Savan Vegas Hotel & Casino Savannakhet

... The best bit, though, was the market is 50m down the road so we had dinner there for next to nothing.

The next day, we visited the dinosaur museum (which was the sole purpose for us coming to Savannakhet!). It was so much fun… One of the researchers gave us an impromptu guided tour and we got to check out the genuine dinosaur bones that were found in Laos a few years ago ...

Savannakhet is a rather beautiful small city located in its namesake province in central Laos. I don't think it sees a huge number of tourists, making it a very authentically Lao place to be, as the visitor must fit in to the daily lives of the people, rather than a place very much set up for tourism. Wandering through the streets was a really lovely experience, there are some ...

... increasingly annoyed with both parties. Eventually he started to grab our bags and threaten to dump us back at the airport. We finally agreed on $3. Welcome to Laos!

For the next day and a half we didn't see any other tourists. The town was dead and wet. Although there was some old French charm scattered around it just felt a lonely place. To spice things up a bit we signed up for a one day trek in the jungle the following day. This was a great ...

... Thailand, we grabbed a tuk-tuk and headed out there. It is forbidden for Lao people to gamble so this casino is entirely for Thais to nip across the border for a quick gambling fix, and subsequently everything is done in Thai Baht. This unexpected currency switch confused us and Raj had won and lost £250 thinking it was £25 before we realised. Taking a break from the gambling we went to inspect ...

... rain!) to the town, only to find that there were no buses, nor any taxis or motorbike drivers eagerly offering to take us the 250km to Savannakhet where we, and our bags were headed. We spent the next 3 hours desperately ringing the offices of the tour operator and bus company in Vietnam and Laos who weren't particularly fussed about our predicament, or about returning our calls. We were still with the other 2 couples, and our Blitz spirit gradually evaporated, especially as the older ...

Unfortunatly we did eventually have to leave my favourite town in the world, Luang Prabang and head south down through Laos. Our first stop was a small town called Phonsavon after a terrifying mini-bus journey along the most mentally windy road i've ever seen across a mountain range. We've had a few scary journeys so far but this was the worst, at one point the tires were sreeching as we went round a really sharp bend with a sheer drop to our side. I was glad when that trip was over ...

We left the village and caught a local bus to Savannakhet the next day. We tried to find the dinosaur museum but the map was useless so we couldnt find it. Apparently its just a room though so we didnt miss a lot. Apparently they have found lots of dinosaurs in this area though. We then went to the eco tourism office and booked up a trek for the following day, it was pricey but the money goes to the local ...

Savannakhet We bought tickets to Savannakhet and continued our journey North. This involved a small boat to the mainland, a minibus to Paske and a local bus to Savannakhet. There seemed to be an awful lot of people involved in getting us across the river where we were crammed into a minibus heading for Paske. It was a little cramped but still quite good. All the other people, backpackers, were going to Paske or East of there, we were the only ones going North. We ...

Yesterday I very reluctantly left the Lao capitol of Vientiane and headed south to the township of Savannakhet. I had a feeling the bus trip was gonna be something special when I climbed on and the driver fired up the on-board karaoke machine. Unfortunately, I can't speak or read Thai, nor did they have any English VCDs othewise I would've gotten up and given it a bash. Being just under 183cm (6′1″) tall and taking a 10 hour ...