Our first night in Laos: a flat tire, a tent and dinner with a local family

We entered Laos on August 4, 2015, on the scooter we had bought back in Phuket. From Chiang Rai we rode to the border, crossed it and found ourselves in a new country. Ahead of us were two weeks in Laos: we wanted to see Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng and the capital, Vientiane.

The roads in Laos turned out to be quite decent, but mountainous: one switchback after another. Then again, the views are such that riding these roads is a pleasure in itself, even without any sights.

That same day we were riding toward the small town of Vieng Phouka, and a few kilometers short of it we got a flat tire. We had to stop, and we pitched our tent next to the house of a local family. Our hosts did not speak English, and we communicated almost entirely with gestures. But they fed us dinner, and at the table it turned out that one of them had studied in Tashkent forty years earlier and still remembered a little Russian. In the morning the family helped us with the scooter, and we moved on.

The next day we made it to Oudomxay and there we finally bought a local SIM card, so we had internet again. Compared to Thailand, our speed dropped by more than half: there we averaged 85 kilometers per hour, and here about 40. You cannot pick up speed on switchbacks, and after the flat we were wary of every little pebble.

On August 6 we set off for Luang Prabang. For the first fifty kilometers or so the road was awful: mud, rain, and that stretch took us about three hours. In the photos everything looks even better than it actually was.

The bad road did not stop us from enjoying the views, and along the way we got a good look at how rice grows.

For the remaining almost one hundred and fifty kilometers the road was fine, and we reached Luang Prabang much faster. Another discovery of those first days: traffic in Laos drives on the right, and after all the previous countries that took some getting used to.

After that we rode the whole length of Laos from north to south, through Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng, Vientiane and Pakse, and crossed back into Thailand.