We did have a little bit of a problem with our accomodation, which was booked in adavnce by our previous hotel.
We paid for a room with A/C, TV and on suite, and ended up being offered a room with a fan and no bathroom.
Needless to say we didn't stay, and opted for a much cheaper room at the aptly named DMZ Cafe guest house with A/C.
It was more like an old style B+B, the ones where you really don’t feel the need to sleep under the covers, but it was cool and only cost $5 !!
The next day, we crossed the road from the guest house and picked up our bus to Laos.
The only real saga of this story, was the customs point between Vietnam and Laos.
We were made to get off the bus at the exit point, and go through no end of paper work, then re-join the bus and move to the next section which was the Laos boarder check.
The Laos side was much more of a challenge, as every official that you had to deal with would request different amounts of US Dollars.
I quickly learned to explain, that I had already paid and pointed to the man at the first desk !!
The whole exercise of going through the check was nothing more than an excuse to rip of foreign visitors.
The passport checks were a token gesture, with Alison even ending up with Tipex all over one page where an official was making too many mistakes.
All they were interested in, was asking for more Dollars !!
We finally made it through the checks, and made our way back onto the bus which was heading for Savanketh in Laos.
The first thing you notice about Laos is that compared to Vietnam, its much drier.
All the fields in Vietnam were well irrigated, whilst Laos didn't seem to have any rivers to irrigate from.
The villages on route to Savanaketh, all had houses that were all raised up on stilts.
I can only guess that during the wet season, the whole area must flood which is why they live so far off the ground.
We stopped of on a number of occasions on route, and were lucky enough to see a local festival in full swing just as we were about to get back on the bus
We arrived in Savanaketh around 4pm, which didn't really allow much time to walk around before it was too dark.
From the quick glimpse that we had of the area, it seemed very sleepy and not really set up for western tourists.
We did however strike lucky with accomodation, and ended up staying in the same house with a girl from Denmark and another British guy.
Both of them had been traveling for some time, so it was great to swap stories and recommendations on places we had all visited.
The following morning, we managed to share a Jumbo ( large Tuk Tuk) to the bus station to catch yet another bus.
This one was going to be a local bus, which would mean no A/C and probably too many people !!
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