Vientiane - un relâchant plus la capitale.

  Vientiane, Lao Peoples Dem Rep
Thursday, July 10, 2008

From Luang Prabang we moved down to a town called Vang Viene, every bit the 'Brit's abroad' holiday hell we attempt to avoid. Vang Viene; a long line of restaurants all showing friends, and another long line of guest houses and hotels. The attraction here is the floating inner tubes, bar-crawl down the Mekong river which ends back in the town centre.

It rained non-stop for the two days we stayed. We were asked to leave a bar because we didn't want to buy a meal, just drinks. All of the internet cafes are in a ridiculously fixed high price cartel. People stumble around the streets of Vang Viene wearing in-appropriate beach clothes which is dis-respectful to the locals. All through the night we were woken by Brits, drunkenly shouting in the streets to their mates about lost (pick any one) mates/money/fags/brains etc. It was a nasty place.

The Laos Arc de Triumph

Its wild to think that Vientiane is a capital city. We walked from one end to the other in half an hour and found a cheap guest house with a large fan room for $6. Even better was the fact the cleaner had accidentally left the remote control for the air con unit in our room so we stayed for six nights and enjoyed Arctic temperatures at night time.

The Laos Arc de Triumph 2

Vientiane is built along the Mekong River and has a noticeable French influence in its architecture and foods. We really like our time here and went exploring the markets along with drinks each evening sitting on bamboo platforms watching the sun set over the Mekong. We filled much of our time with trying the fancy French restaurants, which are here for the ex-pat community. They have reasonable Laos prices and awesome French foods. We had a great day exploring the city on bikes, cycling around admiring what the French had left behind. Vientiane was going to be the Capital of their new colony which would have been Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. They designed a wide tree lined city street with an Arc de Triumph at one end and some fancy building at the other. It was all very Oh La La. I believe their colonization attempt failed when they discovered the only natural resources inside the countries were rice!

Vientiane main street

The new Western style gym is worth a day's visit. For only $6 we had a one day membership which includes access to a mountain of gym machines, an hour long massage, a good outdoor pool, a Jacuzzi, steam room and sauna. It was nice to go for a run in an air-conditioned room and the next day I decided to cycle the 20km to the Friendship bridge which is the border crossing to Thailand.

(?)

I cycled off amid a constant waving and hello's from the locals, Laos people are some of the most friendliest people. Almost everyone I passed would shout Hello. Along the road were some quality road signs, I've uploaded. I cycled through passport control, ignoring their stares and onto the bridge to the centre, which is the official end of Laos, where i could take a photo. I crashed the mountain bike on the bridge, hitting the rail tracks at the wrong angle I wobbled off and skidded to a halt, embarrassingly in-front of all the cars crossing over. More pride was hurt than body.

This way to get LAID

We left after a week and went to the Issan region of Thailand in the North East. A special prize to the first person who email's me with the correct translation of this blogs title. danjcooper@hotmail.com

Cooper Out

Love Dan & Kat