Vang Vieng

After a night's pitstop in Luang Prabang following Muang Ngoi, I took off for Vang Vieng, tubing capital of Laos. I decided to avoid the millions (ok, 10-20) of travel agencies that wanted to sell me a spot in a small air-conditioned mini-van or VIP bus full of only foreigners, and I headed to the bus station by tuk tuk, expecting a bus to be leaving before too long. Afterall, Vang Vieng is on the way to Vientiane, Laos' capital, and there's only one road connecting Luang Prabang and the capital.

I arrived to the station just after noon expecting there to be a 12:30 or 1pm bus, as my guide book suggested there might be, and I saw three backpackers on the ground sprawled about their bags and playing cards. Good sign to see some foreigners waiting, I thought - that means that the bus I needed hadn't left yet, and hopefully there would be one soon. Wrong. The next bus left at 2pm, despite signs all over to the contrary.

I bought a ticket and plopped down close to the three backpackers, who were English. We started chatting and I was soon invited to play some gin rummy. I found out that they had been waiting since about 10:30am, and the 11am bus wasn't full enough to go, so they'd deferred to the next time of 2pm. Not a good sign. Luckily, the bus did indeed leave at 2, and we were treated to some beautiful scenery and a very, very windy road. Right as we were setting off, the driver's helper walked through the bus handing everyone 1 or 2 plastic bags meant to be used as sick bags if needed.

We ended up being just fine, and I enjoyed the views immensely. Laos is a beautiful country - green and full of winding roads, which means big hills/mountains. At about 8pm, we were dropped on the side of the road, and we walked to the main strip of Vang Vieng.

Vang Vieng is a very unique place. There are several things that define the small town, and I think that "Friends" is probably the most defining of all features, as there are literally 5-6 restaurants side-by-side that include seats you lean back against so you're basically laying down, all facing the same direction, which has several TVs mounted against one wall, all playing "Friends." You just have to listen for a couple of minutes, and then you'll figure out if they're playing the season you'd like to see. If not, there are another 4-5 restaurants for you to plop down in for several hours.

What a crazy concept! It threwme off when I first got there, but by my second (and last) evening, I had joined the masses and watched a couple of episodes.

The two main things to do around Vang Vieng are tubing and caving. I decided to fast-track it on out of there, so I chose to try out the tubing. For about $5, you rent a tube, and get taken about 5km upstream of town. And that's where the fun begins!

Tubing in and of itself is fun, but tubing in Vang Vieng is a bit dangerous. Not due to rapids or rocks - but because the river is lined with bars, and all bars have some sort of device from which you can hurtle yourself into the water from up high.

I took off down the river with my 3 English friends from the bus, and we stopped at basically every bar. We had a dry bag that we'd rented between the 4 of us for clothes and money, and we traded off who had to float with it. We started off slow, not drinking at all of them. The first one had a ridiculously-high rope swing (*note: the swings were more like trapezes than swings) that I refused to go up to, but the second was a bit more up my alley. The second bar had a zipline starting at about 4-5m high and finishing at about 3-4m. I was a bit nervous before I went, but it wasn't nearly as fast as it looked, and I landed in the water without any problems. After nursing a bit more of my beer (my first), I went again. Fun!

Then the crew headed across the river to another rope swing. I needed to finish my beer, so I said I'd join them. When you're floating down the river and you want to go to a bar, you signal to the guy or gal on the side, and then they'll pull ya in either by throwing you a rope, extending a piece of bamboo or some other like-minded contraption. Saves you from working up too much of a sweat paddling.

The day progressed slowly, and at our 2nd bar, the bar staff started handing out free shots of LaoLao, a whiskey that's so cheap they can afford to give it away. I did a half-shot to appease my British counterparts, then I handed the bottle back to them. When I wasn't jumping off of of or waiting in line for the rope swings, I enjoyed watching everyone jump off of them. Things went along just fine until we hit stop number 5 or 6.

We decided to share a bucket. A bucket is a small pail, about half the size of the bucket I used to use when I went to the beach when I was a kid, and they fill it with ice, half a bottle of booze, whatever mixer you want, and about 10 straws. Vodka/Red Bull was our poison of choice. I had a bit, then I headed up to the rope swing, as any good person on their way to drunk should do, and I jumped, much to the surprise of the three Brits I was with, as I had skipped several of the previous swings because they were too high for me. This one must have been about 20-30 feet above the river. When I came back up the banks of the river, the crew had dipped into our money and gotten another bucket. Great.

The rest of the evening is a blur for me, including a mud fight at dusk involving about 30 people, another rope swing further downstream, a massive (and I mean massive) mystery bruise on my upper right arm (that I apparently got as I slipped getting back into my tube later on), and the tuk tuk ride back to town, as we hadn't quite made it all the way back to town (too much drinking/swinging!) and needed to hitch a ride to return our tubes. And after showering and sending off some drunk e-mails, I plopped down in one of the aforementioned chairs and indulged in some friends.

The Day After
Four Days Later

The next day, I decided it was time to leave, and I was on a mini-van at 9am heading for the capital. I'm sad I missed out on the caves, as they're meant to be great. And I didn't find out until AFTER I left to ask for the "special" menus both on the river and in town. The Special menu is apparently special because the ingredients on it will leave you in altered mind-states after ordering. Someone told me that one day, a certain bar "didn't have" a special menu, but then the next day, after the police had stopped poking around, their special menu magically reappeared.

Anyway, Vang Vieng's certainly a unique town - I could never live there, but getting drunk while floating down a river (it was a very gentle river, mom...) and then curling up to back-to-back friends seems to be just what a backpacker needs from time to time.