We arrived in Laos pretty early - a one hour flight on Vietnamese Airlines (no word on Abby's age this time...). Within an hour of arriving, we had gotten our visas, paid for our tickets that I'd reserved but couldn't pay online for our flight to the North, cabbed it the 4km to get our hotel, checked in and gotten SIM card for Laos. This city is very sleepy - particularly during this "low season".
First stop, lunch and the famous Beer Lao!
There seems to be plenty of options for food, a mix of Thai and Lao food. Laotian food definitely seems to skew more towards Thai than Vietnamese.
After lunch we grabbed our first Tuk Tuk - the girls were really looking forward to them ever since we watched Slumdog Millionaire, though the Lao Tuk Tuks have bigger capacities, with a u-shaped bench seat in the back.
We took the Tuk Tuk up to Pha That Luong, one of the most famous sights in Vientiane. On the way, I was kind of shocked at the orderly way people were moving - obeying lights, staying in lanes, letting people through - this is not Vietnam! I also noticed that, though this is the nation's capital, it is very laid back and not even close to the hustle and bustle in even smaller Vietnamese cities. There are more cars than we've seen on the roads, but that is only relative. It seems very quiet.
The Buddhist stupa is pretty impressive. It reminded me of the large golden stupa in Myanmar. The girls had to cover their legs with loner skirts, and they stepped up to pray (for continued trip harmony I hope!).
The grounds and parking lot surrounding the stupa were huge, with a smattering of large temples in and around the immaculate gardens. The whole area was dead - we actually thought it was closed. It was a great way to see the sights!
After checking out this cool reclining Buddha, we went to the ever-present tourist stop market. Robin negotiated hard and got a genuine (I'm sure) pair of black Ray Bans for 13,000 Laotian Kip (about $2.00 Canadian!). We noticed another thing - nobody EVER asked us to buy or hassled us in any way... We were almost feeling insecure (do they not want to sell to us?!? :-). The people seem very relaxed and respectful - ok we'd been here for just 3 hours, but first impressions....
We walked back towards our hotel - the sun was really beating down, but the shade was nice with a bit of a breeze coming on. I noticed another great mishmash of overhead wires that we'd seen so often in Vietnam - and ironically there is a Vietnam flag in the background...
We stopped in at the impressive Patuxai, the "victory gate", a monument celebrating the Independence victory over France that ironically mimics the Arc de Triomphe with a very Laotion twist. It seemed almost as big as the Arc, but I don't remember 3 levels of gift shops while climbing of the Parisian monument. Still, it was pretty cool.
There has been some "caw cawing" by members of our group to signal the presence of Monks. The Maiko girls from Kyoto are very happy we are in Laos!
After a little chill time, we strolled around looking for some more local food. We got lucky as we found a pretty good one in a somewhat backpacker-type area. The weird thing was there was a foreigner playing piano throughout the meal and all he played were depressing ballads. I whispered under my breath "the food was great but for some reason I feel like slitting my wrists!".
We headed to the banks of the Mekong River after dinner. There was a huge night market (maybe a kilometre long) between the main road and the river. Abby stared with wide eyes at a mobile shop that looked looked like a dessert cart... Here was the result:
Then we saw another vendor that sold sesame balls, some mochi coconut dessert and oddly enough samosas. All quite good thank you very much!
We made it back around 8:30. We are loving the hotel - it's from the Ibis chain and we have two adjoining rooms. I figured when I was planing this out that we had a quick in and out in Vientiane and it would be best to be very comfortable - I think given how sleepy the city is it wouldn't have mattered, but we are very much enjoying this place.
Tomorrow we have a unique city tour planned, so we are looking forward to that. We leave the following day for our adventure in Northern Laos.
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