After gorgeous weather during my five days in Chiang Mai it bucketed down the entire overnight bus ride to Nong Khai, across the border from Vientiane. In addition all of my stuff got wet due to a leaky roof and I had no way of charging my phone. Grab apparently doesn't operate in the area so I got a bite to eat and then took a tuk tuk to the border. As the driver walked off to get some change his tuk tuk started to roll away so myself and a customs officer held onto it until the driver got back; otherwise it would have rolled into traffic. After getting another passport stamp I took the bus on the Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge across the Mekong River. The visa for Laos costs $35 (US) and takes up an entire page in your passport. Finding a CouchSurfing host in both Bangkok and Chiang Mai was a piece of cake yet was next to impossible in Vientiane.
For 2020 I've set myself an ambitious goal of 20 new countries to visit and I've done two so far. As a collector of SIM cards I swapped out my Thai SIM card and purchased a Lao one. On the bus into Vientiane I noticed a flag with a sickle and hammer fluttering in front of a Mercedes-Benz dealership. Laos is officially one of the five remaining communist countries (the other four are North Korea, Cuba, China, and Vietnam) but communism is nowhere near as apparent as in Cuba or North Korea. Upon reaching the bus station I began walking toward Dream Home Hostel. First I stopped to grab a couple of postcards, as I haven't received one from Laos. Afterward, I visited That Dam; a large black stupa.
There I signed off my first geocache in Laos. I've now found caches in 31 countries. Just as in Thailand I'm sure to have an overdose of temples, stupas, buddha statues, and colour as I visited a temple on the way to the hostel.
After settling in at the hostel I got a traditional Laotian massage. They sure bend you all over the place and you feel gelatinous at the end. All wobbly after the massage I had a glass of wine and watched the sunset over the Mekong.
Just across the river is Thailand. As a light tea I got pork soup with spring onions and then had a few beers with a Canadian named Doug. We stayed up a bit late and discussed whether or not it's "Lao?" or "Laos?" The offical name of the country is Lao People's Democratic Republic (often shorted to "Lao PDR"). The language is Lao and the citizens are Laotian (pronounced like "lay ocean"). Even more confusing is that many foreigners pronounce th name of the country with a silent "s" but I've always pronounced it like "louse."
Tomorrow I'm prepared to explore the capital of Laos with all its splendour. After a few beers I was dreaming of what I'll see and experience...
