Day 5 - Ride Like A Local

We both finally had a decent nights sleep. I woke up at 6.30am and Jackie managed to sleep on to 8.30am. We went down to breakfast 45 minutes later. I ordered the pancakes with banana and honey, whilst Jackie went native and ordered fried chicken rice with a fried egg on top. Our best breakfast so far.

At 10am, I set off on foot, loaded up with my passport, driving licence, credit card and cash to rent myself a scooter. Jackie struggled down to the pool sun beds for a rest!!

It was a mile and a half hike into the city centre, where, whilst mildly perspiring, I located TL Motorbike For Rent. I was offered a scooter for 250,000 Kip, which I agreed to and we completed the paperwork, but when I was given a demonstration, the fuel cap would not open. This was no good, so I was offered a bigger brand new scooter for 300,000 Kip (£10). With my passport held by them as a deposit, I negotiated the busy roads back to the hotel.

Jackie was waiting for me and soon we were both boarding the scooter for a day out. Unfortunately Jackie’s helmet had a floppy visor and kept falling down until we jammed a folded hotel business card under the visor.

We rode down to the river side road and then followed the Mekong River on Thadeua Road south east out of Vientiane. Our intended destination was the Buddha Park. The fuel tank was only a third full, so we put the equivalent of £3 worth of petrol in the tank which filled it right up.

As we were leaving the Vientiane suburbs I turned right off Thadeua Road on to a minor road to take a more southerly long route following as close as we could to the Mekong. The roads were in very good condition and we were able to scoot along at a decent lick.

There were numerous Buddhist Temple complexes, but one half way into our journey looked particularly impressive. I rode in and parked up inside the complex. Jackie attempted to dismount the scooter and disaster struck, her trusty Navratilovas ripped. The rip was virtually indecent and was only going to get worse, they would now have to be consigned to the bin, so Jackie scuttled off behind a temple and changed into a baggy pair of elephant trousers.

Whilst Jackie was changing, I set off to take some temple photos until a pair of nasty looking dogs ran at me barking and snarling. A young Buddhist monk in his orange outfit came to my rescue and called them off.

We continued our ‘long cut’ until we found a little supermarket to obtain some refreshments to combat the searing heat. We bought 2 large cans of beer, 2 bottles of water and a Cornetto and an ice lolly for the grand total of £2.71. I got the impression they didn’t get many tourists in their supermarket.

We ate our ices and drank our beer at a shaded table and chairs outside the supermarket. We returned to the scooter and Jackie decided she wasn’t going to wear her helmet any more and was prepared to pay the $4 US dollar fine.

We eventually arrived at Buddha Park sometime during the early afternoon. We paid our 60,000 Kip (£2) and commenced our tour of the park of 200+ concrete sculptures. It was boiling hot and my phone told me that it had also got too hot, then went all dark so I couldn’t see what I was taking photos of.

One concrete structure was a massive ball with a mouth as an entrance and a pointy tree thing on top. I stupidly entered the tight entrance and climbed up the ever increasingly narrow and steep steps before crawling out almost upside down out of a tiny entrance at the top. It was akin to being in the Chi Chi Tunnels in Vietnam and definitely not designed for a 5’11” tall, 14 stone something, hunk of a man in his 60’s and slightly arthritic. All for the sake of a photo opportunity!!

After an hour or so we were melting and it was a pleasure to be back on the bike with a breeze - in Jackie’s case rushing through her hair. Several miles back along the road towards Vientiane, we pulled over at a scenic little riverside shack, where we treated ourselves to our couple of beers and a nest of very crispy fried noodles to snack on.

Suitably refreshed, we were back on the bike and racing towards Vientiane. The road was much busier with rush hour traffic. Once we actually arrived back in Vientiane there were vehicles everywhere and the rules of the road went out the window.

The scooter was king as they weaved through the slow moving or stationary cars and lorries. I soon got the hang of it and was riding like, no, actually better, than a local. When the road just got too congested, us scooterists took to the pavement to ride round the queuing traffic, having scant regard for any pedestrians!!

After a tiring all action ride, we eventually arrived at our next destination Pha That Luang, a huge golden stupa. It is depicted on everything from banknotes to buildings. This Buddhist stupa is the most important religious building in Laos and is the country’s national symbol.

The present structure dates back to just the 1930s and is a reconstruction of the original thought to have been built in the mid-sixteenth century. In 1867 the original structure was overgrown but still intact, until a few years later when Chinese-led bandits plundered the stupa looking for gold and left it in a pile of rubble.

We took our customary photos and it was then we made a dash through the chaotic traffic back to our hotel arriving at 6pm absolutely shattered. After a short lie down, we showered and hit the road again. Jackie had decided she fancied a bbq style dinner and research showed us that a there was a highly recommended suitable restaurant on TripAdvisor less than a mile from us.

The night time ride was a strange experience, because other road users kept pulling out in front of us as if they hadn’t seen us. When we made it to our destination still miraculously in one piece, it was Sod’s Law to find that it was closed for refurbishment. This was fate.

We remembered a Japanese Style BBQ restaurant on the riverside road from the previous evening so we decided to give that a try. Our circuitous route took us along the main roads, accidentally past the airport and back down to the riverside road. It was on this leg that we came to a relatively unlit area and then, and only then, did I realise that we had been riding around the entire night without any lights on. That explained a few things. Luckily we hadn’t got stopped by the police, otherwise we would have been looking at a double fine with Jackie still refusing to wear her helmet.

We arrived at the Japanese Style BBQ restaurant with the road now wondrously illuminated in front of us. After getting a table, we were presented with a menu of meats to barbecue and other assorted accompanying dishes. We chose 2 dishes of Ribeye and 1 Pork as well as the recommended vegetable platter, which all came with a selection of sauces. We obviously ordered a couple of beers and a cheeky Kimchi starter.

The waiter provided us with a small bbq on house bricks with red hot embers and we (and I do mean we) set about cooking our dinner. It was an unforgettable meal, utterly beautiful, a great dining experience and all for less than £13.

Sadly, I was still feeling hungry so we toured the city until we found a 7-Eleven shop and bought 173,000 Kips worth of sweets, biscuits and Coke Zeros. Back at the hotel we had a couple of nightcaps and called it a night.

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