Southern Laos

Southern Laos was dreamlike. It was similar to every "south" of many other countries that I have visited: the people were friendly and full of smiles, the food was rich and good, time went past slowly, there was really no need to get anywhere or do anything in particular, and the sun was always shining. I started off by taking a truly VIP night bus from Vientiane to Pakse (roughly 10 hours). We arrived in Pakse at 6am where I teamed up with two other travelers, a Pole and a Dane respectively, and we hired a local boat to take us 2 hours down the Mekong to the village of Champasak in order to visit the ancient Khmer ruins of Wat Phou. At that early hour in the morning the river was extremely busy with paddle canoes full of fisherman, locals towing piles of fruit and veggies across the river, children taking their morning baths, and ferries going from north to south and south to north. The morning light is such a beautiful time to catch all of these common moments of everyday life. We were dropped off at a lovely riverside guesthouse where we were all lucky enough to find rooms overlooking the Mekong and then proceeded to Wat Phou at the height of the afternoon heat. We went by tuk-tuk through a sea of schoolchildren cycling home from school shouting hellos and waving to us farangs.

Wat Phou is lusciously set against a backdrop of vibrant green mountains within sensuously scented frangipani trees and drooping jungle plants and flowers. From the base of the site one could not make out the hidden treasures that the jungle withheld which was quite tantalizing as we were the only visitors there and so were able to feel completely consumed by the place. Wat Phou holds many traits similar to Khmer temple architecture, of which many of you may be familiar with through Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Wat Phou is said to be the best Khmer temple outside of the Angkor complex. I, for one, can not say as I have yet to visit Cambodia, but I am sure that it merits this praise. After a slow stroll through the complex we returned for some BeerLao and conversation at the riverside to watch the sunset and the monsoon winds and rain settle in for the evening.

Early the next morning, I proceeded further south to reach the island of Don Det within the area known as Si Phan Don or 4,000 Islands. I was ferried along the river on a rather dubious wooden raft to catch a sangthaew, a converted truck meant to carry any number of travelers, food items, motorbikes, animals, etc. The one I alighted proved to be not terribly crowded, holding only about 15 people, a motorbike, some chickens, and several bags of produce. The ride was only 3 hours and was made even more bearable by the fact that it stopped at every village, each offering their own unique food item. I dined on gluey kumquatesque citrus fruits, grilled bananas on a stick, but stopped at the offer of gigantic fresh grasshoppers and frogs on a stick. Maybe next time.

I found a riverside bungalow complete with balcony for $2 a night. Yes, the bathroom was across the road but what can ya' do? I had planned to only spend a couple of days on Don Det, but ended up for one week! Really, one can quickly get used to island time: waking up to watch the sunrise, taking an early morning dip in the Mekong, eating a slow breakfast with a blond Lao coffee, reading the afternoon away on the hammock, swimming some more, and ending the night with a few BeerLao in the candlelight. It really just sucked me in. This island had electricity only 3 hours a day (from 6.30pm-9.30 pm), fishing was their main source of income, tourists were treated as welcome visitors rather than money-making beings, the cleanest, brightest bit of the Mekong flowed on all sides, one could see Cambodia from the southern tip, and the silence permeated everything so one could hear every little sound from every gecko and bird on the island. Paradise truly!


This paradise was interrupted only once during these 7 days. My new friend Tomasz, fortunately or unfortunately, talked me into taking a bike ride across the island to visit a waterfall. Now, since I am a perfectly rational being, I considered that facts that the island had virtually no motorbike traffic, absolutely no cars, and only one dirt path around it and so I decided that this would be a perfect reintroduction to bike-riding for me. Boy was I wrong! I had forgotten that the reason I don't cycle in the first place is that I am terrible at steering and my sense of balance isn't what it used to be 15 years ago. We rented a blue bike for Tomasz and a pink bike for me. Since I am sch a girlie-girl I figured that pink would give me super-powers that I did not possess at the time. The ride in and of itself was quite smooth and easygoing, expect for when the local children zoomed past me and I had to maneuver around parked water buffalo and chickens. I almost made it to the waterfall but chickened out at the old railway bridge which was pockmarked with rocks over which I envisioned myself tumbling into the Mekong below! I did mange to take a photo of the bike though!

After my Vietnamese visa had already been in effect for 2 days, I decided that it was time to pull myself away from Don Det and head north to Hue' Vietnam. Let me tell you, the going was tough in all manners of the word! The journey took me no less than 36 hours, though technically the distance was less than half that. I was shuffled from boat to tuk-tuk to bus to rickshaw at a variety of points on my journey. The minute I arrived in Pakse I was the only foreigner I saw until I arrived at my hotel in Hue. I understood no one and could only hope that I was on the correct night bus headed for the Vietnamese border. Arriving at the border at 3 am is not necessarily a pleasant experience. We had to park the bus and wait until 7 am to pass, but since I was foreign they took my passport with no explanation and did not return it to me until I was already in Vietnam. A quite unsettling feeling at 4 in the morning when one thinks she has lost her passport on the Lao-Vietnam border. But, in the end, my passport was handed back, stamped and approved! It then took us about 6 hours to make a 3 hour journey as the bus kept stopping for no apparent reason every 20 minutes or so. I was so ready to reach Hue that I jumped into the first decent looking hotel and grabbed a room. Luckily, it was clean, bright, and boasted CNN so I could catch up on 10 days of international news.

I will post a new blog emphasizing the variety of differences between Laos and Vietnam shortly. Happy Reading and please look at my new photos!