Pakse, Laos

Pakse, what can I say? (that rhymes when Pakse "Pak-say" is said correctly). A town that we had been told by "they" held nothing and was best to skip out. As we arrived at 6am after a night bus Rach and I decided to stay for a day or two just to check it out and then move on.

Well "they" weren't completely wrong...the town itself didn't offer much in the way of things to do being mainly restaurants and a few Wats. BUT that's the only thing that "they" got right. We rented motorbikes and did a sections of the Bolaven Plateau loop and it was one of the best days I 'd had travelling so far! This was my first proper experience of having a bike and the freedom that comes with it rather than paying extortionist prices for tours.

On our way to see some waterfalls we passed a local tea factory whose produce was all locally farmed. We went in and were given the tour of a very basic but effective operation, sampled some of their different types of tea and ended up with a couple of bags of it for ourselves! Further down the line, still on the way, we ended up taking a detour down a dusty trackway to a fish farm at the very bottom and having a drink.

When we reached our first waterfall the "owner" of the land (rents off the government) and general guardian of the waterfall talked to us about how he grows coffee which we got to try both as the classic drink and the plant bean itself before dried (not that great). He also gave us a free shot on the house that he had brewed himself which he described as "medicine". There were bits floating in it and the smell was strong enough to burn your nose hair off, needless to say we both gave it a go although not too much because we were biking...safety first! Tad Yuang, the waterfall itself, was, and still is, on the day that I'm writing this (19/8/2016) the most magical I have been too. Not as beautiful as Erawan or as magnificent as Kuang Si but it had an element to it that was like nothing I'd seen. It was our own little paradise as we were the only ones there, the sun shining on the mist being thrown off creating a rainbow, rocks either side for climbing like the big kid I am. It was wonderful. After we both knew that we'd found somewhere special.

Tad Fan was the second waterfall we saw which has the longest drop in Laos, 120m. We saw it from the viewing platform at the top and it was pretty spectacular to see such a fall of water (clues in the name I know but still).

Tad Something was our final adventure of the day. Driving along drit tracks through coffee plantations to get there, we arrived towards closing and so again it was completely deserted, just a guard who left us to it after he'd taken some photos of us together. The height was about 15m which meant that the erosion of the rock, usually too high to reach, had created a cavern behind the water fall which was accessible with a little bit of scrambling, great fun.

Haters gonna hate...head to Pakse.

Side note: Really annoyingly, I lost my memory card with my photos on it for Pakse and Chammpasak, only a few uploads and Rach's to go by.Read more