Mali Namphu Guest House Vientiane

After an overnight train we arrived early and very grumpy to the Lao border.
Here I tried to use my UK passport so I could then use my longstay Thai visa when entering back into Thailand - but no such luck.
They rejected my passport due to all the land border stamps being in my NZ passport - so now I had the same issue as Cam - no valid visa to stay longer than 15 days in Thailand ... BUGGER!
So most of our time in Vientiane was spent trying to sort out our Thai visa - this included ...

We made the most of the pool at our hotel on our second day in Vang Vieng...topping up the tan and relaxing. We were going to go on a trip to sit in a rubber ring and float down the Mekong River for a few hours, but we decided against it....the thought of being in the chocolate dirty river for more than a minute put us off .... so we just chilled instead. There were other activities to consider...Kayaking, treks, climbing....none of which tickled our fancy lol. We ventured back into the town ...

What a change Vientiane was! The capital city has changed almost beyond recognition since we were here 6 years ago - then almost no cars at all. Now mercedes shoproom , traffic jams, traffic lights & cars everywhere!! However we were told by a bloke at a sauna at a temple in the forest that it was all chinese cars.... However its still a very small capital city & the Mekong festival was just beginning, sponsored by the French. The lure of french cheese & red wine was too hard to r...

Our flight was pretty standard to Vientiane and upon arrival we had minimal queues to get our visa. Unfortunately we did not have any Laos Kip or US Dollars so had to pay in Thai Baht, this being the most expensive way and costing us 25 pounds each, for a 30 day visa. After negotiating a price we bundled into a taxi which took us into the centre of Vientiane. For some reason we seemed to be 'rushing' around and checked into the first hotel we came across. This was one of the hotels recommende...

Day 11 - Ponsavan to Vientiane - 211108 There're multiple buses that leave for Vientiane every morning. I decided to take the bus ride out at 7am so as to have a good chance of reaching Vientiane before sunset. My tuk tuk driver was late in picking me up so I only got to the bus station 10 mins before time. Chucked my bags under the bus's luggage compartment and motioned to the driver I was going across to the coffee shop to grab a quick coffee. 2 mins into drinking my rapidly cooling coffee ...

Evening all!! So how are you liking these blogs??!! Very quiet bunch you lot!!! So what did I do today you are wondering. Well after breakfast, I decided to head off to Xieng Khuan or easier to say is the Buddha Park. The others had poo poo'd the idea and wanted to head for the water park. But Gretta had also spotted this park in the brochure and Maria and Bex decided to come too. We jumped in a tuk tuk and headed off 25km down the road. I had considered cycling this but am so glad I didn't! ...

To start off i need to clear one thing up. Vern said at the beginning of his last blog entry that i refused point blank to take public transport to Phonsovan. This was not just because i was being awkward, but because i did not fancy 6 hours on a non a/c bus where they stuff people, chickens, kilo's of rice etc onto it, and where as soon as you leave and go into the mountians the locals start throwing up. The busses provide you with sick bags and i did not want 6 cramped hours of locals throw...

Vientiane- not a huge amount to see here except for the huge market but just a stop off point really. The guesthouse was nice and there was a restaurant serving fried crickets and larvae but we passed, thanks. Luang Prabang is way nicer, no open sewers!!

26 June (Monday) I left Phonsavan (finally!) on Monday evening, on a teeny tiny plane bound for Vientiane. The plane was a 17 seater, a tiny little thing with propellers where you can feel every bump and move of the plane. Needless to say I felt a little bit seedy when I got off! The airport in Phonsavan was interesting too - a small building looking onto a tiny runway with chickens running about. If I wasn't so happy to be going to Vientiane I think I would have been quite worried. But it al...

Not much to say about the Capital. Check the pics.

^ World's laziest entry ^