Vacation in Laos

We spent 16 days in Laos over Christmas and New Years enjoying Christian's "use or loose" vacation time accrued over the past 8+ years with the government. We will be posting our trip in segments by city so as not to overwhelm our blog (or its meager readers).

Laos is on the verge of tourism explosion. We found plenty of tourists there because it is the dry season, therefore the high tourist season. All the things to see and do in Laos are very spread out, which entails a lot of travel on roads that are narrow, heavily traveled and under repair. It was interesting that our cars and busses often had to slow down and even stop for water buffalos, cows, chickens and even people who had meandered into the road.

We flew to Vientiane on an "Indiana Jones" type plane with propellers. Xander got a kick out of seeing them start up and whirr during our flight: "go round and round, plane go." The kid is fascinated and thrilled with anything mechanical that moves.

In Vientiane we saw the golden stupa, which is somewhat of a national symbol to the Lao people: its image is on their currency. We saw the Lao version of Arc de Triomphe, rode tuk tuks (the kids LOVED getting around in tuk tuks), and let the kids run around in a park with other Lao kids and families. Let me just say that the Lao really know how to give massages! My muscles are screaming for another massage right now! Seriously, it was on par with my wonderful massages in China.

We enjoyed The Morning Market and Jennie went "ga ga" over the silk textiles and Christian deliberated much about buying a HUGE, 24 lb. wooden elephant that eventually made its way back home with us to Hanoi. Above, Jennie is imitating the "peace or stop arguing" Buddha pose, which is unique to this area.

We saw beautiful temples, one of which survived the raids of the Thai warriors and is now the oldest temple in Laos. It had such a wonderful old feel to it.

We visited a Buddhist Park. Emma asked if she could play on the swings and we sadly told her that it was a different kind of "park." There were hundreds of gigantic statues of Buddhist and Hindu religions. One of the things that made it memorable for us was a group of Lao kids climbing on the statues and laughing. One guy had a flute that he played with his nostril and sometimes mouth (interesting). He played the whole time we were there and it was very nice. We didn't see him until the very end and gave him a little money for making our visit so nice.

Our last night in Laos was spent next to the Mekong River enjoying yummy curry and seafood. Emma calls the Mekong River the “magic” river after Christian explained that the flow of the Mekong inverts at different times of the year in Vietnam and through Cambodia causing a giant lake to form near Siem Riep Cambodia (home to Ankor Wat).