The unexpected walk with a heavy pack to Vientiane had left my feet in need of a rest. I had originally hoped to walk across SE Asia but the time restrictions on visas made it prohibitive. I decided I would extend my visa in Laos once again and search for a bicycle to roll south on.
Vientiane is the capital of Laos with a population of 1 million. There were plenty of bicycles that would have been suitable for me to tour on if I was a foot shorter. Thankfully I found one for sale through an expat community of FB. The frame was not a perfect fit for me but with some seat and handlebar adjustments it would make due.
During my time in Vientiane I was hosted by wonderful cyclists from the Warmshowers community. I first stayed with a French couple and then with a South African. If I could I would stay with local or expat hosts much more often. Not because it’s a free place to stay but because it’s a much easier way to get to know a place and find community. I’m super grateful to all of my hosts and look forward to paying it forward when I have space.
I had read a blog from some touring cyclists who had travelled all over the world on their bikes, that Laos was one of their top places to cycle. I have a feeling that a lot has changed since they were last here. Specifically the amount of “development” that is arriving from China. Although the economy is still tiny compared to it’s neighbours it is growing fast and is also a convenient transport route between China, Vietnam, and Thailand. Unfortunately for me this mean more big trucks. If you were to time it right it might mean better roads, but that is hit and miss for sure.
The first 300 km’s out of Vientiane were mostly on the highway, the only paved road heading south. I was then able to leave the highway onto a secondary road which is part of a popular tourist motorcycle “loop”. The Thak Ek loop offers adventurous backpackers the opportunity to get off the beaten track, rent a motorbike, and drive a couple hundred km’s in a circle. The route leads you from cave to waterfall to hostel to cave to lake to hostel to cave and back. It’s the type of experience that your friends and family back home might think of as a crazy near impossible adventure but when you are on it you feel like you are just another farang out of the thousands who have done the exact same loop that year.
The path is well beaten for a reason. It’s beautiful riding, especially on a bicycle. The caves are wonderful to explore, and who doesn’t love a big waterfall. It also provided me with good cheap accommodation and a welcomed variety of food which didn’t exist in many of the places I visited in Laos.
There is also lot’s of undeveloped land. In Laos this doesn’t mean uninhabited, but it was sometimes hard to see people. The dead giveaway is not that you can hear their activity but the fact that you can’t hear anything. When there’s no vehicles in sight and there is no sound coming from the jungle. No birds whatsoever. They like to hunt and eat everything here, or sell it to China.
I was usually getting up with the sun in order to avoid the heat of the day on the pavement. One morning I did this and it was actually cold!. So cold that my hands were freezing and I needed to put on extra clothes. I was happy to be cold. It had been almost two years since I had experienced such refreshing cold while sailing from San Francisco to Hawaii.
I took a risk on a side road for the last day to Savannakhet where I would meet my new cycling companion. Some large dirt sections and goat traffic made it a perfect day with not many cars or trucks. I rolled into town and was greeted by Gina, whom I had met in Vientiane. She had been living and working in Savannakhet for half a year and was keen to go on an adventure cycling south with me. I was looking forward to a couple days of rest and recovery before we rolled out together.
