Laid-Back Laos Loses My Vote

July 7-July 11

Backpackers love Laos.

Usually, when I ask them why, they say things like “it’s less touristic.” (Side note: I’ve noticed that Europeans and Asians speaking English often use the world “touristic” instead of touristy. It sounds weird, but I think it’s still grammatically correct.)

Another version of the same thing that I’ve heard it “it’s more authentic.”

I understand the push for authenticity, to see how people really live. But, at the same time, I argue that tourism is such an important industry in South East Asia that “touristy” places are authentic.

Anyway, most of the backpackers I talked to told me they loved Laos. And when I asked questions, they seemed to love Vang Vieng and Luang Prabang, which are the most popular places to visit in Laos. They weren’t necessarily going “off the backpacker track” to find what they dubbed these authentic experiences.

So I had high hopes for Laos. And, for the first four days, Laos let me down.

I arrived in Vientiane, the capital. Everyone told me there wasn’t much to do there, but I found a cheap flight and I had to enter Laos somehow. I arrived at night, so I decided to stay 2 days so I’d have one day to explore Vientiane.

In the morning, I grabbed breakfast and walked to the Victory Monument (Patuxai). It was constructed to honor those who fought against the French for independence. (And, ironically, it looks a lot like the Arc de Triomphe in Paris).

I enjoyed my walk. It was a bit weird actually because Vientiane is so quiet. The streets aren’t chock full of traffic. No one was honking their horn incessantly. There were actual sidewalks (though, sometimes the sidewalks were also parking lots as is common in Asia). Intersections had crosswalks and lights to indicate when to cross (though, having spent 2 months in Asia and also because there was hardly any traffic, I ignored all the crosswalk lights).

It was, of course, glaringly hot. I had my umbrella out to shade from the sun, but otherwise it was a peaceful walk.

So I continued on to the famous temple in Vientiane, which is featured on Lao currency. Pha That Luong was, as temples go, not my favorite. The stupa and surrounds are covered in gold (probably just paint). It’s nice and impressive, but to me the best temples are the ones with many colors and intricate designs. It was very odd, however, to be at the temple and see only 1 other visitor in my 20 minutes of wandering around. Along one side of the temple were the usual rows of vendors selling trinkets and cold drinks and textiles and cheap clothes, but it was so quiet. Only one called out to me when I got close to her and when I said, “no thanks,” she immediately left me alone.

It was like being in an empty mall. Surreal after all the similar sights I’d visited that bustled with people and noise.

Well, I had seen the top two things in Vientiane and it wasn’t even noon. So I decided to visit Buddha Park, which many bloggers had written about positively. I was feeling pretty good about myself because I found a local bus that would take me there for less than $2 round trip while my hostel had listed that a tuk tuk was going to be $20 (round-trip).

And I am so glad I didn’t take a tuk tuk because the visit wasn’t even worth the $2 round trip bus ride. I had expected a grand park with ample paths to wander and impressive statues spread over a vast space. Instead, hundreds of random statues were crowded into a 2 acre space. I took a few photos, walked around the outskirts to see if there was something that I was missing and then got the bus back. It was a great disappointment.

So, Vientiane…definitely not much to do.

I headed back to town, found a place to get a cold milk tea, and walked to the park, hoping that I could find a bench to sit on a read my book for a while. That was also frustrating because the park had no benches. SE Asia in general has a deficit of public benches, but I can usually find at least a couple in parks. Not here.

Later, as night fell, I walked to the river front in search of the night market. As Vientiane seems to be sleepy and local, I thought there might actually be some worthwhile items at the night market. It was nice to see that only one or two stalls sold Laos t-shirts and tourist trinkets, but I was surprised to see a lot of familiar stuff. Even local-oriented night markets have twenty stalls selling the same range of cheap clothing, the same range of jewelry, the same phone cases and accessories.

I left the market area quickly and found the riverfront where finally I found a charming scene. I sat on some stone steps for about 20 minutes enjoying watching the kids playing on bouncy castles and riding county fair-type rides. On my other side, locals gathered around a small stage and big speakers where a woman was leading a dance-exercise class. This was a cool area with the joyful, everyday atmosphere.

