Day 95

Vang Vieng > Thakek

Inspired by all the paramotors flying around the in the sky yesterday, and the $70 price, I thought fuck it, and booked on to the "sunrise" paramotor. It was a bit risky because my bus was at 9am and this was meant to leave at 6am. The guy told me it was only 1 hour and I'd be back at 7am but I wasn't convinced. I waited at the office for about 10 minutes before hopping in the back of a tuktuk with 3 other people and we headed to wherever we were heading to. We had to sign some forms, put on a bright red jumpsuit, and wear a helmet but after that we were ready to fly. Unfortunately, the paramotors weren't ready and we had to wait around until about 6.50 for the first set of flights. So much for making it back for 7. There were 4 of us and 2 paramotors so I waited for the first pair to do their flight before I got to go. Luckily, it was only about 5 minutes before the end of the first set and the start of our flights. We got given a gopro attached to a selfie stick thing to record our flight but honestly I wanted to enjoy it instead of focusing on recording the whole time.

The big fans revved up and before we knew it we were up and in the air. The total flight time was a out 20 minutes and was really beautiful. We did a small loop over the fields aswell as up and close with the mountains. There was no sunrise to speak of because of the clouds but it was still beautiful regardless. Plus, I got maybe the coolest picture of me ever taken. We landed smoothly and were given some paper certificates to write our own names on to mark a successful flight. We made our way back and I got back just before 8am so I had some time to eat a quick breakfast and brush my teeth before saying my final goodbye to Michelle as I was on my way to Thakek and she was not. It had been a nice couple of weeks travelling on and off with her but it was time for me to finish off my travels solo.

I headed to the bus office and got picked up by a tuktuk to be taken to the big bus that would take me to Thakek. I think this bus left around 10am and we made our way South. I had to change bus in Vientiane which was a bit annoying but gave me some time to grab some food and some snacks before our next bus from Vientiane to Thakek. We got in another tuktuk to take us to the next bus and after being given our tickets we were loaded onto the bus. Pretty much everyone on the bus was doing the Thakek loop so I would end up bumping into alot of these people again over the next few days.

It was quite a long bus, leaving Vientiane around 1pm and arriving at roughly 8pm. The bus was okay but didn't have alot of leg room, and I managed to chat with a couple people around me to pass the time as my phone was running pretty low on battery and I needed a little bit of charge to make it to my hostel so had to ration wisely. For alot of our journey it was raining quite heavily outside and there was loads of thunder and lightning. This is pretty normal for rainy season in Laos but because there was so much probably boded well for the next couple days as there would be less rain. The only issue is my seat was underneath the emergency exit hatch and it wasn't very waterproof so I periodically got dripped on.

We arrived at the bus station and it was absolutely tipping it down. We all crammed into a few tuktuks, with me being right at the front half in, half out with the driver. Luckily he dropped me right to my hostel and with a few percent left on my phone charge. I pay the tuktuk guy and check in. I plug my phone in and order some dinner and have a beer with a Dutch guy who was also at the hostel as neither of us fancied venturing out into the rain for some food. The yellow chicken curry I had was pretty nice, and the Dutch guy had a really nice looking duck bruschetta. After dinner I chilled for a little while on the covered roof, watching the lightning fill the sky before having a shower and heading to bed. Unfortunately mid shower there was a power cut because of the storms so had to shave and shower using my phone torch which was definitely fun.Les mer