Passage to Xam Neua
What would have been a long journey of about 8 to 9 hours ended up being just over 11 hours. The roads are good, winding and beautiful. The traffic is almost non-existent. About 70km away from our destination we heard a loud thud proceeding from our precious transport. The driver stopped to discover a broken bolt meant to secure the fork of the front wheel to it's steering bar.
With the broken half in hand he proceeded to try to remove the rest of the bolt to replace it with another bolt taken from some other less important part of the bus. When this attempt failed and with two trucks by now backed up behind us the driver just put the wheel back on and drove us on to Xam Neua. In the 2 hours we waited broken down next to this main highway the amount of traffic passing in our direction we could count on our one hand. The rest of the journey was fine except that we hit and drove over a small cow, ripping away the right-side head light housing of our bus. We were very relieved to finally hit our comfy bed which we managed to find at about 9 pm. The bus rested for the night at the bus station. Early the next morning Johan went to enquire about onward travel only to see our bus loaded and ready to return from where it had come. Makes one shudder.
Our reason for stopping over in Xam Neua, besides our desired ongoing passage to Vietnam, was to tour the caves in nearby Vieng Xai. There are a lot of karsts around here and of the 102 known caves in the area more than 12 of them have really interesting political history, namely that they served as the former Pathet Lao (Vietnamese supported liberation movement in Laos) secret (and bomb-proof) headquarters. The two of us and two other guys we met on the bus helped fill up a songthaew - a large tuk-tuk like vehicle and headed to Vieng Xai, 1.5 hours away. We managed to find the caves authority office where our guide rented us some bikes.
The whole experience was very relaxing - cycling from cave to cave, the only tourists around. We visited about 5 caves which had been created or modified to shelter revolutionaries and their entourage. Each had a special emergency room fitted with a Russian donated "oxygen machine" good for purifying air in the event of gas bombs. There are also Russian cars to be seen around the premises. One natural cave is so big that a section was modified into an amphitheater where none other than the Russian circus was shipped in to entertain the comrades.
According to our guide the people in the rural areas may very well not recognize the existence of various Caucasian countries but group all white "falangs" (term for foreigner, literally meaning "big nose") as either American of French!
The same New Year's/ball throwing festival was still underway in this small town and our guide took us to the center of the festivities. A great lunch of Lao beer, fish and rice followed Johan's try at a dart throwing game where he managed to win some sweets.
With the broken half in hand he proceeded to try to remove the rest of the bolt to replace it with another bolt taken from some other less important part of the bus. When this attempt failed and with two trucks by now backed up behind us the driver just put the wheel back on and drove us on to Xam Neua. In the 2 hours we waited broken down next to this main highway the amount of traffic passing in our direction we could count on our one hand. The rest of the journey was fine except that we hit and drove over a small cow, ripping away the right-side head light housing of our bus. We were very relieved to finally hit our comfy bed which we managed to find at about 9 pm. The bus rested for the night at the bus station. Early the next morning Johan went to enquire about onward travel only to see our bus loaded and ready to return from where it had come. Makes one shudder.
Our reason for stopping over in Xam Neua, besides our desired ongoing passage to Vietnam, was to tour the caves in nearby Vieng Xai. There are a lot of karsts around here and of the 102 known caves in the area more than 12 of them have really interesting political history, namely that they served as the former Pathet Lao (Vietnamese supported liberation movement in Laos) secret (and bomb-proof) headquarters. The two of us and two other guys we met on the bus helped fill up a songthaew - a large tuk-tuk like vehicle and headed to Vieng Xai, 1.5 hours away. We managed to find the caves authority office where our guide rented us some bikes.
The whole experience was very relaxing - cycling from cave to cave, the only tourists around. We visited about 5 caves which had been created or modified to shelter revolutionaries and their entourage. Each had a special emergency room fitted with a Russian donated "oxygen machine" good for purifying air in the event of gas bombs. There are also Russian cars to be seen around the premises. One natural cave is so big that a section was modified into an amphitheater where none other than the Russian circus was shipped in to entertain the comrades.
According to our guide the people in the rural areas may very well not recognize the existence of various Caucasian countries but group all white "falangs" (term for foreigner, literally meaning "big nose") as either American of French!
The same New Year's/ball throwing festival was still underway in this small town and our guide took us to the center of the festivities. A great lunch of Lao beer, fish and rice followed Johan's try at a dart throwing game where he managed to win some sweets.
Culture shock: In Laos MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) is available everywhere and you will find it liberally added to all your food. In fact, on a restaurant table you will find MSG and pepper containers rather than salt and pepper containers! Salt has to be specifically requested! The MSG manufacturers even have aprons advertising their product!
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