On Friday 13th, we headed off on a trip to the Kong Lo cave - a 7km cave with underground river flowing through it.
The setting was stunning - an aquamarine lagoon circled by more of the gothic limestone cliffs that Laos does so well. We’d come to the cave with some of our fellow guests - a French couple, a Belgian couple and a German couple. We were split into 3 per boat, so I jumped in with Belgian pair, Ollie with the French couple.
The entrance to the cave is beautiful - a jagged cutting into the rock. Armed with head torch, we set off into the cave. One of the things I liked about the cave was the fact that it was used as a rat run by local people - I mean, why clamber over a mountain when you can whiz through on a long tail? I do like a functional tourist attraction.
Inside, the cave was filled with cavernous (funny that) halls - some were 100ft high. We were there in the dry season, so water levels were low, which meant scrambling out of the boat and wading on several occasions as our boatmen lifted it over rocks.
In the central of the cave is an island. We got out here, to check out the stalactites & stalacmites. As we’re in Asia, naturally some of the rock formations had been turned into handy offering areas - even in the Kong Lo cave, spirits need to be left sticky rice.
There were plenty of what looked like tiny diamonds on the rock - although Ollie pointed out that it was more likely to be salt deposits. Which is slightly duller.
After taking some spooky photos in the blue lighting, we continued through the cave, eventually reaching the end and sunshine once more. After a lunch stop (mmmm more sticky rice - ick. On a side note, Lao people eat nothing but sticky rice. Which would normally be ok as I love sticky rice. But here they cook it SO badly - it’s revolting)
After journeying back through the cave, we had to pick up a truck back to the main Route 13 in order to pick up a local bus heading south. After waiting by the side of the road, dining on a fine range of crisps and peanuts, a bus eventually stopped & we jumped on. Ollie squeezed into a tight spot at the back, I ended up on a plastic stool in the middle for a while, before claiming a recently vacated seat next to a man who was really quite unhappy at having to share with me. Tough. It was a shortish journey - just an hour and a half or so to the town of Tha Khaek, where we had about an hour to kill before our 8 hour local bus down to the Southern city of Pakse.
We headed to a local hostel and drank copious amounts of coffee whilst Ollie had a battle with the internet (narrowband is sooooo 2001). There was an amazing festival going on at the local temple - if we’d been staying longer it would have been great to check out, but as it was, we just caught glimpses of the fireworks.
We headed back to the bus station, hoping to flag down a tuk-tuk. One arrived, and we started to negotiate. Once again, I hadn’t learned that negotiation was much harder when you’re stood there with a backppack on, talking to the only tu tuk driver around. So we lost our driver for the sake of 10p. I wasn’t very happy with myself, and started a quick march in the direction of the bus station.
Luckily, Ollie managed to flag down a lovely tuk tuk driver and his wife, who got us to the bus station on time. Unfortunately, when we got onto our bus, it was absolutely rammed, and we had to resort to plastic seats in the aisle which wasn’t a great prospect for an overnight bus for 8 hours.
We snatched a quick game of Uno, which fascinated our fellow passengers, and set off towards Pakse.
We soon noticed that on one of the seats near us, there was only one person sat, but she’d put her bag on the chair and was studiously avoiding our eye. After being frightfully English and not saying anything for a while, eventually I went and plonked myself down. She wasn’t moving the bag though, which meant we were completely crushed. Ollie used this opportunity to have a snooze on the floor of the bus in a Hanoi sleeper train fashion.
Luckily, after about half an hour, my ‘friend’ got off the bus, so Ollie and I had a proper seat for the rest of the journey. Once again, it wasn’t the most restful nights sleep, and I’m eternally grateful for my ipod, but we got to Pakse at about 6am.
We managed to grab the last room at our guesthouse, and paused for some breakfast, at which point we saw a sight I’d been looking forward to seeing since I arrived in Laos - a procession of monks collecting alms. See, there are some benefits to being up all night.
It was always going to be a struggle for us to see as much of Laos as we wanted to in our short space of time, so in Pakse we elected to join a group tour around some of the local sites. A full day of sightseeing after an overnight bus was always likely to be a bit of a struggle, but we do like a challenge.
First stop: the Bolaven Plateau. When the French colonised Laos, they spotted that this flattish, cooler area would be perfect for growing tea and coffee to rival the plantations of the Indian sub-continent. After the French left, the coffee plantations had a downturn, but a new accord with the Vietnamese (who adore their coffee) has meant that Laos tea & coffee is back up and running.
Everything here is done by hand - new tea leaves are picked by hand every two weeks - the primary crop here is Green Tea which has a much wider market in Asia than black tea. The leaves are then briefly dried out, and crushed and roasted. All of which takes about 24 hours
Coffee production is a lot more drawn out - the beans need to dry in the sun for about 2 weeks before any of the roasting begins.
