Day 72

We got up and ate breakfast at 7am. This was so that we could be at the ruins early before the 10am-4pm daily heat wave. I actually woke up first around 5.45am and saw a really nice sunrise. To my delight we rented motorbikes again to cover the 10km or so between Champasak town and the Wat Phu ruins.

1 Sunrise on the Mekong

The ruins were small but very interesting. I met a retired English couple at the top of the hill and we spoke about China and my recent time there - the man was very fond of Chengdu - a place that I had liked too. Archeologists were busy working around (and still excavating) the ruins and it felt like this was a minor tourist stop which was nice as we had the place to ourselves more or less. Even at 9am the sun was getting hot and the breeze from the bikes on the way home was good.

2 Sunrise 2

To get over the Mekong this time we didn't use the car ferry. We had a motorbike taxi which was led onto a small raft - basically two canoes stuck together with a few bits of timber! It was enjoyable to do this crossing again and I didn't know it yet but by the end of the day we would have crossed it three more times.

Those extra crossings came from indecision at the 4000 islands. We made our way to the main island which turned out to be a pretty boring one. The 4000 islands are an 18km stretch of the Mekong that 8km wide in places. That width means the water level is lower than usual and many inhabited islands are revealed as a result. Khong Island is the biggest but we didn't stay long as it had nothing to offer so I organised a bespoke trip to Don Det ( a much better island for tourists to visit) via a massive waterfall at Phapeng. It's the biggest cascade in South East Asia and was a nice sight for us after a long day. After our last river crossing of the day we arrived on Don Det and found a nice hotel to stay on. I had a bungalow but the island only has electricity between 4pm and 10pm so after some candle-lit beers till 11.30pm I had to scratch around in the dark to get to bed. I noticed that there was no bedding either (somehow I'd managed not to notice when viewing the room) so I had to find my sleeping bag liner in the dark too.

3 Wat Phu ruins - Mekong in the distance

4 Archeologists working

5 Close-up 1

6 Close-up 2

7 From the ground in front

8 A Temple building up the hill from the ruins

9 Our ferry back

91 Patrick and Samantha on board

92 Papheng Waterfall

93 Sunset