Today we were picked up at 9am and whisked to the bus station for our short ride back to the capital, Vientiane - only 3 hours this time! We were very tempted to book into Hotel Khamvongsa again after our last stay, but we decided that we should really stay somewhere cheaper this time so we headed to Saysouly Guesthouse instead when we arrived. We'd found this place in the Lonely Planet guidebook and it was OK, although it was a bit tired and needed updating. O...

Our last day in the capital of Laos today; our bus wasn't due to leave until 8pm so we had time to fit in a few more sights. After another fantastic breakfast at the hotel, we left our bags behind and caught a tuk-tuk to a place called COPE, on the outskirts of town. COPE stands for the Cooperative Orthotic and Prosthetic Enterprise, which is a bit of a mouthful but bear with us - it was one of the most interesting and inspiring places we've visited on the who...

After a very good night's sleep in our massive bed we went down to the restaurant for our free breakfast - another rarity for us! We'd read some really good reviews about the breakfast here and soon saw why. We were handed a menu with 6 different breakfast options - I went for the 'light European' breakfast of fresh fruit, yoghurt, croissant, butter and Laos jam, while Dave went for the 'American' of fried egg, bacon beans and toast (isn't that a full English n...

Woke up on the sleeper train again today after another less-than-perfect night's sleep - still much better than the overnight buses though! We arrived at Nong Khai, close to the border, at about 8:30am, and saw that the international train to Laos was leaving at 9am. We quickly bought our tickets for the 15 minute train ride - only 20 baht each! Then it was through passport control on the station platform to be stamped out of Thailand and onto the train in 3rd ...