Our next stop was the highest waterfalls in Laos - a 120m twin waterfall of Tad Fane. Unfortunately, as we were on a whistlestop tour, we didn’t get to see the falls from close up, only at a distance. They were spectacular though - very Jurassic park as the falls shot over cliffs amidst jungle.
Next stop was a local village famed for it’s coffin production.
I’m never very comfortable with the human zoo aspect of tourism, so I didn’t enjoy this part much. It was the first place on the trip that I encountered children begging, not because they were homeless, but because they knew that if they asked tourists, they’d get things. Even though the village was dirt poor, I refused to give anything to the kids - I think it’s pretty irresponsible and teaches kids to beg rather than work for things. I prefer to help in a more constructive way.
We headed off to some more falls, this time at the village of Tat Lo, where we stopped for lunch. This was a beautiful little resort which had a great feel to it - it would have been great to spend a few days here, swimming in the falls and doing some trekking - a definite place to return to when I next visit Laos.
Our final set of falls was at a local tourist village - this place had been set up to demonstrate the living styles of some of the tribes within Laos - interesting, but once again, a little bit Disney Laos. Instead, Ollie and I set off for a scramble over some rocks to our final waterfall - Pha Suam. The Lao really do do waterfalls very well.
After a long day, we headed back to Pakse, and decided to go for a pizza and beer - Ollie’s first beer since Vang Vieng. Well, it was valentines day, and we were both single and alone, so we thought we may as well console ourselves with a little western food.
Next day it was another early start as we had yet another marathon day. After grabbing a quick breakfast off the street - baguette (with Laughing cow this time - luxury!) and iced coffee, we jumped in a tuk-tuk to the bus station to get a local bus down to the town of Champasak.
We got to the bus station, jumped on our Songthaew, and were faced with two unusual things: a live pig in a sack and a Songthaew filled with Westerners. It’s very offputting when you’re trying to travel in local fashion, to be met with loads of other Westerners. WE are meant to be the daring and intrepid ones.
Hey ho. The Songthaew filled up with more locals, and off we headed down to Champasak which was only an hour away. On the way, we did have a tyre blow out, which once again caused me to lose an octave of my hearing - after a brief pause to repair, we were on our way again.
Champasak was going to be a bit of a smash & grab mission for us - we were going to head to Wat Pu Champasak, then get straight back out onto the road to the 4000 islands. This meant we were on a tight schedule as the last bus to the islands left at 4pm. The other Western tourists were impressed by our speed and efficiency (HA - we are proper travellers), and one of them, an Italian - Max, decided to join us in our plans.
Champasak is unusual for Laos - it’s on the Western bank of the Mekong, after the river kinks in and no longer provides a border with Thailand. To cross the mighty Mekong, we had to go over on a car ferry - which was actually two rusting barges lashed together with a platform on top - genius.
The Songthaew pulled into Champasak - phase one complete, We then negotiated a trip to the temple in a tuk-tuk and headed off. We promptly broke down - our second transport issue of the day. The temple was 10km from town, and we broke down in the town, so as our driver struggled to fix it, Ollie ran off to see if he could find another driver, which he did, but that driver had a flat tyre.
It seemed as though it was to be a day of transport issues.
Our original driver got the tuk-tuk started and we shakily headed off towards the temple. Halfway there, and miles from civilisation, the tuk tuk gave out for the final time. Drat. Our driver flagged down a passing pick-up truck, laden with big water bottles. The boys jumped into the back of the truck, I was put in the cab (booooooo).
We arrived at the Wat and headed off for an explore. The temple pre-dates Angkor Wat, and although has nothing on Angkor in terms of size, some of the same features are included - the avenue to the temple, the building style etc. This Wat is built into a hill, so we had a bit of exercise in the midday sun to climb up. Sacrifices were made here, and Ollie naturally decided to see if he could fit into a lizard shaped altar. Bizarrely, he could.
It was a really stunning setting, with great views over the countryside - well worth our flying visit, but now it was a dash back to the road - the 10km back to Champasak, a ferry then another tuk-tuk back to the main road where we could pick up our bus south. Our tuk-tuk driver had said he’d come and pick us up at the Wat, but the damage appeared to be terminal and he wasn’t there, so we jumped into a local Songthaew to get back to the ferry. We arrived at the river just in time to catch a crossing, and made it to the road for about 3.45
Had we made it for the last bus, or would we have to find somewhere to stay for the night?
A few minutes later, a pick up truck pulled over, offering us a lift. We grabbed it - a much more fun way to travel, and this time, FINALLY, I was able to sit in the back of the truck with the boys.
And what a great way to see the country - you couldn’t wipe the grins off our faces. We got to the South in super quick time, having travelled through some gorgeous scenery, seen loads of local life in the villages and had a great and comfortable trip. Absolutely brilliant - I loved that journey.
We arrived at the shore of the Mekong, just in time for sunset, chartered our long tail and set off towards our final destination - the island of Don Det.