Later, I did manage to find a small food market area that was brightly lit and serving a lot of exciting dishes. Two of the three things I got were delicious, though the dumplings were disappointingly cold.

For the following day, I booked a bus to Vang Vieng through my hostel, including a pick-up. When the “pick-up” arrived the next day at the door of the hostel, I shouldered my big backpack and followed him. We walked past a car, then past a motor bike, then turned a corner and walked past a row of small shuttle-vans and one bus. “Wait here,” he told me, pointing to a picnic table. So I did.

Twenty minutes later after a few other people arrived, he told us all to get on the bus. Glad I paid for the “pick-up.” It was this day, my second full day, that I also discovered that the exchange rate I’d gotten from the ATM the day horrible was absolutely horrible.

In Laos, 90% of prices I’d seen so far were listed in USD. But I didn’t have any USD so I’d gotten out Kip to pay for things. So, my taxi ride from the airport to my hostel was listed as $7 USD, but I paid in Kip, so the driver charged me 150,000 kip (which Google said was the equivalent of $6.77). But, when I calculated out how much I’d paid based on the exchange rate I got from the ATM, I really paid $7.28).

I was so confused because the ATM didn’t ask me if I wanted to use their conversion rate (which is usually high like this). So I found a new ATM and pulled out a tiny amount, but I got the same horrible conversion rate. It’s not very much, but I was feeling ripped off by Laos. Especially because if I’d just had USD, I wouldn’t be paying so much.

Turns out, after doing some research, that VISA just has a horrible exchange for Kip. So it had nothing to do with the ATM or Laos. It was my debit card giving me that trouble.

Needless to say, I wasn’t that impressed with Laos so far and “overpaying” even by a small margin was extra annoying because of it.

Then I arrived in Vang Vieng and it was stunning. The karst mountains around the town rose out of flat valleys, similar to the Ninh Binh area in Vietnam except the mountains were more tightly clustered together and were higher. The area was beautiful, the town was really small (the bus drove on a few dirt roads to get into town), and I was charmed.

I’d had some trepidation about Vang Vieng because it has a history as a big party town. And, though there were many hostels in town, they either were quiet and had bad reviews, or were complete party hostels with onsite bars and yet had good reviews. So I’d anxiously picked a party hostel so I could sleep in clean sheets.

The hostel was clean and beautiful, but the staff weren’t the nicest (maybe because they are usually surrounded by drunk, privileged westerners) and it was definitely a party hostel. After talking to a few girls in my room, I followed them to participate in that night’s pub quiz. The quiz part was interesting (asking a lot of questions about SE Asia), but it also involved shot-gunning beer and lots of free shots, so I left as soon as the quiz part was over.

Another unfortunate occurrence that coincidentally seemed to coincide with all the other unfortunate things in Laos was that this was the second day in a row that I was experiencing all-day acid reflux, or something like it. All I could taste was stomach acid burning in my throat for hours and nothing could get rid of it. The food in Vietnam hadn’t been super spicy but once I got to Laos I suddenly ate several very spicy dishes, so that could have been the cause. However, I’d eaten spicy dishes in Thailand and hadn’t experienced this, nor did I ever get it at home when eating spicy food. The thought that I wouldn’t be able to eat the spicy local dishes had me feeling worried and down as well. I was really anxious that night that this was going to be my new normal.

Vang Vieng is another one of those places where all the bloggers say to rent a motor bike and drive yourself. But I don’t drive a motorbike. I could get a tuk tuk to take me around, but that would be expensive. The hostel offered some tours that went to several different places. My top priorities were kayaking and the famous viewpoint just outside of town called Nam Xay Viewpoint. Of course, only the most expensive tour included both of those activities. So, I reluctantly signed up for that tour, committing to a full day of visiting a cave, three swimming spots, and then finally getting to kayak and hike the viewpoint. Someone who’d done it the day before told me it was fun.

