SABAI Dii !!!

BORDERCROSSING

early on the 19th we took the ferry across the mekong and grabbed a minibus that would drive us to the loas-cambodian border. We decided not to take the speedboat as the water is pretty low so it is slower that way (many sandbanks and rocks reach above the water) and more expensive too.
At the Cambodian side it took only 2 minutes. They stamped our passports and declaration forms and then, after handing it back over, asked for money. We smiled and walked away.
The Laos side was not that easy. They first asked a small processing fee before even looking at our forms. We refused to pay by telling them our visa was already paid for and that we weren’t going give them some drinking money. The answer was clear: no money, no stamp… and they just left the hut and went back to their business, which is laying in a hammock or playing cards. There is only a handful off tourists crossing that border so they don’t have better things to do. After waiting 30 minutes and threats from the minibus driver that he would take our bags out and simply leave us in the middle of nowhere, we decided to pay each 1 dollar (the minimum). That was all it took for the lazy government officials to come out of their hammock and do what their fucking paid for! Actually we didn’t do that bad cause normally they ask anything between 1 and 5 dollars on each side.
We got dropped at the river border crossing, a couple of km inland, where we joined some people who were on a daytrip from don det (our destination) to visit the irrawaddy dolphins and the khon phapeng falls, where we had lunch. The pick up dropped us in ban nakasang where we took a long tail boat to don det, one of the islands.

DON DET

The area is called si phan don, which means 4000 islands. It’s the Mekong’s widest reach in its journey and during the dry months the river recedes and leaves behind hundreds of islands, islets and sandbars. The largest are permanently inhabited year round and offer fascinating glimpses of tranquil river oriented village life. The communities are self sufficient, growing their own rice, vegetables, rice, fruit, harvesting fish from the Mekong. Time stood still here for ages! Don det, the one we stayed on, is on of the most relaxing places we have ever been too. There is no traffic, except some bicycles, no electricity, no TV s, only a generator that runs from 6 till 9 pm to provide light. And damn, it was fucking WARM without a fan,

Every farmer on the island has build some bungalows (just 1-2 dollars a night), which are very basic, just big enough to fit a bed and a mozzienet, that’s it. And every bungalow has a hammock in front, never seen no many in my life. There is nothing to do but ride a bike around don det and don khon, read, or take a refreshing dip in the Mekong. A relaxing backpackers heaven!

I got pretty sick the first night: diarrhea, headaches, lack of balance. Could just be a case of travelers’ diarrhea because it went away after a couple of days of taking antibiotics. But we think is the Lariam (anti malaria tablets). We are taking them pretty long now and we both have very strange nightmares (Laura’s her scare the shit out of you). The dreams are really vivid and when you wake up it s sometimes hard to tell if the dream actually happened or not. So we had to upgrade bungalow to one with attached toilet, because sitting over a stinking hole 10 times a day with cramps isn’t that fun…But we managed to ride around both islands.


THE WAY TO PAKSE

After a couple of days we left the islands and made our way to Pakse by bus. Well actually it is more like a converted pick up or truck with benches down either side and one in the middle (it is called sawngthaew or something like that), all bags go on top. In Europe they would fit 10-15 persons in it, but here they jammed in 36!! Unbelievable. I was sitting there, still feeling pretty sick and couldn’t move my legs or even stretch them. Just like in Cambodia most older people here have terrible teeth, if they have any left of course, and serious bleeding, infected gum. It looks horrible. And at some crossroads people jump on and stick fried food through the bars. Then the eating, spitting and drinking festivities begin. Some of the passengers brought plastic bags with fish (among other stuff) with them, which after some time began to leak and smell. The whole floor was covered with it, and so were our flipflops. It smelled awful. But this wasn’t the worse… in front of us were some old ladies with teeth as i described above. And after their snacks they started to spit blood and god knows what in a plstic bag they brought with him. And we were so packed we even couldn’t move our turn our heads. My already sick stomach must have turned a hundred times.
We have had a lot of sort like rides, but this one stood out. So you see, the life of the traveler isn’t all fun ;-)

we were dropped at the southern bus station and took another of those things into the center. But they just dropped us a couple of km further at another bus station. We had no clue where to go and luckily we found a Frenchmen who pointed us in the right direction. After walking some kms we finally reached a hostel.

