We caught an early 'VIP' bus from Luang Prabang down to Vang Vieng. VV was supposed to be a backpackers haven and a 'must do' on the south east asia trail, allegedly. A 'VIP' bus does have many advantages compared to other Laos bus. It is priced to attract tourists (ie is quicker, less inclined to break down, but more pricey) so there were no bags of rice on the floor this time. We also had a VCD to watch 'Windtalkers' (Nick Cage)....

By 0930 we had found a cheaper and better hotel for the following night, which was nice. Our new base was close to the Mekong and a shedload of washing was gratefully deposited with the owner. By lunch we had waved goodbye to our passports (applying for Cambodian visas - to be reunited with passports in Vientiane later this week) and then we were off to the waterfall at Tat Kuang Si for the afternoon. Our minibus had some interesting nurses from Germany and Austr...

We had a day of kayaking planned in Lam Nam Tha. But this was about the only chance we would get for the next few days to get some travellers cheques cashed at the bank, so Dave headed into town on a tuk-tuk (the lodge was about 6km from town) to check out the 'Lao Development Bank'. It was great! Whilst waiting to become a kip (Laos currency) millionairre, the bank's TV showed Chris Benoit applying a 'crippler crossface' to William Regal, whi...

Up and away from China - we checked out from Mengla, and got a cycle ride down to the 'southern' bus station. Easy enough we were on our last Chinese bus - the 0900 to the border. We relented with the relentless money exchanger and changed some yuan into kip. Our 90 minute ride to the border was not vastly disturbed by roadwork incompetence this time - although we did see the teams of 'diggers' who were the root cause of the chaos. It appeaars tha...