We arrive into Vientiane on a Saturday evening. We weren't able to get seats beside each other on the bus so i end up sitting beside an 'interesting' English woman who likes to make noises and gasp as she is reading her book and say things like "Aw I knew it was him" every so often.
She strikes up a conversation with me and proceeds to tell me her life story with all the ups and downs included. Grand- if a little soon in our relationship considering I just met the woman about 2 hours ago! Luckily she likes to talk so doesn't really require much input from me apart from the odd "yeah" every so often. So as the bus pulls up to the station, and I'm thinking about the relief of my impending freedom -she asks if she can share a tuk tuk with us to the area where the hotels are. Oh no :(
She is very opinionated about the way in which we should search for hotels and is on a tight budget. We are more than slightly concerned she will ask to stay with us in a 3 bed room with us so in a bit of a sly move, we end up staying somewhere slightly more expensive than we probably would have just to shake her off! A bit mean you say? Ah well sure- not to worry, over the next 24 hours that we spend in Vientiane we spot her about 3 more times, One of these times she sees us and of course runs across the road to strike up a one-way conversation and invite us shopping with her. So she wasn't too offended by the hotel shake-off....nor can she take a hint!
Meanwhile I notice I have a little red patch on my leg and don't remember getting burned as I've been quite good with the oul suncream application.
So Vientiane is a town that was colonised by the French in the late 1800s and you can see that the buildings have a very french colonial look that we haven't really seen in the other places we've been. The hotel we stay in also has a frenchie feel to it.
Hotel:
There are lots of little nods to the days of french rule such as street names and architecture and they clearly got hooked on the oul coffee and baguettes here back in the day and you can get quite good ones of each here. This is nice because as delicious as the Thai food is, they don't really know how to do bread.
However, on our one night in Vientiane the search for fun is futile. Tourists? Backpackers? Locals? Its a Saturday night - where is everyone?! We give up and settle in to eat in a restaurant that appears to have about 10 people in it.(the guidebook had implied it was non-stop/hopping with people etc!) . Its a relatively warm evening and but as we sit down to dinner I am shivering with the cold and completely lose my appetite. To cut a long story short have to go home to bed so maybe it's a good thing there was no party to be had anyway. That little cut on my shin in Vang Vieng wasn't as innocent as it first appeared and when I wake up the next morning the feverishness passes for a while but I have puffy red ankle that Nurse (by familial association) Ellie tells me is probably cellulitus.
Great- how many afflictions to I have to suffer that start with the letters c.e.l.l.u.l.i.t. !!
The next day we potter (limp) around a very very hot Vientiane and visit Haw Pha Kaeo -a national museum of religious art, which is nice but its pretty much another temple in disguise. And not a very good disguise as it's actually housed inside an old temple next to the pretty, French looking presidential palace.
Museum:
No pics allowed inside
In both Thailand and Laos they are quite bad at putting notices or signs on things so you are looking at 100s of these little Buddha sculptures and artifacts and maybe 10 of them will have a rough indication of what century they are from and that's about it. So it's a bit of a quick breeze through a museum when you don't really know much about the significance of what you are looking at!
After the museum trip we head up for a look at Patuxai or the "vertical runway" as it is known. Situated on Vientianes wannabe Champs Elysées (Lane Xang Avenue) this is a bad impression of Arc de Triomphe and was built from concrete that the US donated for the building of a runway! Haha! hence the nick-name! I believe its also supposed to be an homage to the Laos people that fought against the French for their independence, interesting so that they would build them their very own Arc de Triomphe!
We walk(I hobble) back to the hotel where we get collected by our bus. We head to the border where we will catch the overnight train to Bangkok (still adamant on the no more VIP minibuses issue!!)
She strikes up a conversation with me and proceeds to tell me her life story with all the ups and downs included. Grand- if a little soon in our relationship considering I just met the woman about 2 hours ago! Luckily she likes to talk so doesn't really require much input from me apart from the odd "yeah" every so often. So as the bus pulls up to the station, and I'm thinking about the relief of my impending freedom -she asks if she can share a tuk tuk with us to the area where the hotels are. Oh no :(
She is very opinionated about the way in which we should search for hotels and is on a tight budget. We are more than slightly concerned she will ask to stay with us in a 3 bed room with us so in a bit of a sly move, we end up staying somewhere slightly more expensive than we probably would have just to shake her off! A bit mean you say? Ah well sure- not to worry, over the next 24 hours that we spend in Vientiane we spot her about 3 more times, One of these times she sees us and of course runs across the road to strike up a one-way conversation and invite us shopping with her. So she wasn't too offended by the hotel shake-off....nor can she take a hint!
Meanwhile I notice I have a little red patch on my leg and don't remember getting burned as I've been quite good with the oul suncream application.
So Vientiane is a town that was colonised by the French in the late 1800s and you can see that the buildings have a very french colonial look that we haven't really seen in the other places we've been. The hotel we stay in also has a frenchie feel to it.
Hotel:
 |
| From Laos Van Vieng and VNTN |
There are lots of little nods to the days of french rule such as street names and architecture and they clearly got hooked on the oul coffee and baguettes here back in the day and you can get quite good ones of each here. This is nice because as delicious as the Thai food is, they don't really know how to do bread.
However, on our one night in Vientiane the search for fun is futile. Tourists? Backpackers? Locals? Its a Saturday night - where is everyone?! We give up and settle in to eat in a restaurant that appears to have about 10 people in it.(the guidebook had implied it was non-stop/hopping with people etc!) . Its a relatively warm evening and but as we sit down to dinner I am shivering with the cold and completely lose my appetite. To cut a long story short have to go home to bed so maybe it's a good thing there was no party to be had anyway. That little cut on my shin in Vang Vieng wasn't as innocent as it first appeared and when I wake up the next morning the feverishness passes for a while but I have puffy red ankle that Nurse (by familial association) Ellie tells me is probably cellulitus.
Great- how many afflictions to I have to suffer that start with the letters c.e.l.l.u.l.i.t. !!
The next day we potter (limp) around a very very hot Vientiane and visit Haw Pha Kaeo -a national museum of religious art, which is nice but its pretty much another temple in disguise. And not a very good disguise as it's actually housed inside an old temple next to the pretty, French looking presidential palace.
Museum:
 |
| From Laos Van Vieng and VNTN |
No pics allowed inside
 |
| From Laos Van Vieng and VNTN |
In both Thailand and Laos they are quite bad at putting notices or signs on things so you are looking at 100s of these little Buddha sculptures and artifacts and maybe 10 of them will have a rough indication of what century they are from and that's about it. So it's a bit of a quick breeze through a museum when you don't really know much about the significance of what you are looking at!
After the museum trip we head up for a look at Patuxai or the "vertical runway" as it is known. Situated on Vientianes wannabe Champs Elysées (Lane Xang Avenue) this is a bad impression of Arc de Triomphe and was built from concrete that the US donated for the building of a runway! Haha! hence the nick-name! I believe its also supposed to be an homage to the Laos people that fought against the French for their independence, interesting so that they would build them their very own Arc de Triomphe!
 |
| From Laos Van Vieng and VNTN |
 |
| From Laos Van Vieng and VNTN |
We walk(I hobble) back to the hotel where we get collected by our bus. We head to the border where we will catch the overnight train to Bangkok (still adamant on the no more VIP minibuses issue!!)
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