Up before the sun shines, the birds fart and breakfast is ready. Need to pack, but it’s hard to do in zombie mode.
I’ve slept like a baby after passing out last night. That means waking several times a night screaming for attention. Nah, only kidding, it’s been a good night’s sleep.
We pack most of our stuff, grab breakfast, pack the rest and head down to wait for the transport to the bus. He finally arrive twenty five minutes late and five minutes before the bus is supposed to leave the center of town.

We get on the bus, relax, put our day packs on the shelf above us and sit down. Only to be told we’re changing bus add soon add my ass is in the seat. Off one, into another. This one is just about full, but Katja manages to find us seats bevy to each other on either side of the aisle. Now it’s five hours to the airport (maybe) and then we’ll see what happens.

The hours passed and we did a short stop for toilet visits and to buy some food. Ever seen “Crocodile Dundee”? Remember the scene where he steps on top of the head of a lot of people in the subway to try to get to the girl? That’s a pretty fair description of Katja’s movement to get first in line for the toilet. I maybe forgot to tell you we’re on the second to last row in the bus…
Well emptied we meet again under less pressing circumstances. The place does not invite our appetite, but we share half a pineapple before we get back in the bus.
We killed the last couple of hours with iPad and movies and got dropped off at the airport. One of the things that swings in favour of countries like this, where timetables and structures are mere estimates. You can get them to take a detour for you, you get picked up at the hotel and brought to the bus, but the bus itself was really nothing to brag about. In the last two rows we had the climate system working above us. It was extremely noisy, and gave little effect back from the power it used. I was drenched I swear when we finally got off.
We grabbed lunch at different places. Katja did the better option and I got me some junk food.

Not much to write about the airport. It’s like all other smaller airports. Check in, immigration, security, more waiting and finally boarding. Uneventful flight, hello Laos!
Laos offer visa on arrival and since we weren’t that many getting off the plane it went by like a breeze. Fill the form, one picture, and passport in one counter, move one down to pay and get the passport back. Straight through immigration and we’re in Laos. Another country we’ve never visited before.
ATM for dinner money, prepay Taxi tour to hotel and get a local SIM card. Lurid traffic into town and suddenly are we standing in our hotel room. We turn around and head out to check out the city.

It’s dark, but Vientiane looks like a very clean and well kept city compared to some of the others we’ve visited so far. Lots of restaurants, bars and hotels here in the old part of town. We walk through a night market and compared to many other markets we’ve been to it’s pretty relaxed and laid back. So far Laos is showing itself from a very nice and pretty angle.
We ebbs the night at a bar on the sidewalk trading the local BeerLaos. A tad too sweet and a little less bitterness than I prefer, but passable.