CHAMPASAK

In Pakse itself is nothing to do or see so we got a motorbike under our ass and dove to champasak to see the famous wat there (late Angkor era). Its nothing compared to the ones in Cambodia, so it was quit disappointing. But as it was build on the slopes of a hill, the views were ok. We have been spoiled with the temples near siem reap, so we wont be visiting any other ones soon, and these inevitably became the standard. And to be honest nothing we ll be seeing any time soon can match them or even come close. So enough temples for a while. The 90km roundtrip from pakse was cool as you have to cross the Mekong. we had to get ourselves and the motorbike on a wooden plank attached on 2 canoes (to create a sort of catamaran) which brought us across the mekong.

BOLAVEN PLATEAU

Yesterday we drove a motorbike (as daytrips there cost 20 usd pp, just for transportation and driver/guide. Unbelievable!!) for a more then 200 km roundtrip across the bolaven plateau. Its famous for many things but especially for the coffee plantations. (for the fanatics, they grow some of the best and most expensive coffee in the world: Arabica and robusta f.i.). workers live on the estate and the going wage is 1 usd per day. The ride was great and in a lot of places you got smell the coffee while driving. The plateau is home to a lot of minority (laven, Katu and Alak) villages. We stopped at some and walked around. The children were really happy with the stickers we gave them (bedankt petra an mark!). .

we visited some waterfalls too. Tat fan is the most spectacular in Laos with parallel streams plunging out of dense forest and down more then 120 m. Absolutely breathtaking views! the Tat lo fall isn’t that spectacular but the surroundings are great. It was a very laidback place. the kind of place we could spend some days… I had a refreshing power shower before driving the last 85km back to pakse.

VIETIANE

We decided to take the night bus the same day (10hours) to Vientiane, the capital of Laos. It is very small place, only 250000 people and still a very relaxed capital compared with the other ones we have been to. We walked around in the afternoon and decided it is a nice place to spend some days.

And finally we have some western food again!! After a couple of weeks of eating the same day in day out, it was a welcome change! Especially because I don’t eat meat (and laura besides chicken almost nothing too) the diet is monotonous. This together with the diarrhea made me lose weight like hell. Only thing is, Laos so far is pretty touristy and prices for western food here are sky rocking. In a supermarket, the feta cheese from home costs 5 dollars, a yoghurt 1,5 usd! That is 30-40% more then in the big Cambodian department stores. Even local food is expensive compared to what we were used to. But we are gonna spend some money on western food (it is delicious) because we are really bored from the rice, noodles vegetables and occasional fish we had the last weeks. Being a vegetarian when you come here a month or even more is fine, especially in the cities or more touristy arias. Much respect to ones who travel a long time and don’t eat fish or seafood, but I cant.

A lot of fancy bakeries with price croissants, sandwiches, etc…here in vientiane. You instantly noticed it is more developed and tourists have been coming here longer. Even the prices of simple souveniers and handicrafts are more then dubbel! they know the price to ask

And traffic!! It is heaven. Signs everywhere, I is hard not to find the place you are looking for. And a lot of roads are paved here, even on the countryside near the bolaven plateau. Till now Vietnam had by far the worst traffic, but Cambodian road conditions were the worst. here in vientiane no motorbikedrivers to drive you around cheap, only tuktuks. and they try to ask a dollar for distances as little as 2km. petrol here is half the the cambodian price, so for 2,5 dollars you can drive more than 200 km with a motorbike

And there are a lot more tourists in Laos then in most parts of Cambodia and even Vietnam. A lot of French and Americans tend to come here.
And in our first week here we have seen a lot of the typical (i-have-the-coolest-dirty-pajama-pants wearing) backpackers. The ones we will probably see in Thailand too.

it all starts to look familiar. Architecture, people, nature,… so far Laos is nothing new. Hate to say it but often we had the been-there-done-that-feeling. Don’t get us wrong, it is beautiful but we need something else, something new.
We cant wait to get to the beaches of Thailand!! And just relax, dive, party, lay on the beach. It is going to be nice to spend a couple of months at the same place in stead of moving around every other day or so.


PLANS

Probably going to visit vieng vang, luang prabang, phonsavan (the top tourist attractions in the north). After that we plan on hiring a motorbike and dive around the mountains in the most upper northern regions (to the border with china, Myanmar and Vietnam) and see some remote hill tribes, jungle and waterfalls. After that the plan is to head to the (southern) middle of Laos (tha khaek and savannakhet) before crossing the border around the 17th of februari

Enjoy the snow back home!!
We will be in touch