls (on very big and a smaller one) and a few plunge pools around that made for a lovely place to spend an afternoon swimming and relaxing. We then carried on some easier trails on the bikes that passed through dense, uninhabited jungle which was pretty cool. At the edge of the jungle, before the road cut through back to town we stopped at a goat and mulberry farm for a spot of dinner. We had an amazing papaya salad that was straight off the tree along with laap (minced pork cooked with loads of mint, basil and chilli), coconut curry, iced mulberry tea and delicious mulberry wine. Then at least it was home time for a well deserved sleep.

The benefit of putting a bit of effort in is most people don't, so you get it to yourself!

The following day we decided to go climbing. We hadn’t even known that Laos was known as a climbing destination but it seems a few climbers passing though have bolted some of the cliffs and the locals have learnt to climb and can now guide and hire out kit. We had a hot and sweaty trek through the jungle, wading through two streams as we went to access the climbing but once we had cooled down and dried off a bit we found it was well worth it! The climbing was on amazing tufas and razor sharp limestone with some really interesting lines. We got a bit spanked on the 6as and both of us ended up dangling off a particularly large tufa, dripping with sweat and wondering if Laos people had somehow managed to learn to extend their arms by 2ft halfway up a climb. However we both concurred that it was the best climbing of the trip so far and well worth a visit for any heading out that way. On our way back I ended up running through the jungle screaming at Ben as a herd of cows came stampeding through the undergrowth at us but thankfully they seemed to be intent on catching one of their own and left us alone. We spent the rest of the afternoon chilling and overhearing conversations about the best places to get mushrooms (the ‘happy’ kind) and how corrupt the local police were (very).

The local crag, too steep for these arms....

......So we just enjoyed the view.....

....until its time to bushwack home