Day 11: The long and winding road to Vientiane

It’s 5:45pm, I just got into Vientiane and I’m already thinking of how I’m going to get out. Not that there’s anything wrong with the city, it’s just that I need to be back in Bangkok before the 18th, and it’s already Friday tomorrow, so I need to book myself train tickets back to Thailand.

The bus pulled out from the station just outside Luang Prabang at 8am. It was interesting to see how different the places outside LP looked. It was more modern, and there were no tourists in sight. Riding the bus were mostly backpackers on their way to Vientiene like me, or hopping off at Vang Vieng.

The bus drove up and down the mountains, going slowly as there are sharp curves that bends to the left and right. Still, even with the driver’s careful maneuvering, a lot of passengers still got motion sickness, and the plastic distributed at the beginning of the trip was fully utilized. We passed through the worst of it on the first part of the journey. By the time we stopped for lunch, everybody was ravenous. Luckily, this time, the food stayed in their tummies.

While the bus was winding through the mountains, I kept looking at the electric posts that line the road. There doesn’t seem to be any lights along this road, and it must be really scary driving through the mountain in the dark. We arrive in Vientiane around 5:30pm, and since I don’t have any reservations, I just pointed to the names of the guesthouse I written down in my notebook and hoped my tuktuk driver knows where it is.

It turns out he didn’t. After conferring with a bunch of other tuktuk drivers, they really didn’t know which guesthouse I was talking about, so I pointed to another guesthouse at a different address. He knows where that is and drove me there. It turns out the guesthouse was full, and he insisted that he knows another place where he can take me. So he drives to this guesthouse that’s still pretty near the river, but I already had a bad feeling when I saw the door to the room. It reminds me of those hospital doors that are built wide to let hospital beds pass through easily, and inside, it was just as bad. It wasn’t dirty or anything, but it just has that feeling of being a hospital. I don’t think I can sleep there.

Not that the one I’m currently in is any better. I just relented since it was cheap and I just want to get rid of my tuktuk driver. I paid for two nights here, and tomorrow, I’m going to look for better digs. My target is to get out of Vientiane by Monday evening, so I have to buy my train tickets tomorrow as well.