But it was not fun.

The next morning I get picked up from the hostel and taken to a central point where the full-day people and the half-day people are split up.

“What tour are you doing?” the driver asks the seven of us full-day people. One couple is doing tour #3, one person is doing #4, another is doing #6, the second couple is doing #4, and I’m doing #1.

So I’m wondering how this is going to go…

The driver added some equipment to the top of the tuk tuk. Another guide got in and then we set off. Suddenly, we stopped and one of the couples was told to get out. They’re going tubing on the river with the guide. “Leave your bags,” the driver told them. “We’ll see you later.”

The couple left their backpacks and the girl left her phone and they carried their tubes down to the river with the guide. The rest of us headed off again in the bumpy tuk tuk.

Much later we stopped. “We’re going to do water cave and elephant cave instead of…” and he rattles off some other cave names. I didn’t care about the cave on my itinerary so I don’t care that he’s switching up, but another person in the tuk tuk didn’t have any caves on their itinerary. We look at each other, realizing we’re all in the chaos together, and follow the leader, trying to make the best of it.

We jumped into tubes and pulled ourselves along on a rope into the low-ceilinged cave, our headlamps bouncing around the walls. It was kinda fun, though the water is moving pretty swiftly against us so it’s definitely an arm workout. We went about 100 meters into the cave. Halfway the water force got too strong, so the guide told us to put our feet down, our tubes bouncing around our waists, and walk.

Then, he told us to get back in our tubes and go back the way we came. The water is still gushing around us so he had to hold the tubes. One woman fell in because the water was so strong and her tube went shooting down the length of the cave. We then went back.

I’m pretty shocked, to be honest. The whole thing felt quite redundant and not at all safe because of how fast the water was moving.

Afterward, the driver walked us through two more caves. Then, finally, we did something on my itinerary – kayaking!

The driver told me to leave my shoes (I’d worn hiking shoes because I was supposed to hike the viewpoint) and my bag in the tuk tuk and he would meet us at the pull-out. I was hesitant because the couple who’d previously left their bags over 3 hours ago still hadn’t been reunited with them, but I didn’t have a dry bag and getting all of my gear wet was worse.

I was glad to finally kayak, though the woman I shared the kayak with didn’t have this on her itinerary and was pretty nervous. We didn’t have to do a lot of work because we were going downstream and the river current was pretty strong. The other couple and the guide were in the other kayak and they went ahead just a bit. The guide had not said a single word to us and never looked back to check on us, even as he steered around the river.

At first, I just let us go wherever (I’m in the back, so I steer), but after we went through a patch of pretty rough water and only some quick maneuvering (thank goodness I’ve kayaked before) saved us from tipping, I followed the exact path the guide takes. But if that woman had been steering or if I hadn’t kayaked before, we absolutely would have tipped. The guide never said a word, never asked if I’d kayaked before, never told us to follow him. The scenery was beautiful and since I have kayaked, I thought it was fun. But the other woman was pretty terrified.

We stopped for lunch. The driver who’d said he’d meet us was actually there at the lunch point when we crawled out of the river, but he left immediately, driving off before I could get my shoes or my backpack which had my towel, my money, and my passport.

We ate lunch. The kayak guide told us the tuk tuk was on it’s way back to get us. And then we waited 45 minutes for it to come. When it did, it was a different tuk tuk and didn’t have my shoes or my backpack or the other woman’s backpack.

But the driver said we’d see the other tuk tuk at our next destination. All I could do was trust.

At our next destination we did find the other tuk tuk. Unfortunately, I had to walk through a bunch of mud and thistles to get my shoes, but I did retrieve them and I vowed to not let go of my bag for the rest of the day.

So, back to the chaos tour. There we were at a the zip-line place even though neither I nor my kayak companion were supposed to zip-line. It was getting pretty late in the afternoon, so finally, I asked the driver about the Nam Xay Viewpoint. He said he can take me there but it would be extra. “I paid for it already,” I told him and showed him the receipt. He got really quiet, probably realizing that we’d done almost nothing on my itinerary. So, he told me and the other woman how to walk to the Blue Lagoon One (which was on both of our itineraries) and promised to take me to the view point and Blue Lagoon Three afterward.

