Orn's Travel Blog

Vang Vieng surely is a town one of its kind!  We arrived just when it was getting dark and the town was starting to get lively.  Many of the restaurants where playing Friends or Family Guy on the TV and the guests lounged on benches, sipping beer and watching the shows – it all looked so cozy! 

We were quick to find a room, get rid of our bags and head for a nice looking restaurant.  We had been warned that all you could eat in Vang Vieng were Happy Pizzas, Opium Burgers, Mushroom pasta and the like so we were very curious.  Our menu didn’t have any of that stuff and in fact we didn’t see any of those dishes – not that we were really searching :)  It wasn’t long before we could smell the sweet odor of ganja from the next table.

On our way back to the guest house we met a few drunken kids, skanky girls in bikinis and guys only in their shorts – all too happy to tell us where the cheapest buckets of whiskey were to be had – but the oldies just went to bed ;)

The next morning we headed towards the river for the town’s main activity (besides partying) – tubing.  For the uninitiated, tubing is floating down the river on an old tractor tube stopping at the various bars along the way, jumping into the river on big swings or water slides. 

We bought our ticket and were driven about four kilometers up river.  We kind of thought that we would just be spectators watching the young ones having all the fun but it ended up being a lot of fun for us.  They have about twenty different bars that you can stop at.  Many of them have free shots and cocktail specials and all serving ice cold beer to a thunderous beet of dance music. 

The river was surprisingly clean and the surroundings absolutely beautiful with high cliffs towering over the river between jungle covered hills so no matter what you are looking for – it should be a lot of fun.  Unfortunately we didn’t dare take the camera with us so we don’t have any photos :(

It took us about five hours and a few beers to float all the way back into town.  When we came to town we saw that the town is not so cozy in the daylight – the restaurants are all kind of sweaty and the people either suffering from a hang over or drinking it away. 

After shower we planted us into one of the Friends bar, ate dinner and watched a few episodes of Friends, an excellent evening after a fun day.

We kind of knew that we had done everything we wanted to do in Vang Vieng and didn’t want to stop too long and repeat any of it, always stop while you’re ahead,  so we just took the bus then next morning to the capital – Vientiane – before going back to Tailand.