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4 Dec 2017
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We got to the summit and there was a long line of trucks parked to the right and s we rounded the corner we could see why the road can be closed at times. There is a 300 m section of muddy steep road and when we arrived a minivan was making another failed attempt to get up the hill. Dan went down to see how tricky it was and reported back that it was not too slippery for the downhill and we would be ok once the minivan backed down out of our way. There was an even bigger line of vehicles waiting to get up. It was wet and steep and muddy, but not slippery going down. Once we passed this there was another 2 sections of dirt and now mud of 200 m each to pass, but we did with no trouble.
 FILE3568 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
Then the rain started in earnest and we pulled over for the over suits. We had gotten a bit wet, but we would have been soaked otherwise. We continued on down hill and out of the clouds and rain about 15 minutes later and we could pull over and get the suits off so we could dry out underneath.
 FILE3576 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
The rest of the ride back down to the 13N was uneventful and then we had 57 km left to go south from Kasi.
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-28 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-29 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-30 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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8 Dec 2017
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Vang Vieng is a smaller, but very touristic town and mobbed with young kids. We stopped for some lunch and checked online for our options. We settled for a quiet inn off the main road with excellent parking. We managed to get some rest and then walked down the road to a local Bbq place for some grilled fresh fish and chicken. This is not really a very nice spot to be and Trevor does not recognize it at all from his good memory of his last visit.
 IMG_0525 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0527 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0524 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-31 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-32 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-33 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-34 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-35 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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8 Dec 2017
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Today the forecast is for rain and we have some time to kill anyway and so we will stay another day. Trevor will head south to Vientiane tomorrow and fly to Phenom Pen Cambodia to get our TVIP sorted and we will head north.
 IMG_0533 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0534 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
As predicted it poured, but only for an hour and the sun came our in time for us to have a small tour in a long boat up the river.
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-27 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-36 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-37 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-40 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
And then some  s!
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-41 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-42 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Border & Luang Prabang-43 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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9 Dec 2017
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9 Dec 2017
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9 Dec 2017
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This route is all curves and heads up into the clouds and mist over the mountain. At times it was a bit hairy with the wet road, sharp curves, and almost zero visibility. Luckily on the down side the road was dry and the curves continued.
 FILE3776 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE3799 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE3819 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-7 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE3835 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE3840 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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9 Dec 2017
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We only stopped once for 30 min for a Laos noodle soup lunch and it still took 5 1/2 hours to get to our hotel.
 Laos Phonsavan-8 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-6 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
The last 60 km we got some speed up and managed to get out of 3 rd gear. We had booked into a guest house located off the main road and not too far from the “plain of Jars” sites that are the attraction here. Dinner was treat as there is an Italian Chef here with a place 400 m from us and we had very nice red wine and very delicious pasta for dinner. There are very few tourists here and no backpackers.
 IMG_0542 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0544 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0546 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0548 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
There are a lot of reminders of how much this county was bombed.
 Laos Phonsavan-11 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-12 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-13 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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10 Dec 2017
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Today the weather in much nicer and we rode the 10 km to the Plain of Jars Site 1 after our banana french toast.
 Laos Phonsavan-14 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
At the site foreigners pay 15000 Kip to enter and 3000 Kip to park. The jars are on one of the most heavily bombed regions of the country.
 IMG_0563 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0564 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 IMG_0565 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-15 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-16 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-19 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-20 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-21 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-22 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-23 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos Phonsavan-24 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
We also did a bit of a ride around the city and found a nice local place for a noodle soup lunch (note more ditch weeds). Fingers crossed Trevor is at the ministry of transport in Phenom Pen today to try to get our authorization letter to enter Cambodia with the bikes. This will be a major problem for us if we can not get them this week.
 Laos Phonsavan-25 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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10 Dec 2017
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We stopped for a Laos noodle soup about 1030. We love the Asian soups and the bowls of “ditch weeds” they always serve along side to add some flavors.
 IMG_0591 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
This is THE main road, but there is almost no traffic. Several times we thought the road might be closed as we had not seen another vehicle for over an hour. After “breakfast” the road is straighter and we made better time.
 FILE4007 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4022 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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10 Dec 2017
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After 320 km we were just passed Na Hin (which has a lot of guest houses, but is not a nice place) and we stopped for fuel. There was a sign here for a resort near the Konglor cave in 45 km and so we decided to see how the road was (mostly paved).
 Screen Shot 2017-10-28 at 10.05.34 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4048 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4055 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4066 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4068 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4077 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4078 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 FILE4099 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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16 Dec 2017
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The attraction here is being on the river, paddling up into the lagoon, and to visit the Konglor cave. This is a huge pitch black cave where you ride on a long boat 7.5 km thru the cave twisting and turning guided by the driver using spot lights. We opted to also take a 45 min long boat ride from the resort up the river to the cave entrance.
 IMG_0598 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-14 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-15 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
At Konglor park headquarters you buy your cave ticket and the driver takes you across the river as it is a 200 m walk to the navigable entrance to the cave. 100 m inside the cave itself you step into one of the boats moored there.
You ride about 5 min and then get out for a short hike thru the lighted area with stalactites and stalagmites. You meet your boat on the other side of the short hike and continue the journey on the river.
 Laos-21 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-22 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-23 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-24 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-25 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
There are some rapids at the far end that you must walk up, but get to ride down on the way back! The ticket is for the return ride as well.
 Laos-27 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-31 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
Last edited by saralou; 17 Dec 2017 at 14:21.
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16 Dec 2017
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The next day we lazed about all day until Vicki told us we really needed to do something! So we borrowed a canoe from the hotel and paddled up the “spring”. This is the smaller waterway that joins the river and starts deep in a cave that is now collapsed, but you can see the water welling up at the entrance.
 Laos-46 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-38 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-44 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-10 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-12 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-35 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
 Laos-36 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr
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