Day 26 - Vang Vieng to Vientiane, Laos

A relatively low key post today as not much going on apart from our trip the Laos capital Vientiane to join back up with the Mekong River.  

Our bus wasn't until 1.30pm so we met Trent and Sasha for breakfast at a little French patisserie in town. Not the greatest breakfast we have had and a very disappointing cookie!

We make our plans to meet up with Trasha again in New Zealand. They are taking us for a couple of nights to a place called Goat Island about an hour north of Auckland. Supposed to be beautiful there. Can't wait. Will be so great to meet up with them again in a month! 

So long Vang Vieng. You were not what we were expecting but the place has a certain charm. We have really enjoyed our time here as well as the company we have met. 

We then chill out by the pool for a bit until we are picked up for the bus station for our 4 hour trip to Vientiane. Randomly every town here has two bus stations, one north of town and one south and always on the outskirts. A real pain for those that are just transferring buses to carry on south. 

All aboard. 

The scenary is not as epic as the Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng leg of the trip but still pretty nice. The mountains aren't quite as high now and as a result the roads are lot straighter. 

We arrive in Vientiane at about 6pm and get a shared Tuk Tuk type van into town with some very strange people including; 

1. Japanese girl who couldn't speak a word of English, had no map or address of where she was staying but just kept saying 'Mekong' and showing us the word on a piece of paper for where she wanted to go.  

2. South American girl who had absolutely no time for Japanese girls attempts to direct us to every place in Vietnine that had the word Mekong in it (which is pretty much everywhere). 

3. Annoying Dutch guy who was sat behind us on the coach and did not shut up about his two years traveling for the whole journey who I then subsequently got caught in the cross fire of his 'know it all' traveling stories. 

4. Idiot guy who was sat at the back and had one simple job to keep the bags from slipping off into the road as we drove but seemed to be woefully under qualified for this simplist of tasks. 

5. Angry old couple who were getting very annoyed at idiot man from #3

6. Peruvian opinionated woman who was more direct than an express non stop train service. 

7. Nat ;-)

Our hotel doesn't look too great when we arrive. 

Only kidding. Our is next door! We are staying at the Lao Orchid hotel which is lovely. Fairly basic but does the job and great location. 

http://www.lao-orchid.com

We have a Christmas tree too! 

View from our balcony out over the night market to the Mekong. 

The night market. 

A huge bunch of people doing aerobics on the side of be river. Pretty random. 

We go for a walk around. The place is pretty buzzing and has lots of nice looking restaurants. We opt for Sushi tonight which has been non existent since we left London but this place was great. Fuji Japanese restaurant. 

We then go for a night cap in a nice rooftop bar called Bor Pen Nyang. Strangely there were quite a few hookers sat at the bar despite it being a really nice place. 

Pooped today so head back to the hotel for 8.30 for an early night.