come vang vieng for the caves and tubing!

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the 5 hours bus journey to vang vieng from luang prabang was quite a nightmare as the roads through the mountains were very windy for a straight 3hrs. but once we arrived, we were greeted with the view of beautiful limestone karst, bamboo bridges over the nam song river and idyllic scenes of rural life with its varse countryside and buffalos lazing near the green padi fields.

luang prabang may have the temples and monks, but vang vieng has the caves and tubing! i went for a funfilled tour while i was here.

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we visited 4 caves. the tham xang cave (or elephant cave, named after the elephant-shaped stone in the cave) has a huge buddha scrupture which the villages come to pray and offer alms. the other 2 caves, tham loup and tham hoi (snail cave), can only be explored with a guide and headlights. when all of us switched off our headlights, the pitch darkness was scary. there are limestone formations everywhere in the caves and they produce a drum-like sound when gently struck with fingers. some parts of the caves were so narrow, i had to waddle like a duck to move along. the falangs or westerners often had to go on all fours.

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tham nam (water cave), only 500m, was my fav! the cave is explored on inflated tractor tyre (or tube) during dry season. each of us sat in a tube and dragged ourselves thru the tunnel on a fixed rope. it was alot of fun.

to wrap up the day, we floated back to town over the nam song river on the tube. along the way, we stopped at several bars with swing ropes and flying-fox over the river. it was fun swinging like tarzan over the river and making big splashes into the river. the 3km trip was a relaxing way to admire the mountains and a perfect end to a day.

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info:

`special VIP bus from luang prabang - US13

day tour with riverside tours: US13

room with balcony view of nam song river at vang vieng orcgid: US10