These two places are fairly close to each other so you can visit both in a single trip easily. Also, we didn’t explore everything Vang Vieng has to offer because we stayed out of town so our experience of it is pretty limited.
We arrived in Vang Vieng in a minivan from Luang Prabang. It is a pretty uncomfortable ride as the roads are very bad but it only takes around 4 hours so it is bearable. We paid £8 each for the journey and booked it through one of the travel agents on the main street in Luang Prabang. After the fact, we were told by our hotel that you can do this cheaper but it seemed a fair price to us so we didn’t change the plan. The VIP bus was double the price and more comfortable (it avoids the bad roads) but it takes 2 hours longer I’m told.
We booked to stay in Green View Resort which we saw in YouTube videos. The hotel is located on the shores of the Nam Ngum Lake which is around half an hour drive south from Vang Vieng. We were aware of the location and picked it so that we can have a relaxing time but if you wish to be close to the action I would recommend staying in Vang Vieng centre. It was a bit difficult getting in and out of the resort and it cost a lot too.
The town of Vang Vieng itself isn’t amazing or particularly big but it became very famous a while back for raucous backpacker parties along the river. Tubing on the river used to be huge business here. You basically got a giant tractor tire and you floated down the river in it stopping in various bars. But all good things must come to an end and after a year of over 20 tourist deaths on the river, the Lao government shut down the tubing and the bars. The town needed to reinvent itself and now you can do tons of other activities here like kayaking and zip lining. Tubing was eventually reopened and lots of the death traps were removed but only 3 bars can be opened on any given day and no drugs are advertised openly either. I’m guessing the fact that the activity was toned down, coupled with the modern, health conscious backpacker profile, is the reason why tubing doesn’t attract as many people today as it did in the past. Nevertheless, we liked the idea of floating gently in the river for a few hours so we decided to give it a go. It was really nice and we thoroughly enjoyed it, we even stopped in one bar and got slightly tipsy but decided to move on once the owner started offering us some dubious looking opium vodka shots… The river is really shallow and it was slow in parts so we had to get out of the tubes to try and push ourselves along. A good piece of advice would be to wear water shoes as the bottom of the river is covered with stones. We had a lovely time and including the bar stop it took us just over 5 hours to get to the end. The tube hire is just under £6 per person and the tuk tuk to the starting point is included. Overall, a very good value activity. You end up right in town and leave your tubes there.
So that was our Vang Vieng experience! We stayed in the resort for 5 nights and were largely super lazy but the hotel offers free kayaks so we explored the lake a little which was fun and my first time in the kayak too! As some of you know, I can’t swim so this was a big deal. The hotel is just a few chalet type rooms overlooking the lake with your own private terrace. They also have a restaurant on site and the chef makes really good food, the curry and larb were superb. The swimming pool is a big bonus too. The views were beautiful and sometimes you felt like you were in a nature program when the water buffaloes came to graze on a nearby island and were swimming in the lake just in front of you.
Once our lazy time was over we took a minivan to Vientiane, the capital city. It took just over 3 hours to get there in a minivan and cost £5 each. There is of course an airport in Vientiane too if you were flying in to this part directly (no direct flights to Europe but you can easily connect from Bangkok or Hanoi). Vientiane is a small capital city, with less than a million people and no major high rises. It certainly feels like a local town more than a capital. We stayed in Vientiane Garden Villa Hotel, great location near to the night market and many bars and restaurants. We didn’t have a long list of attractions to tick off here so wanted to be near a pool and the hotel offered this too (about £30 per night).
The first thing we saw was the Cope project centre. It is a charity which helps people who lost limbs to get prosthetic replacements. This is actually a big issue in Laos and one I wasn’t aware of. Due to tons of unexploded bombs scattered around Laos accidents involving these bombs are actually fairly common. The charity helps to raise awareness of the situation too it was very eye opening to find out how badly Laos suffered during the Vietnam war. Highly recommend a visit here.
The next day we went to see the Buddha Park which is located out of town, 30km away. The hotel quoted some outrageous price for a return journey so we were a bit put off but we noticed an ad for a tuk tuk tour on a tree in town and decided to try it out (it was about £7 pp). Simple advertising works it turns out! The driver was a bit of a character and spoke decent English. He stopped at a temple before getting to the park and told us a few interesting stories.
The entry to the park is about £1.50. The park has over 200 Buddha and various Hindu statues scattered all over beautiful landscaped garden. It’s a lovely place to hang out and enjoy the green space (there aren’t many of those in the city). As a part of the tour you could also go and see their most impressive temple and the Patuxai monument but we chose to call it a day and see them the next day.
We explored Vientiane further on our second day. First we went to see That Luang temple, supposedly the biggest one in town. It was all gold and nice to look at but didn’t have the grandeur of its Myanmar equivalent, Shwedagon Pagoda. Still, it’s worth a quick visit and you can also see a reclining Buddha in a nearby religious complex too.
Our final stop on the sightseeing tour of Vientiane was the Patuxai monument which is also called Arc de Triumphe since it bears some resemblance to the one in Paris. The area around it feels very European and it’s a nice square to hang out in and have some ice cream.
We also had a brief stroll around the riverside and the Night Market which predominantly sells clothes and tech from China so unless you need some new tshirts or shorts can be skipped altogether I think. The area around the market has a lot of nice bars and restaurants though, so should definitely feature on your agenda. We had a few beers in the Bor Pen Yang bar, very lively atmosphere and decent music (well, apart from the 15 minutes they played Ronan Keating’s biggest hits). Tired from the Asian food, we used Vientiane to fill our bellies with as much Western food as possible and if you fancy a change from the endless rice dishes please visit Tyson Kitchen. The owner is Canadian but of Lao descent and is super friendly and attentive. The food is amazing too.
To sum up, I think Vientiane is good stop over place if you need to break up the journey around Lao or rest after a long flight but I wouldn’t recommend more than 1-2 nights here as the attractions are far and few in between. Also, being any longer in a city where there are no proper taxis and you have to haggle with tuk tuk drivers would drive anyone mad.