He did take me the viewpoint and I loved the muddy, rocky scramble to the top. The views were beautiful, everything I’d hoped for. I was, of course, drenched in sweat, but it was worth it. I felt slightly vindicated that the whole mess of a day hadn’t been for nothing.

When we got back down at 5:45, the driver asked if I wanted to go to Blue Lagoon Three.

“How far?” I asked. I was exhausted from doing a bunch of things that I hadn’t signed up for. “30 minutes.”

Well, we were already 30 minutes from town and it wouldn’t be worth going to to the swimming spot just to look at it for 5 minutes, so that meant at least 2 more hours out and about and coming back in the dark. I told him no. So, I paid for an expensive day tour where we ended up doing 3 of the 7 activities on my itinerary. None of the other people got to do all of their chosen activities either. And we’d been yanked around and forgotten and left to do some stupid and risky stuff. I was feeling pretty down.

When the tuk tuk dropped me off at my hostel, I went next door to pick up the laundry I’d dropped off the day before. It had been more than 24 hours so it should have been done. Instead, at 6:15, the doors were closed and the place shut.

So I was muddy, wet, exhausted, and now had no clothes to put on other than my pajamas. I really wanted to go home.

Back at the hostel, I went to the activities desk to ask for some money back and also book a bus or train to leave tomorrow, but the activities desk was also closed. I checked back with the laundry place and activities desk again an hour later and both still closed. That night I did not participate in any of the hostel activities and just went to bed. But something about a party hostel makes people think it’s ok to have loud conversations in the room until 11:30pm, so I didn’t really get any more sleep than the night before.

Around 7:30am the next morning I checked again for my laundry. Still closed.

I checked the activities desk. Still closed.

I hung around, checking back every half an hour, but both were still closed.

Finally, the activities desk opened at 9am. I talked to him about getting some money back and he said he’d called someone (probably the tour company) and confirm my story. Then I asked about trains. The 1:30 train was full so I could either get the 10:30 (which meant a 9:30am pick-up) or the 4:30pm.

I just wanted to get out of Vang Vieng. “I want to do the 9:30 but my laundry is still next door with the hostel-sponsored laundry service.” He went next door and came back saying that they were finally open.

So I told him to book the 10:30 train with 9:30 pick-up and ran to get my laundry. Where the shop owner promptly told me to sit down and wait: my laundry was still in the dryer.

I was supposed to be able to get it at 2pm the day before, so it was 19 hours after my pickup time and it still wasn’t done.

I ran back to the talk to the activities desk guy. He had already booked the train for me, but said I could get picked up at 9:40 instead and that he could give me a discount on the train ticket because of my experience the day before.

So I ran upstairs to pack my bag. Ran back down to get my laundry. Ran back up to shove my unfolded and still slightly damp clothes into my bag. And made it to the street at 9:39 for my pickup…

…Only to hop in the tuk tuk, drive into town to pick up one other person, and then drive 4 minutes out of town to make it to the train station before 10am.

Sitting in the train station in Vang Vieng, I was feeling completely fed up with Laos. I wanted to go home. I wanted to cry. I also hadn’t had any breakfast so I’m sure that wasn’t helping.

Any one of these events, or even two, strung together would have just been an adventure. Something to laugh about later. I know this. Even in the moment I can’t lay blame upon the country of Laos. It was the cumulative effect, especially of things beyond my control like the bad currency conversion and the acid reflux, which then made my patience for horrible organization and stupid activities even lower. Yet, even with all of this, I don’t hate Laos.

There were, of course, some highlights amidst the disappointments and frustrations. The beautiful scenery in Vang Vieng, finally getting to hike the Nam Xay Viewpoint, and the kayaking (while horribly run) was nice.

But, if what people meant by “not touristic” and “authentic” was poorly organized, no safety concerns, and never open, then I’m not sure what they liked so much.