The capital of Laos, was not what you could call a sprawling metropolis, in fact it was the smallest and quietest capital I have ever been to, but it was nice. Little french Cafes and coffee shops dotted around bars and restaurants on the banks of the Mekong and a few sights to see.
As we only spent one day there we did a bit of a whirlwind walking tour of the major sights including Wat Sisaket that had some beautiful murials painted on the walls that are centuries old (unfortunately that means that they are in quite bad shape) and it houses some 2000 buddhas some of which are older than the temple itself dug up by archeaologists in the surrounding area. Unusually though it is built in the Siamese (Thai) style, which they think is why it survived the attacks on Laos from Thailand many centuriess ago making it the oldest surving monestary in the city. The Wat also had a really nice Buddha with a Naga hood (which means that Buddha is protected by a five headed serpent that shelters him) and a really old library and we saw the presidential palace which was next door but we couldnt go in.
We also went to Patuxay, the city's memorial which is knows as the Laos Arc de Triomphe, and as the vertical runway. Apparently the concrete to build it was given to them by the Americans to build a runway, and instead they half built this in the 60's and never completed it! But it had a brilliant view of the city and some really nice landscaped gardens around (which is unusual as there are hardly any gardens landscaped or not in Laos!)
We had a bit of a wander around the local market where they sell everything from handbags to gold jewellery to washing machines!
And to be honest that was about it, we ate quite a bit of Indian food and we had free entertainment from a local drunk business man in the restuant shouting at the owner as he gave money to a beggar!
The people here generally seem richer than those up north or maybe just because it's a capital city, and the weather is definatley getting warmer again after the coolness of northern thailand. But after our one day tour we were off and we caught a local bus to Savannakhet which you have to share of course with the locals and their 10,000 loads of belongings that they take with them (one couple we spoke to said they saw a family moving house on them taking all their belonging including their moped onto the bus, we were lucky however and didn't see one chicken!) They are very cramped and the 5 hour journey becomes 8 hours on hard seats, We were lucky though some people got plastic stools in the aisles that they had to sit on for a whole 8 hours! At one stop we got off to stretch our legs and saw a lot of women peelimg lemongrass all sitting in a row...with the obligatory woman selling whole sundried dead squirrels at the end, and in the toilets it was 1000kip for the loo or 2000kip if you wanted to really relax and take a bath!
But we did finally make it and found Savanakhet to be a dive! It was a nothing town, the arse end of nowhere, no street lights and nothing at all to do. We only planned to stay one night before doing the second leg of our journey to Pakse the following morning, but we wandered round for ages unable to find a restaurant or a bar or...well anything! So we didnt do much just went to bed!
Got up reeeeeeeeeally early again the next morning and went to Pakse, again on a local bus (cheap and cheerful!) however this time they were all out of plastic stools for the isles so on the tiny benches there were three of us and the bloke that shared ours fell asleep on Si's shoulder! But again in good time we got to Pakse, found a nice guesthouse and chilled out for the evening....luckily there's much more to do here and 2 Indian restaraunts over the road! Its like being in Lye, home from home!