2013 Laos – Luang Prabang
Thursday 5th December
It was only a one-hour flight to Luang Prabang in Laos, a small, highly recommended town. Our hotel was outside town and a big disappointment. I wondered why it had such good reviews on booking.com but soon realised it had nothing to do with the accommodation and everything to do with the manager. The woman who owned the hotel employed her gay son to manage it and he was so likeable it would be difficult to give them a bad review.
The building was a masterpiece of bad design. The rooms were dark, with dark shabby furniture. There was a bath actually in the bedroom and a curtain to pull across for privacy. The light switch for the toilet also controlled the light above the bath so if you turned the toilet light on in the middle of the night, it lit up the whole bedroom. It was in a general state of bad repair and we would have liked to have moved somewhere else but apart from having paid in advance we wouldn’t have had the heart to tell the manager. It was frustrating walking around town and seeing so many nice little guest houses but we accepted our fate and were determined to make the most of it.
The drop in temperature came as a shock. Once the sun went down it got quite cold and as the hotel was two kilometres from the centre of town we had to sit in an open tuk-tuk which was freezing. During the day it was nice and warm though. We went to the market every night where sellers set up their wares on pavements instead of stalls which made a pleasant change. There was a large square with lots of seating where they showed films that people could watch free of charge. One evening we joined the crowds to climb Mount Phou Si (sacred hill) and watch the sunset, which was spectacular, although a little crowded. 
Kuang Si Falls was a group of pools fed by a waterfall. Some of the pools were busy with youngsters swinging on a rope and dropping into the water. 
We chickened out of that but we did brave the cold water and had a swim. The highlight of the afternoon was seeing the face of a woman who went into the public toilet and came running out with her hand over her mouth and nose looking like she had just been to hell and back.
When we first arrived in Thailand I was very sensible about what and where I ate but as I had a strong stomach, my standards dropped and even after eating in a couple of dodgy places I was ok so I got a bit overconfident. We were in a reputable restaurant which was full of Westerners and for a change I thought I would order sweet and sour pork. It was a pretty stupid choice even without the waitress’s warning. When she heard my order she repeated the word “pork?” as if to say “are you crazy? You want pork?” Federika also warned me but I still didn’t listen. I ate half of it as it wasn’t very good anyway and never thought anything more about it until I spent half the night on the toilet. The worst thing was that the toilet was very small and the extractor fan was linked to the light so I couldn’t turn it on because it would have lit up the bedroom and woke Federika. It was a very unpleasant night and although I was ok in the morning I still took it easy and stayed in the room. The restaurant that the hotel claimed to have didn’t exist and the only other restaurant in our little area had a kitchen that no self-respecting dog would eat in so we had to go to town for a light lunch.
Fortunately, these things never lasted long with me so by the afternoon we were able to go on a two-hour cruise up the Mekong River to visit the Pac Ou Caves. Cruise might not be the right word as the boat looked like it had been knocked together out of driftwood. We had tiny seats like those used by kids in infant schools and for padding, there was a thin piece of carpet but it was fun and my arse did eventually recover.
Our first stop was the Whisky Village, so called because they distil their own whisky out of rice. I hate whisky but I had a taste of theirs and it was more like a strong sweet liquor than whisky. As for their “still” it consisted of an oil drum with a pipe sticking out the side where the spirits dripped into a filthy cloth. 
Their whisky was on sale in bottles that contained either a small snake or a scorpion. Why anyone would want to drink something with a drowned snake floating around inside was beyond me. 
Next stop was the Pac Ou Caves which contained lots of statues of Buddha and other various religious artefacts. It was divided into an upper and lower cave. The local authorities didn’t seem to have the hang of tourism as the upper cage was in complete darkness so only visible to the well-informed tourists who had brought torches. Most of the time I couldn’t see a thing. Someone could have made a fortune selling torches but there was nothing. Or maybe there was someone selling torches but no one could see them because it was so dark? We did manage to get a glimpse of some of the statues and I must admit the dim light did give them a special quality. 
Coming back from the caves we were chatting to an Irishman and got a shock when he told us he was having trouble getting a visa for Vietnam and we were due to fly there the next day. I was always very careful about these things and had read on the Vietnamese website that we could get a visa on arrival at the airport which was quite common. Back at the hotel I did some more research and found a lot of conflicting information, including two Norwegians in our hotel who told us they had just come from Hanoi and where they had no trouble getting a visa on arrival. Federika phoned Laos Airlines who we were flying with and they confirmed that we did need a visa and they wouldn’t let us on the plane without one. After further research, I discovered that you definitely could get a visa on arrival but for that, you need to show them a “letter of approval” from an agency. However, the Vietnamese embassy in the UK advises against getting a letter of approval as there were so many bogus agents out there. As for the Norwegians, it turned out that Scandinavians didn’t need visas at all. So there you are, clear as mud.
It looked like we were going to lose our money for the flight and hotels but we were lucky that a Vietnamese consul had opened in Luang Prabang only a few weeks earlier. They claimed to be open at 7 am which we took with a pinch of salt but we got there at 8 am which turned out to be when they did actually open. Our hearts sank when the man behind the counter said it would take three days to get the visa but when we told him we needed it immediately he said we could pay an extra $10 each and we could have it at 2 pm. What a relief.
After the Consulate we went for breakfast in a lovely little café on the main street and sat at a table outside with a coffee and a pastry. We were basking in the sunshine and thinking how much we had enjoyed our stay in Luang Prabang when a truck pulled up opposite. A man got out and walked over to our table, grabbed our umbrella and threw it in his truck. Our waitress suddenly appeared and quickly started clearing our table. Then a waiter asked us to stand and the next thing we knew, the table and chairs were taken away and we were left standing with coffee cups in hand wondering if we were part of one of those hidden camera hoaxes. The waitress tried to explain what had happened and although we didn’t understand a word of what she said, we guessed that they weren’t supposed to have tables on the pavements. They had lost the umbrella and if they hadn’t removed the table and chairs they would probably have lost them as well. We always associate this kind of daft bureaucracy with England but I suppose it happens everywhere, even in countries that are so desperate to attract tourism.
Back at the hotel, the manager and his staff gave us a big send-off, pleading for a good review on booking.com.
It was one of the worst hotels I had ever stayed at and I wouldn’t have thought twice about giving it a bad review but Federika insisted on a good one because the manager was so nice. If other people had been more honest about it we would never have stayed there so rather than lie, I wouldn’t write anything and left it to Federika if she wanted to, although she never did.
We had been assured that our visas would be ready by 2 pm but you never know so it was a great relief to find everything ok and we made our way to the airport.
2013 South East Asia
