Vang Vieng

Floating in an inner tube of an old tractor tire I survey the landscape from water-level after passing under a wooden foot bridge crossing the Nam Song in Laos. It's midday with the sun beating down hard, but the cool river water is close-by if I need a splash to cool off or a small swim. I arrived in a tuk tuk filled with other tubers like myself. Bouncing along the pot-holed dirt roads with a stack of tubes up on the roof, I watched the elderly driver shift gears in his primitive-looking cab. We followed a number of other similar tuk tuks carrying travelers, most younger than myself, eager to get a good party and good scenery on a long afternoon of floating. Suddenly, a bottle with a rope tied to it flies through the air landing in the water just behind me. I grabbed onto that rope and the young Laotian guy towed me in to the first bar.

Vang Vieng is a small town. At its center is an old airstrip once used by Air America to fly war supplies to hill tribes in the north as they battled the North Vietnamese. Up until about fifteen years ago, it was one dusty road passing through on a mountainous connection between Luang Prabang and the Laos capital. Things changed fast as backpackers started taking the tubes down the Nam Song and the town gained a reputation of being a booze and drug filled party town. While restaurants and guesthouses popped up fast to cater to the large crowds of foreigners, so did the number of bars along the river where tubers would stop along the way to party. After some unfortunate incidences, authorities worked to improve the situation in Vang Vieng.

A rickety wooden walking bridge connects the main part of town with a line of riverside bungalow guesthouses at the base of a section of steep limestone mountains. Vang Vieng is possibly the last sight of this amazing landscape that we've enjoyed throughout Northern Laos and Vietnam. The main route continues down and out of the mountains to the Mekong river plain and the capital. Mihai found us a nice bungalow across the river while I was out navigating the dusty roads on a bicycle. She returned to our guesthouse earlier that day to find raised rates for the busy Labor Day weekend. Despite being low season for tourists, Labor Day brought a larger crowd. Aside from the European party seekers and the Korean tour adventure seekers, Lao and Thai folks busied the streets and the river for the long weekend. Below that rickety wooden walking bridge they were wading in the water with beers or cocktails in hand. People sitting in the shallow river on picnic tables half submerged with their truck, parked in the river, pumping out the tunes.

Meanwhile, I was trying to get the most out of the mountain bikes we rented. I lucked out with one nice trail through a small wooded area past some gardens and opening up at a village school. From there I found the trail that brought me to the top of one of the many limestone peaks in the area. I looked out over the landscape near and far. In the distance there were more limestone peaks with even more behind them. In the foreground was a farmed valley. Rice was the crop but grazing buffalo was the season. Even nearer was that god-forsaken dusty road. Sharpe stones studded its surface making for a miserable ride. I would try to find smoother parts but my weaving from side to side was in vain and quite dangerous considering the traffic. Periodically, four-wheel drive trucks would come up quick blasting past me, leaving me in a thick cloud of dust that took its time dissipating. Really, with the traffic on that road to the blue lagoon, the cloud never actually dissipated.

A deep, cool, aqua-tinted stream exited the tightly packed karst mountains and meandered through a small shaded area at the top of the road. Its flow was so slow as to be unnoticeable. This was the blue lagoon, one of the more popular attractions around Vang Vieng. On a hot day such as that one, I had no question as to why the people came to this place. Almost immediately upon arriving, I dropped my gear in a safe spot where I could keep an eye on it and entered the water. It was cold water, but the kind of cold that you welcome with open arms. Those arms were quickly treading water as the depth of the stream rises sharply from its banks. From there I watched people, mostly younger than myself, take to jumping from tree branches hanging high above the water.

After drying off a bit, I proceed to the base of the nearest peak. I put a couple dollars worth of Lao Kip on the table to rent myself a headlamp hoping that the sign telling me that it was needed wasn't just trying to rip me off. The climb to the mouth of the cave, a steep one that at times needed the use of both hands and feet, lasted about 15 minutes. Light poured into its expansive first chamber from a couple of large holes in the wall. No headlamp needed yet, I thought. Looking down through the chamber, people who showed up before me would pop out of crevices to reveal the cave's scale. I followed arrows down to a reclining Buddha statue and continued on, leaving the main chamber and switching on my headlamp. Entering the darkness of the cave is one of few instances in which I'm thankful there are a good number of other tourists around. Though I was alone, other yellow dots up ahead gave me reassurance that I was going the right way, or that if something bad happened I'd get help. It was a deep, large, and interesting cave. Despite the other people around, the coolness and the silence is closest to you when you are alone in a large black hole. The feeling can be refreshing and liberating as the silence of sound and sight necessitate a closer look to your thoughts. It can also be harsh and suffocating for the same reasons.

Over the following few days in Vang Vieng I returned to that lagoon on one other occasion. I was with Mihai and it was a much more relaxing trip. Rather than taking on those sharp stones with a bicycle we headed out by motorbike. By then the holiday weekend had ended, the road less dusty, and the lagoon less crowded.

Aside from the blue lagoon and tubing down the Nam Song, we spent a good amount of time relaxing in restaurants watching the show “Friends”. Though it is not my favorite show, I kind of took to it while I was in Vang Vieng. A few of the restaurants in town offer seating in a comfortable, reclining position, facing an LCD screen. They play DVD reruns of shows like “Friends” and “Family Guy”. At first, I thought it was quite strange seeing folks traveling through this exotic country stop to lounge around and watch these old shows. When I found myself doing the same, I began to rationalize. Being on the road so much can get tiring. Furthermore, you don't realize how much you miss more familiar things that you tend to do without when you're jumping from place to place concentrated on the exotic. Friends was something relaxing and familiar. I would turn to it again on another stop through Laos.