Tuesday was a very relaxed day as we had no further sight seeing on our list. We did some shopping for our breakfast for Wed morning because the transport to the bus station was due any time after 7am. By the time we went out to dinner we were packed and ready to go. We did have a chat with an interesting man at the hotel. He is an Italian by origin but has lived in the USA for 20 years and now China for 20 years. He came to Laos on holiday and was intending to go to Thailand for cataract surgery. Now he has been told that he will not be able to return to China for 12 months. While in Loas he has discovered that he can have his surgery there cheaper than Thailand so was settling in for a stay.
When we arrived at the bus station we discovered that our travel agent had rorted us by booking us onto the cheaper local 20 seater bus while we paid for the tourist standard bus. Nothing to be done at that stage and it only had 8 passengers so we had plenty of space. Because we were early we also had front seats with the best view.
Our driver proved to be careful and the countryside was fascinating. We made reasonable speed until lunchtime but after that it was up into the mountains. The road was constantly winding with plenty of hairpin bends.. There were huge heavily loaded trucks which were just grinding up the hills. I was amazed at how the driver managed to scoot around them on very short straitish sections and avoid on coming traffic. The road was reasonaably wide so it was possible for one truck, one commuter bus and one motor bike to be abreast but that diidn't seem to happen.. It was like someone weaving the traffic and was obviously down to the bus driver's experience. Never the less I had full front view and was always watching for that unexpected vehicle to loom around the corner. Closer to LP there was lots of road works where they had ripped up broken bitumen and put down clay ready for resurfacing. This was either crumbly and rough or had been watered and was ridged with wheel tracks. Either way it was dusty. After lunch our driver started periodically breakining into a yodelling accompanyment to the pre recorded music and we both wondered what his liquid lunch had been. His off -sider slept almost all the way except when bellowed at to open the door , buy cold water or put a rock behind the wheel when we stopped at roadworks. We came across three tankers stopped on the side of the road and soon saw that two were protecting traffic and the middle one which was on it's side. It had gone to close to the drain and tipped over on to the bank . Fortunately it was on the hill side not the cliff side. The waiting staff were nonchalantly squatting along the top of the tank out of the way of traffic.
This may sound like a trial and it was certainly a long 10 plus hours but we saw interesting village life in action. Women still following traditional foraging of the jungle for bamboo and various leaves which were then threshed for basket weaving I think. Children going too and from school riding their bikes one handed and holding unbrellas aloft. All styles of housing from thatched bamboo to wood to concrete. The village often lined the highway for some distance and houses were built over the precipice because there was no other space. We saw dogs, hens, ducks, goats, pigs and cattle all free ranging and with highly developed road sense. Toward evening the villagers were often bathing , very discretely, at the village water tap. Community toilet blocks were in every village and in entrepreneurial style there was the equivalent of a 30 cents charge for travellers. We stopped only for 1/2 an hour for lunch and two ten minute toilet breaks so arrived tired and dusty. Took ourselves of to a recommended restaurant for dinner which was posh, down beside the Mekong and double what we usually pay but we felt we had earned it.
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