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Well, Well! The fun in Lao is most certainly continuing now we?re in their grand capital city, Vientiane. We boarded our bus nearly an hour late? apparently that is normal in this laid back, slow paced country, only to find that it is packed to the brim. Fold down seats in the isles and backpacks galore meant that the shortest of dwarfs would have struggled with leg room let alone Laura. We panicked a fair bit, imagining that this was our form of transport for the up and coming 4 hour bus journey, however thankfully a quick 10 minute journey down a pot holed, graveled track led us to the real bus station and we boarded the ?VIP bus? (In Lao this means the worst possible standard of bus just with the appealing title of VIP)
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After a relatively comfortable bus journey- we cleverly picked the front seats this time- we arrive in the capital. We?d been warned that the capital of Lao would be of no interest to us and that it was only a little bit more built up than Vang Vieng, but we had no idea just how under developed it would be. We looked around for a bit for a guesthouse, but instead settled on a fairly up-market hotel, fully equipped with satellite TV, a fridge, air-con (although that was most definitely not needed as it had been pouring down with rain for the past 24 hours), 3 beds, hot water and even a lift for our heavy bags? all for a hefty 3 pounds each! We settled in to our clean, fresh room and of course the TV went straight on!
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After a cracking American Idol show, we ventured out to get a meal. After passing several run down traditional Lao resteraunts, we came across Tex Mex. Oh how our mouths watered when we saw our meals in front of us? a huge platter fit for a king, of chips, spare ribs, rice, chilli con carne, chicken burrito, and salad! While Laura and Martha shared this delicious platter, poor old Nyima chomped away on her Mexican salad- which looked no more appealing than a bag of Tescos Value mixed cabbage and carrot. After the meal we looked around and decided that we had already seen the whole entire capital just by walking down the road, so we went straight back to the hotel to relax and watch some films.
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The next day we packed up our things, leaving our hotel room in the most beautiful condition and went downstairs to book our bus to Cambodia. The hotel was advertising tickets straight there and the lady the night before confirmed our seats for us? however this morning we are told we can only get a bus to Bangkok and then arrange further transport from there! So now we leave Lao at 5pm and have absolutely nothing to do for the next 5 hours. We have no money at all to pay for our bus journey so we go on a hunt to either change our traveler?s cheques or draw money out. But surprise surprise, NOWHERE is open seeing as it?s a Sunday! We are stranded? no money to eat, drink, go on the internet, pay for our bus tickets? We ask about 10 different people who all point us in a different direction of a place that is definitely open- which of course it wasn?t and after about an hour of traipsing around we start to really get frustrated with this weedy excuse for a capital city.
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Finally a ray of sparkling, bright light shines upon us and we spot a small place we?d been walking straight past for the last hour. We eventually manage to communicate with the man that we want small change in dollars and we walk away utterly relieved and dying for food? of course our rumbling tummies led us straight back to the Tex Mex and we greedily ate a whole platter each!
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As you can tell the only good thing about this place is that Mexican restaurant and we are excited to say the least about heading on to Cambodia! We now have a journey of over 24 hours ahead of us though so we are all feeling groggy and are seriously considering taking sleeping tablets!
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Will speak soon, hopefully with some more exciting tales! x x x x
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