Laos - Vang Vieng

Day 135 - Tuesday, June 5

As I mentioned in the last entry, I took the sleeper bus from Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng. It was supposed to get there at 1:30am, but didn't get there until a little after 3. When it arrived, it was raining, and the whole town seemed asleep, with no lights on anywhere. I was more worried than before about my prospects for finding a hotel. I had emailed two hotels earlier that day asking if they would have someone at reception at that hour, but never got a response. I had been told that I could just knock on doors at guesthouses if necessary, which apparently is acceptable behavior in such circumstances, but I wasn't so sure how I felt about that even if I could identify the appropriate door to knock on.

I was a little unsure where I had been dropped off, but eventually found my way to Laos Haven Hotel, which I knew had good reviews on various sites. There was a guy sleeping on two chairs at the bar next door, and I debated waking him up, but wasn't sure that he worked for the hotel. I guess he eventually heard me stirring and woke up, and then he woke the manager/owner, who was half-asleep but extremely friendly and got me a room. Whew, that was easier than expected. I finally got up around 12 or 1, I checked out the view of the city from the hotel:

From Laos - Vang Vieng

I then ventured out into the town to check it out and get some lunch. I didn't see anyone at any of the restaurants I walked by, so it felt like a bit of a ghost town. A photo of the main street, devoid of people:

From Laos - Vang Vieng

Eventually, I stopped at a place that I had read had good/fast wifi, where there was also no one. As I finished my food, it started to rain, so I figured I'd just hang out and use the wifi for a while. Well, "a while" ended being about 6 hours because it didn't stop raining until well after 7 and I had no reason to leave. After some dinner at a different spot, I wasn't feeling very well and I knew that food sickness was a common problem in Vang Vieng, so I headed back to the hotel. Luckily, I was fine - false alarm.

Day 136 - Wednesday, June 6

I woke up early to talk to my parents and then crawled back in bed for a while. Again I wasn't feeling great when I woke up - had a bad headache and just felt kind of bleh. It also looked like it would probably rain that afternoon. So, although I had originally planned on going tubing on Wednesday, I decided to just be lazy again.

That evening, I figured I'd go check out some of the bars by the river, which is where I had heard all the fun was had. I figured since those bars were at the endpoint of the tubing, and tubes had to be returned by 6pm to get your deposit back, that around 6pm the bars would be full. So I was a bit surprised when I walked over to that area around 6 and there was literally not a single customer there. What is going on? There really must be no one here this time of year.

I got some dinner and a couple of beers in a quintessential Vang Vieng restaurant/bar with episodes of Friends playing constantly on TV.

From Laos - Vang Vieng

It seems virtually every restaurant in Vang Vieng plays Friends non-stop (or in some cases Family Guy). By about 9, the place was full (maybe I'm not the only person in this town, after all), and then promotional girls for one of the bars by the river came by and handed out vouchers for free drinks and explained to me that no one goes to those bars until later in the evening. So I went out for a bit, but decided to take it easy because I didn't want to be hungover for the full day of drinking and floating down the river the next day.

Day 137 - Thursday, June 7

Finally, 2 days after arriving in Vang Vieng, I actually tubed down the river, and I immediately wished I hadn't kind of wasted my first 2 days there. I also figured out why the rest of the town had seemed like a ghost town before about 9pm. Turns out everyone is on the river until sunset (opting to return their tubes later in the evening and only get 1/2 the deposit back) and then I guess everyone showers and eats and doesn't go to the bars close to town until later.

So anyway, I did some floating and did some drinking and did some ill-advised jumping off various raised platforms into the river. I met a lot of cool people and had an awesome time. Definitely the highlight of my time in Laos. And I got to put my waterproof camera to use:

From Laos - Vang Vieng

From Laos - Vang Vieng

From Laos - Vang Vieng

From Laos - Vang Vieng

From Laos - Vang Vieng

From Laos - Vang Vieng

Day 138 - Friday, June 8

So. Incredibly. Hungover. I kind of felt like death when I woke up. Maybe death warmed over. It was not pleasant. I had debated staying in Vang Vieng another day after having so much fun the previous day and hearing that there wasn't really anything to see or do in Vientiane (my next stop). But I knew with the way I felt that if I stayed there I'd just spend the day in bed nursing my hangover, and staying 2 extra days wasn't an option because I had already booked a flight out of Vientiane for Sunday, so I decided to take the afternoon bus to Vientiane.

On the way we saw the fallout of a pretty nasty moped accident, where a moped had collided with a large semi truck, the moped was totally smashed and the driver was apparently alright enough to be sitting up on the side of the road, though he was covered in blood. Hope he was okay. This was the second moped accident I had ridden past while in Laos, so I'm sure they happen somewhat frequently.