We booked a bus/boat combo ticket to take the 2 day slow boat journey from Thailand into Laos. The bus ride to the border town was a bit arduous but we got there & filled in the immigration forms.
The company we used were a bit cheeky as we were told we could pay dollars, she said only baht. Took our dollars to exchange into baht then delivered our dollars back at the port minus a $10 each for their 'service charge'. Cheeky b*****s. Hey ho, we left Thailand & got a boat to the visa office in Laos. We were definitely on Laos time there waiting for our visa but all was ok. Grabbed a cushion & a sandwich for the boat & off we went.

It's a busy boat but you get your own car seat so it's not so bad. Once you're moving the outside provides the air con! We meandered down the river alternating between reading, listening to tunes & watching the jungle & wildlife go by. I found it quite relaxing, a real mix of people on the boat too. We made friends with a Swiss couple Charles & Veronique. He was Medicines San Frontiers & she was Red Cross so we had a great time learning about their jobs & their planned holiday trip in Laos.

Docked in Pak Beng for the night. That was interesting, standing on a floating plastic jetty waiting for our bags to be offloaded. Along with 100 other people meaning you're right near the edge!! Managed to grab our bags though & hiked up the hill (Grrrr, my pet hate!) to find a guesthouse. Luckily one right near the dock was good & cheap so we settled on that. Had a lovely Indian dinner & slept ready for the next day.

Back on the boat again for another 8 hours until we arrive at Luang Prabang.
Luang Prabang is a strange city (more like town) in that you forget you're in Asia. The French influence is still visible in the architecture & the abundantly available baguettes & croissants!! We spent time exploring the markets (the best one we've seen yet!) and the bars & restaurants in the area around our guesthouse. On recommendation we went to Utopia & really enjoyed the vibe there. Sy liked indulging in a Belgian beer at The House.

We met a german guy at the guesthouse who was on a hop on hop off tour & later on we saw some advertising that would change our plans somewhat.
Sy & I spoke about what we fancied doing here as we really hadn't researched the country other than our entry & exit point. The thing about Laos is transportation. There are no trains so only bus and the distances between destinations can be deceivingly long due to the road quality & landscape. We were looking at visiting the Plain of Jars in the North East of the country but a 10 hour journey to get there was not so appealing. We decided to see what the hop on hop off thing was like. I had used one with Gwen previously in Turkey & found it to be a great way to see things en route, meet people & do things you hadn't planned. The brochure & website looked good. We actually picked 2 routes to do, they a great range of routes inside Laos or routes through Thailand, Laos & Cambodia.

So we booked on to leave on the 1st route in a couple of days time. We had a drunken night as we tried the local Lao Lao rice whiskey. Fair to say I don't remember much of the end of the night, I learnt not to mix it with a fair few glasses of wine!!

We were woken early by a knock at the door. We opened it to see the German guy from earlier on a heap on the floor. He asked if we could take him to hospital as he wasnt well. Earlier that day he had mentioned his stomach was bad but he looked awful at that moment. Sy left to take him to hospital. When he came back he said they had put Florian (the German guy) on a drip to replenish fluids & prescribed anti biotics. They had also drawn blood incase it was malaria but it looked more likely that it would be food poisoning.
He was due back from hospital 6 hours later so we swung by to check on him & later bought him some steamed rice for him to try and eat. We felt awful as we were leaving the next day & here he was very ill all by himself. We informed the hostel as we were leaving in the morning but there wasnt much more we could do.
Then we popped to the pick up point to join our 1st stray travel tour.

Click here to view our Laos photos