Lovely Laos.

It's Saturday the 7th of October. We left Bangkok about 7pm, to get an over night train to Nong Kai which is the town closest to the Laos border, when heading for Vientaine. The overnight train was fine we arrived next morning quite early with only noodles in our tummies.

After a short taxi ride to the border we walk through Thai emigration with very little hassel. Then we had to get a short bus journey to the Laos immiagration where we filled in out nessary froms and procedded to the desk and we found out that the price had gone up by 5 dollars, so we had to pay $36. Then the waiting game began it took ages to get them processed and when finally all four of us got or passports and visas back we had to actually go through immiagrations which also took very long so even though we arrived at about 9am it was about 12.40 by the time all four of us finally got through. So from here we hired a tuc tuc to the captial city vientaine. Found a place to stay dropped our bags and headed for city centre.

To our delight there was a local boat racing festival it is the biggest festival of the year and there was such a terrific buzz about the city people everywhere. We went towards the river where we saw people drinking, dancing, laughing and cheering the boat teams on. The buzz and excitment reminded me of St. Patricks Day back home, everyone is happy and the majority of them drunk too.


Next day we decided to look for somewhere more central as our previous place was out of town. It is monsoon season here which mean alot of very heavy rain. So we decided to walk with our heavy bags 10 -15 mins into town. By the time we got to the city centre one of the raods we where walking down was just like a river so what else can you do but wade though it. We had such a laugh at ourselves up to our knees in water, well it was probably up to Alan's ankles. We settled in a nice hotel and decided not to leave for a while.
The Mr. Bean roundabout.
"The Biker Gang"
Next day we rented bikes to wander the city. Lonely Planet have a suggested walking tour of the city but we choose to do it on the bikes. It was such a good days fun we where like something out of a disney movie "The Biker Gang" roaming the very small city. We checked out most of the sites and took alot of photo's. We had a great time just following the route which from time to time we added a few extra times around the roundabout just to do a Mr. Bean.
There is a plaque on the wall which is quite hilarious. It reads: "At the northeastern end of the LaneXang Ave. arises a huge structure resembling the Arc de Triomphe. It is the Patuxay or victory gate of Vientaine, built in 1962 (Buddist Era 2505), but never complete due to the country's turbulent history. From a closer distance, it appears even less impressive, like a monster of concrete. Nowadays this placeis used as leisure ground for the people of Vientaine and the seventh floor on top of the building serves as excellent view point over the city".

As if one day on a no gear bike wasn't enough we rented the bikes for the second day. All with rather tender bums from the preivous days cycling. We cycled six kilometers to the national monument "Phra that Luang"up hill might I add and it was very hard, I never realised how important gears where on a bike until I didn't have any. Of course when we get there it is closed but we took the chance to have a drink with the loacal vendor under her big sun umbrella. There was this building beside the "That" so we decided to venture a little to check it out when we got closer i realised that it was some kind of military building, I remebered reading that if you are close to Military bases or buildings they will escort you away, so I shouted after Donna but it was to late there was a soldier hot on our tail on a motorbike telling us to move away.
On the way back to the city again we where going down hill which was much better. We stopped at the bottom of the hill at a crossroads/intersection then the lights changed and as it is quite hard to cycle these bike you have to work hard to get moving. What do you know my chain came off as i was in the middle of the intersection and traffic. AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH very scary but all turned out well I made it safe and sound to the side of the road to fix it. It's very funny now.

Next day we left bikes back and decided to give our bums a rest and walk to the national museum. It was really interesting so much I didn't know about this country and still don't. I really know so little of the history of these south eastern countries. I just love learning.