August 22, 2003
Goodbye Laos
'Bout time for an update! After leaving Luang Prabang (LP), I spent 10 days in Vang Vieng(VV) which is about halfway (distance) between LP and Vientien. I have spent the last couple of days in Vientien, and I'm headed to Bangkok, for a week, tonight.
Now the longer version: The bus ride from LP to VV took about 6 hours, winding down out of the mountains. There were lots of folks with machine guns walking along the road. It was hard to tell if they were Laos Army, folks that are up to no good, political fighters, or just farmers/hunters that are up for a little sport with Bamby and a machine gun! We even had a guy on the bus with an AK47... I think he was the local "sky-marshal".
Anyway, the journey was uneventfull and I really enjoyed VV. One of the disadvantages of comming down from the mountains was that the weather got imensely more overcast (most of everyday was grey!) I didn't let it get me down, although I did spend a few days in my hotel room fiddling with my computer, because I didn't feel like roaming around... The town is very setup for tourists, millions of restaurants and guesthouses... Lots of signage for adventure treks, tubing, caving, hiking, biking, etc. It's a little grating visually, but the people are really nice, no agressive selling, no folks pretending to be friendly so they can get something from you. The families in town seem like they are happy to benefit from the travelers, but they are also quite happy to do their own thing without getting to caught up the money money money money stick that happens in so many other tourist places.
I spent several days, tubing down the local river, and one very memorable day swiming into a cave under a mountain! There is light for the first 10-20m, then it gets pitch black. It took me about 4 or 5 attempts to get the courage to go into the dark cave (with my headlamp.) And then 2 or 3 more before I made it all the way to the back. It's funny how one can imagine all sorts of monsters lurking under a mountain :) There is something so exilerating about facing a fear and comming out the otherside, no worse for wear... or in my case with no pads left on my fingers (but it only took 3 days for them to heal :) The lime stone walls acted like sandpaper on my finger tips so when I finally got out I had blood oozing from the tips of all of my fingers and thumbs... and no actual cuts... just sanded pads! Yikes... Anyway, a few days worth of Iodine and very sensitive fingers was a worthwhile price to pay, I had sooo much fun!
I've now been in Vientien for a couple of days, it's still overcast and raining even more than it did in VV. So I've spent quite a lot of time sitting and reading (currently reading Confessions of an English Opium Eater) in posh Europeanish cafes and lovely streat side Lao shops. I also spent the afternoon yesterday visiting a local sculpture park. There didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to where the sculptures were placed, just tons of them from both the Hindu and Buddhist pantheon. In someways, it seems quite pointless, somehow that made it even cooler. This guy went to Vietnam and studied with some Hindu guru, then came back and spent years constructing all these concrete sculptures in a lovely little park along the Mekong.
So tonight, I'm planning on taking a night bus to Bangkok. My ticket for Hong Kong curently leaves on the 1st of September, but I'll try and move it up a bit, doesn't matter that much tough if I can't I'm happy to hang out in Bang Kok for a week.
Hope you are all well!
Love,
-- Bindu
