Shafri, Didi & Vientiane

So, Laos. What brings me here is because of my friend Didi. She asked me if I'm interested to come with her and since I'm on semester break, so yeah! Why not? Besides, it's good to have someone that can speak Thai / Lao.

To fly to Vientiane it only took 2 and a half hours which is by a direct flight with Air Asia from KL to Vientiane. Have to admit that I have fear of flying and the weather up there wasn't really nice to us. It was bumpy all the time.As arrived in Vientiane, I noticed that they accepted 3 currencies 1) Lao Kip 2) Thai Baht 3) USD. For us, it is much easier to use Thai Baht as it easy to calculate (100 Baht is equal to RM10). Besides, Lao Kip has less value if converted in Malaysia as Thai Baht exchange rates accepted here and everywhere with good value. 

Departed from KLIA 2 airport.

We arrived in Vientiane at 9 in the morning, and the check in time is at 1pm. We basically have no idea where to go, as this trip we both didn't do any homework about Vientiane. All we know is 1) Tubing party 2) Hot air balloon 3) Blue Lagoon which is all located at Vang Vieng. We decided to walk around to the town and guess what, you could just walk! At 11.30 am, we went back to the hotel as the National Museum & all tourist attraction close at 12pm for 1 hour break. The hotel receptionist are kind enough to let us check in at 12pm and the rates of this hotel are reasonable which cost us 1000 baht per night. This room includes AC, twin beds, TV, wi-fi, hot shower, breakfast, minibar and safe box. Not to mention the bed is so comfy. That fact that the bed is so comfy that make us slept since we enter the room until 5 pm! The plan was to take a nap for 5 mins but opps.... We overslept. We did some research on some nice place to visit in Vientiane right after we got connected to the wifi in the room.

Fail attempt of taking 360 angle view of our room. Didi seems very comfortable sleeping.

On the evening, we went walked along Mekong River. There you can see lots of Lao people jogging, riding bicycle, exercising and Zumba-ing! Based on 4 nights stayed at Laos, all I can say is that Lao people areare very nice, polite, shy, honest to us (from what we experience they exchange rates from Lao - Baht calculate in front of you). Alongside the river there are some streets stalls that serves local and western food which we decided to have a dinner there. So by guessing the street food stalls is cheaper than the standalone restaurant, it's totally wrong. It's very expensive actually, cost us 2 people 600 Baht. But we didn't complaint as the food is very good, besides the view that we had is just to die for.

Sunset view. Mekong river

Later that night, we went to the night market. Night market is not something new for us, infect there are also back at Malaysia. But what captured my attention was that this night market is so organised and clean. Yes, clean. Infect the whole town is clean. There is no rubbish thrown everywhere, not like in Malaysia of course. Anyway, I would recommend you guys to visit this market, it has everything but mostly clothes. Paintings, handmade materials, silk, souvenirs, phone accessories and many more to find there. Here you could bargain, maybe it will work, maybe not. Good luck!

Handmade silks / materials could be found on the night market.

I wanted to see many places in Vientiane especially the Friendship Bridge (which connected Laos & Thailand) which attract me the most. I find a border that separate one country to another is very interesting. But the weather is prevent us from renting a bike to go around because it was raining ever since we came back from Vang Vieng. Besides, Didi wasn't feeling good as she had a flu so we just stayed in the room until the rain stop. At night, we went for a dinner and slept early as our plane is leaving at 9 in the morning. On the way came to hotel from the airport we didn't gave much attention how far is it. So on the way to the airport from hotel it only took like 15 minutes (more or less). And we left hotel at 6 am and reached at the airport at 6.15 am. SMH! Lucky there's a TV or else we're like zombie, bored out of our skull. I noticed that plane departed from Wattay International Airport every 2 hours as the airport quite small. So our plane depart on time as we wish, so goodbye Vientiane, Hello Kuala Lumpur.