Savannakhet

Trip Start Dec 01, 2004

Trip End Apr 08, 2005

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Flag of Lao Peoples Dem Rep Savannakhet, Lao Peoples Dem Rep
Monday, February 7, 2005

We knew from our guide book that the bus station was about 2 km from the area in town that we wanted to stay in, so we were able to negotiate a semi-reasonable tuk-tuk ride to our guest house. We stayed in one of the pricier rooms the first night, as all the others were booked. Once our bags were in the room we took off in search of food. A large pate sandwich with all kinds of good stuff on it for me, noodle soup for Tobi. The long day ended with a nice cool Beer Lao at the hotel and we were lullabied to sleep by the rattle of our 30 year old monster Russian window a/c unit.

Savannakhet seems to be a bit of a ghost town at times. There really didn't seem a lot to do there. We walked around to try to find a restaurant recommended by the Lonely Planet, but it was out of business. An internet cafe we tried to find was also out of business. We saw a lot of older cars there, some Mercedes' and even a '68 Cougar

01 - Dying the cotton

. Evenings were always interesting due to the mix of people we met over drinks at the hotel. We met some Canadians, Sweds and a little Danish guy that reminded me of Smiegles from The Lord of the Rings movies.

We had a plan to hire a tuk-tuk driver for the day with 2 other Canadians - one from Manitoba, Barbara and the other from Quebec, Claude. In the morning Tobi and Manitobi bailed because they weren't feeling well, so Claude and I set off to have a look around on our own. Our tuk-tuk driver named Amphone operates from just outside the "Savanbanhao Guest House" He brought us to see the old French army barracks (now a hospital), the commanders home/offices, and some interesting relics of French military presence. He also brought us to a small production facility where cotton is spun into material and dyed in colours that come from various plant material. There was a Japanese business man buying their products that day. After we said hello and introduced ourselves he said "Maybe you shouldn't take pictures around here". We thought that was weird but we didn't care because we already had lots of them. As we drove along the Mekong, Amphone pointed out a new bridge being built across to Thailand by the Japanese. He told us that we weren't supposed to take any pictures of that either.

As a little side note: I've been to places and have seen many Japanese tourists

02 - Retired French artillary

. It's a well known fact, and maybe a stereotype, that they love to take pictures. I asked myself why doesn't the Japanese business man or the company building the bridge want anyone taking pictures around their stuff? I think that they think taking pictures is a form of espionage. Maybe their (the Japanese)success in technology comes from info gained by generations of Japanese tourists taking pictures! Who cares anyway.

We were brought to a national park to see some big trees and tonnes of butterflies flying around. We visited a Wat with a 700 year old stupa which had a 450kg solid gold umbrella on top. The stupa was surrounded by about 166 Buddhas donated by individuals, families and businesses.

Amphone walked us through a small village near the stupa, as it had no roads - just a maze of paths. We weaved around animal pens, gardens and bungalows with the doors and windows open to reveal the really old babysitting the really young. Often we were stopped by the villagers so the little ones could have a look at the two foreigners. We didn't mind because we were walking around looking at them. We would say hello in Lao, make a few goo-goo, ga-ga noises and move on. I'm sure not too many people have visited the next place we saw, as Amphone had to do some wheeling and dealing to get us in for a look

03 - Big trees

. It was a salt production company. There were 3 methods we saw them use. They evaporated salt water, using the sun, in football field sized trays about a foot deep. On a smaller scale, they boiled saltwater in 8 foot by 12 foot trays and 6 foot by 3 foot trays over smoldering sawdust and bits of scrap wood from a nearby wood mill.

After all the taste tests of the salt we needed a drink so we stopped at a bar in the middle of a large garden. It was a popular spot for locals to drink on the weekends, but we had the whole garden to ourselves. Claude and I each had a beer and we bought one for Amphone too. A good finish to a good day.

Back at the guest house I found Tobi feeling much better. We sat around with Barbara and Claude having drinks and sharing our stories for the day. There was a funny looking guy sitting alone at the table next to us, and after a few exchanges of pleasantries, invited him to sit with us. His name was John and he was an Englishman living in Whales. If allowed, he could tell one joke after another for days on end. I became quickly attached to him as he reminded me of a fifty-something year old version of a friend of mine. We all had a nice dinner and lots of laughs, but Barbara and Claude retired soon afterward. Tobi stayed up a little longer, but eventually went to bed as we had an early start the next morning

04 - I was Stupa-fied...

. John went to the bathroom and never came back. Bob disappeared, I think into thin air. Three Swedes joined my table and Smeigles took off after his "precious".

By 6:00 in the morning, Marcus (a Swede) and I found ourselves in the middle of the road (we drank the hotel dry and hopped over the locked gate to find more beer), finishing our last beers after having spent the night teaching the locals magic tricks. I went back to our room to find Tobi awake, packed and ready to go to the bus station. I packed up and off we went. We boarded a bus that went to Vientianne, planning to get off in Paksan in order to transfer to another bus that would take us to Phonsavan. We found that we couldn't get a straight answer about a bus to Phonsavan, so we decided to stay on the bus and visit Vientianne first.