5th October 2006
Yesterday we went to Luang Prabang’s ‘biggest’ tourist attraction, the Pak Ou caves. They are 2 caves, supposedly filled to the brim with monster, historic Buddha statues and shrines. After a 1 hour tuctuc ride (on the dodgiest, most deadly MOT-failed tuctuc in the history of the world) we were hoping for something magical and full of culture.
We travelled over to the other side of the Mekong river by a little boat and were all thoroughly disappointed with the result. Two rather small caves with approx 200 mini statues of Buddha awaited us. We then had to face another ride of death in the fumigating tutuc. On the way to the caves we spotted Victor and Pete from trekking and made them come with us too. I think they were pretty pissed off they said yes. In the evening we found a nice French-cum-Italian restaurant and had an eclectic assortment of pizza, soup, salads and roast potatoes.
We left Luang Prabang this morning to head south to Vang Vieng. The journey takes about 6 hours and the route is solidly through mountainous, remote areas. It is basically one long winding road called Route 13 connecting north and south. It is renowned as being a very dangerous road, rife with ‘bandits’ who hold busses hostage. More info about this road can be read here: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,421079,00.html
However, there is no other way out of Luang Prabang other than to fly, which the girls didn’t want to do or by boat which takes 3 days.
We were advised when booking that our bus was ‘VIP’ and not a public bus. Meaning it would not stop and pick up locals – or bandits! – so we assumed we would be safe. About 3 hours in to the journey, the bus stopped in a small market village. Gill and I got off the bus to for a comfort break. In front of us, on the stairs of our bus, is a man holding a massive rifle. # Jesus-Christ-what-the-effing-hell-is-he-doing-with-that…
We never got a change to go to the loo. We were told to sit down and we left. As we went back to our seats, I found the rifle man sitting in my seat. Accompanying him were 4 other rifle men, dressed rather menacingly. The gunmen spread themselves out throughout the bus; one centrally on the back row, 2 near the front, 2 in the middle. I took my stuff quickly from where rifle man was sitting and moved to another seat, the girls followed so we were all together.
We had no idea what was going on, they never said a thing. No one explained anything, why they had guns, what they wanted. We were absolutely shitting ourselves. One of the gunmen kept turning around in his seat and leering at us 4 girls, making eye-contact with the guy at the back of the bus.He made sure his rifle was in sight at all times, never laying it flat. No one spoke at all for the entire bus ride. There were only about 12 passengers, all young travellers. I remember thinking, these guys could literally do anything they want now; shoot us, steal our stuff, take one of us away, rape us and we wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. It was pretty terrifying. After about an hour, they left as quietly as they got on.
In Vang Vieng, we are staying at a little hostel called Malany. It is much more upbeat here compared to Lunag Prabang, although it is actually a smaller town. It is lively and has lots of bars and people milling about.
The town is famous for its ‘Friends’ bars. These are bars which have cushions all over the floor or on little platforms for you to lounge about on. They play Friends videos on repeat, ALL DAY while you get happily drunk! Lizzie and Gill are back on their whiskey buckets, while I am drinking copious amounts of fake Malibu. Lovely.
Tomorrow we are Tubing. I can’t really visualise what this is going to be like, but apparently you go down the river in rubber rings, like inner tubes. There are bars all along the river’s edge. When you want stop for a drink, you raise your hand up and they throw you a rope. It’s meant to be hilarious, and after all the boring caves and temples we’re really forward to it!
Today, on the bus journey here to Viang Vieng, we had continuous spectacular views of the mountains, jungle and local villages. It was slightly marred by the whole bandit-with-rifle incident but the views were still beautiful.
This evening we spotted Sponge Bob again, standing right by us in the friends bar, in his Death Railway t-shirt. He was talking to 2 very boring looking American girls and even THEY looked bored with him. Clearly it is not just us.
Managed to get a snap of Sponge Bob:
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