Lao: Vang Vieng, a town better seen from a hot air balloon
- Where To Go Next By I&P
- Feb 21, 2023
- 4 min read
From Vientiane, we booked a minivan with the hotel to go to Vang Vieng, for 150k LAK/person.
When the van from the company Soutchai arrived, we thought it was the van to get to the bus station when, in fact, it was the actual van to go to Vang Vieng directly.
It was an extremely small van where they packed 12 of us and our luggage for 2h.
We were lucky to sit in the front (except I didn't have a seatbelt) and that the highway was pretty new and well maintained.
We arrived safely in the small town of Vang Vieng (VV). Imagine dozens of streets and buildings of 1 or 2 storeys, mainly shops, and some scary wobbly bridges, surrounded by a gorgeous chain of mountains, filled with tourists in swimsuits ready to go tubing. That's Vang Vieng! It concentrates a lot of exceptional activities that you would not find anywhere else at a fairly acceptable price. We went to a town like that in New Zealand, Queenstown, to go bungee jumping, but that's another story. 😁
Before the fun, we needed to secure our Laos-China Railway train tickets to Luang Prabang, which we did with the hotel. The prices were the same everywhere and they all added a service fee of 80k LAK/ticket in addition to the train tickets themselves.
We then searched for our must do activity, the hot air balloon ride 🎈. There are two companies in town: "Above Laos" (French company) and "Balloon over Vang Vieng" (Chinese company), commonly referred to as the French tour above the mountains and the Chinese tour above the city. We really wanted to ride the French company's balloon but it was booked beyond our time in VV so we had to go with the Chinese one instead for 100USD or 1.7M LAK/pax.
While doing a boat tour on the river, we could see them above the city, 4 balloons going up on the south side of town and landing on the north side.
The day we went for the hot air balloon ride at sunset, we were picked up by a typical ride in VV, the songthaew. Like someone said when getting up on the vehicle, "welcome to Mexico!", as it is the type of vehicle you'd see portrayed in movies set in Mexican cities. But this is the typical mode of transportation in VV, like in many places in Asia.
We were brought to a field where 4 balloons were flat on the ground waiting to be filled with air. The hot air balloon team started to fill the balloons with giant ventilators, and once the balloon was big enough, they started the burners. You could see the open air flame and the balloon was suddenly taking shape and going up. Once the basket was upright, we had to quickly jump in.
And we were up in the air! We came prepared as we had our hats and scarves, not for the cold, but to protect from the heat of the burners.
I am sure I lost some hair! 🤣
The view of the city and the mountains was magical, especially as they were covered in a light mist. And we were lucky to go on the last balloon as we could see the 3 others flying in front of us (which was great for photos) but also below us (they caught the wrong winds). It was also overwhelmingly scary to think we were 300m above ground with only this tiny basket carrying us and at the will of the wind. 😖
The landing was a little bit rough but not too bad, and we went back to the hotel with amazing memories.
Fun fact: most of the recent deaths by ballooning are due to contact with power lines but no deaths or accidents have been recorded in Laos. We didn't see any power lines during our flight but, at one point, it almost looked like we were gonna hit a tree 🌲.
As a second activity, I went rock climbing in the mountains on one cold early morning for 22usd or 370k LAK. The company seemed a little shady but I came back alive, even if I scratched my arm. 😅
I was accompanied by Mic, a young Lao who could barely speak English, and we went to a place called the Interzone resort to climb the nearby mountains. There was a path between 2 very tall walls with trees growing on them.
A very interesting place with good grips and tree roots that helped move up on the tougher spots. I had some good fun there!
The following afternoon, we rented electrical motorbikes to go further into the mountains. For 100k LAK for 4h, we had a flashy red motorbike that made absolutely no noise. I could only do the roaring sound of motorcycles in my imagination 🤣
First we went to the Blue Lagoon 1, the closest out of the 3 to the town. It was a small river with clear blue water where the locals had installed games for tourists to enjoy for 10k LAK.
Closeby, you could go up an unmaintained flight of stairs that led you to Phu Kham Cave. This cave was left practically untouched and, as no light was installed, you had to walk through it with a flashlight. But the first chamber was lit up by a hole in the ceiling highlighting the mystical spot where a Buddha was lying down.
5min away from the Blue Lagoon 1, you had the parking for the Nam Xay viewpoint. Yes another viewpoint...but this one was worth it, both for the climb to the viewpoint, and for the viewpoint itself.
We said climb, because the stairs were more like loose rocks that were assembled to resemble a step or mud that was flattened. Luckily there were bamboo handrails to help you up and down the "steps".
The viewpoint was amazing, one of the most beautiful ones we have seen. We were on a peak during sunset, surrounded by green mountains as far as the eye could see. It was a stunning view! In addition, 2 motorbikes were placed in this odd spot (how??? Maybe by hot air balloon 😉), which allowed visitors to take iconic Instagram photos.
Vang Vieng is a beautiful small town lost in the middle of the mountains, where it is very cold at night, and scorching hot soon after the sun comes up. And we all had a lot of fun there!
Comments