The 30 minutes flight to Luang Prabang was uneventful; just the way I like it. Luang Prabang is the capital of the province of the same name and with a population of around 400,000, it is the second largest city of Lao PDR. The city is well known for its UNESCO world heritage status because of its cultural, historic and architectural values. Up until 1565 Luang Prabang was the capital Lane Xang (as Lao PDR was then known).
It was a cool morning and we needed our woolies to start with (about 17 degrees). I loved it. The heat had been too much for me and now this coolness felt like heaven. The locals were bundled up in their jumprs and scarves and made me wonder what they wear when it is cold.
Our first stop was the hotel around 10:00am A very rude attendant told us we couldn't check in because it was too ealy. Thats Ok, I say, we will leave our bags here and come back later, but I will pay you now. Oh, he tells me, cant pay as we have no electricity. And when will you have electricity we enquire. The answer was a shrug. Maybe later he says. OK we'll leave the bags and come back after 2:00pm to check in then.
So what does one do to fill in time? Coffee of course, at a place called Ancient, just along from the hotel.
We make our way to the wedding venue and sort some things there then wander back to town on the way passing a restaurant called "Utopia". The name didnt quite fit the place as it was a large rambling place on three levels that was in need of some urgent repair and most definitely did not reflect the Utopia name tag.
I knew that my new favourite Vientiane Restaurant had a shop here as well so we went looking. It was a long walk and by the time we had mucked around and got there most if the yummy pastries had gone. Still the coffee was good and I know next time to be there early to get the pick of the bunch. I will be back Banneton. The best pastries I think I have ever had, and that is saying something, in the Vientiane shop so no reason why this should be different.
We eventually get back to the hotel about 3:30pm.
All in darkness but at least the rude guy wasnt there. He had been replaced by two dopey females who laughed when we asked about the power and said it might be 5pm, but they weren't sure. I lost the plot and basically told them where to stick their room. I wasnt paying for a room that may or may not have electricity. By this time our phones etc all needed charging so getting to a power plug was getting more important.
We leave and move to the cafe down the road, where we managed to get plugs to recharge phones, wifi connection and eventually a coke to cool our tempers. A quick search of booking.com found us rooms at another guest house and they were instantly booked. We grab our bags and take off. Not having a map we were guided by the hotel description and as usual set off in the wrong direction and went round in a big circle before we found the hotel quite close to where we started.
Looked lovely but when we arrived there was no power. It was 5:25 and they did tell us it would be up at 5:30pm. Sure enough it was and we checked in to lovely rooms on the first floor. The hotel is down a lovely wee cobbled lane (of which there are plenty in the quaint town) so it turns out to be superbly quiet. Other than footsteps from fellow guests it is dead quiet. Except for right this minute I hear chanting from a nearby Vat. Haunting but not what I really want to be hearing at the moment. But their country, their religion, my problem.
A quick refresh and a sit down and we head off again, this time to a lovely pub called Tangor on the main street where we enjoyed a superb ceviche and some divine spring rolls while people watching for an hour or so. The "people" included the guy in the bar who had the most unFrench accent for a Frenchman, but it seems the accent came and went when he chose because we heard him a few minutes after he had spoken to us (in what sounded like a Italian/Greek/Spanish accent) speaking in a very nasal french accent english manner. He also had baggy trousers hiding what appeared to be a cute butt.
Home time and back to our rooms where I watched the news BBC, over and over and over again.
No comments:
Post a Comment