Day 8 - Vientiane

Crumbling colonial architecture

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Catching the 10am flight to Vientiane required us to be at the airport 1.5 hours in advance. This was fine - it was only a short tuk tuk ride from town. We checked in and went to a cafe for brekky, but only a short time later (and well before the stated boarding time), an attendant hounded us out of our seats, telling us we were running late and that everyone was waiting for us. This was our first experience of Lao randomness, which would repeat itself everytime we attempted to use any form of transport.

Our flight - a propellor plane - had to stop halfway and refuel at a southern Lao town called Pakse. The journey took 3 hours all up. Arriving in Vientiane, we were once again ripped off on our taxi into town - $6 for a very short journey. Our driver nearly refused to take us to our chosen guesthouse, kept saying it was dodgy - but at $5 a night we weren't expecting luxury. He ended up taking us there, and we ascended the weird concrete spiral staircase to our first floor room.

mmmmmmmmassage

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Having experienced the mayhem of several major Asian cities, I'm pleased to say that Vientiane, capital of Laos, is like a country town in comparison. It had less traffic than Chiang Mai. It's arranged along the bank of the Mekong, with Thailand in view on the other side. There's hardly any traffic - crossing the road is a breeze, and when we arrived on saturday afternoon, most of the shops were beginning to close. Quickly realising that Sunday would be an entirely dead affair indeed, we made plans to hot foot it to the mountain resort of Vang Vieng the following day.

But we had all afternoon to explore the sleepiest capital in the world on foot. The morning market had an amazing array of silks and lao silver jewellery, although much of it was not cheap - someone wanted $14 for a silver necklace, which of course I refused. But we managed to find a nice silk beadspread, cushion covers and some silver bracelets for reasonable prices - after we had bargained a little.

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After a $6 lao massage, we settled down to dine on the banks of the Mekong, where there was an entire strip of makeshift eateries, selling fresh catch, although the live stuff was a bit pricey so we settled for some ordinary noodle dishes. We then went to a nice-looking bar a few blocks back with an upstairs terrace, where I quaffed a couple of super-cheap martinis.

Later on, I noticed a whole lot of street vendors set up who were selling pancakes - at first I thought they were like French crepe - a hangover from the colonial era - but I quickly realised they were roti, which I'd only ever eaten with curry. I quickly discovered they were just as tasty with banana and condensed milk, or with lemon and sugar.