Day 9 – Viet Nam to Laos
Today was mostly a travel day. A long travel day due to the
fact that there is somehow no non-stop flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Luang
Prabang, Laos. There are flights to Luang Prabang from places like Singapore and
Bangkok, so it isn’t like this is some small outstation (though, after going
through their airport, it kind of is). Because of this, there really wasn’t
much to do today.
I did wake up late (again) because of a late night (again),
but a fun one. I had to check out of the AirBNB, which required a full re-pack,
and got out a few minutes after the supposed 11am check-out. The building I was
in let me keep my bags with them, which helped, but in reality I only had time
for an early lunch anyway as I was a bit weary of traffic to the airport.
For lunch I went to one of the few restaurants on my list
that I had not yet gone to in Cuc Quac Ngon, another beautiful little
Vietnamese joint housed in an old house. This wasn’t the sprawling open style
like Ngon yesterday, but instead of a fancy, smaller house, with a pond in the middle.
The menu was simple, just a few pages of Vietnamese classics.
In the end, I got a chicken & bamboo lime-spiced salad,
which was amazingly fresh, and a bit more of that fish sauce taste compared to
a similar style Thai salad. My main was a braised beef curry which was excellent.
To be honest, it did not seem very Vietnamese either in look or taste, but I
imagine that is incorrect and it is, and either way it was far away good enough
to not matter.
The food at Cuch was excellent, overall the food in HCMC was
among the best I’ve had in Southeast Asia – which is probably one of the most
competitive areas for food in the world what with Bangkok, Penang, Singapore and
even places like Cambodia, in the area.
I returned back to my hotel for a quick turnaround to the
airport. The whole flying part of the day was quite an ordeal, if still enjoyable.
Despite my ticket being booked straight through from Ho Chi Minh to Hanoi to Luang
Prabang, because it switches from domestic to international, I could not check
my bags straight through – or even check-in straight through. I would need to
go through baggage claim in Hanoi, change terminals, re-check-in, go through
immigration, and all that. I was supposed to have a two-hour layover which would
have made all of that fairly straightforward. Instead, a strange 45-min delay
in Ho Chi Minh just sitting in the plane, made it more precarious.
The flight itself was fine. Vietnam Airlines flies a lot of
widebodies between the two main hubs, so I was able to snag a flight on an
A350-900, always a nice little gift. Their interiors and service were fine. The
only issu being that they didn’t allow use of their AVOD system until after
take-off, so we were left without it during the 45-min delay.
The transfer in Hanoi was fine. They got the bags out quickly,
had a slew of shuttle buses to take you between terminals, and check-in, immigration
and security was a breeze. It helps I was by far the last person to check-in –
the guy at the Lao Airlines counter mentioned that he had kept it open just for
me. The flight itself was short, in an ATR-72 (basically a propeller plane,
though one of the bigger ones). It was short and sweet, but Lao Airlines still
was able to get through a box sandwhich and drinks service.
The only travel hiccup was the lengthy time it took to get
out of the Costco-sized Luang Prabang airport. To enter Laos, almost everyone
gets a visa on arrival, which has to be paid in USD. They took forever to
process these. And then even after you do, there was additional paperwork that
was required, and that took a while as well. In the end, it took a while to get
through, but at least their airport was air conditioned.
Outside I met the tuk-tuk driver that my AirBNB host had
arrangd and we whisked off to the AirBNB. Luang Prabang is a tiny town, fully
built on tourism, but from the outside it seemed completely charming, The air
is much cooler here than Ho Chi Minh. The roads are wide and fairly ell lit.
There wasn’t to much mess. Everything was well built.
The AirBNB was a cute two-story townhouse, with dangerously
steep steps that I am already fearful of falling down. The place was really
nicely furnished and designed, with a little balcony overlooking Wat Xiengthong
(which means I might be awakened by the monks at 4am….). The AirBNB host (a couple
from Colombia) assured me that this ‘is the safest place on earth’ allowing me
the confidence to go on a nice 15-minute walk down to the main area for dinner.
The main street of Luang Prabang has about 50% of the
restaurants and 80% of the shops. There’s a parallel road to it that is on the
bank of the Mekong which has some other restaurants more known for views
(meaningfless at 9:30pm). And then there’s pockets of other areas that are
popular, but the town runs on this main road – a bit like El Calafate in
Argentina, if smaller and more rustic.
Dinner was at Tangor Restaurant, a French owned restaurant
infusing Laotian spices and sauces with French preparation. I had a ceviche
made with Liaotian spices which was very good, if a little too big for an
appetizer (an odd complaint, to be fair) and then a masterpiece dish of a well cooked
duck breast sliced over a Penang Curry sauce. The sauce was a bit sweeter than
Thai Penang Curry, but still excellent. This was one of the best things I’ve
had on my trip so far.
I was there basically until the place closed at 11:30pm.
Pretty much the entire town shuts down with last call at 11:30pm. The only
exception, truly, is ‘The Bowling Alley’, which is somehow able to stay open
until 2:30am, and because fo that doubles as the late night hangout more than a
normal bowling alley. This was not the night for that. This was the night to
enjoy being in this random little slice fo Laos, and rest up for a few days in isolated
nature.
