{"id":2802,"date":"2026-03-07T01:14:59","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T01:14:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aerowalsh.com\/cr\/?p=2802"},"modified":"2026-03-07T02:08:02","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T02:08:02","slug":"fri-6th-mar-vientiane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/?p=2802","title":{"rendered":"Fri 6th Mar – Vientiane"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

CR: We were warned by many a guide book that there wasn’t much to do in the Laotian capital. It’s a bit of a sprawling mess. Along the Mekong, which establishes the border with Thailand, there is the skewer district and the carnival and night market. Going away from the river is a confusion of residential and shops. And then further out than that are things like embassies and bank headquarters and a few museums. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today we see all that with a long walk around all this that gets increasingly difficult as the sun rises. It’s only low 30s but it just feels so exhausting walking in the middle hours of the day. I guess it’s the humidity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a killing time vibe to today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DW: It is my last full day on the holiday so I feel a bit confused. We make the most of the day though and get a good feel for Vientiane operates. It is reassuring that the same level of abysmal driving present in the rural areas is also found in the capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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DW: The view from our hotel in the morning. The floodplain in front of the Mekong is visible and a much smaller Thai town is located on the other side of the river. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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CR: Busted, stealing my croissant. There are a small handful of trendy coffee shops in Vientiane. After this we try to get a more substantial breakfast at what is purportedly a morning market. We can’t find it. Research sketchily suggests that a shopping centre has been built on top of the wet market. There’s so little information about anything in Laos online.
DW: It seems like the French influence is responsible for some of these trendy cafes. They are very chic. There are proportionally a lot more European tourists in Laos than American ones as well.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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CR: This monument was built in the late 50s to commemorate the withdrawal of French colonialist interest in Laos. The information signs never explicitly says it but they’ve obviously ripped off the Arc de Triomphe in France. Its official name is Patuxai.
DW: Caitlin obviously didn’t read the signs. The French Patuxai (as they refer to the Arc de Triomphe) is completely different. It only has two arches (this one has four) and no roof structure. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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CR: DW mapping out his plot to make Caitlin walk down this big long busy road.
DW: Don’t let the lotus get bruised, don’t let the water get cloudy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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CR: More of the view from the top. This photo says a lot about Laos. Here you can see an attempt at manicured lawns but they haven’t replaced the dead plants in the star. There’s a regal government building next to a three lane motorway. There’s a fountain peaking through to the right of the photo that was so grimy they had a team of 20 power washing the gunk away. This is the grandest splendor of the country.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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DW: I institue a small workout break to ensure we are in peak physical form for the rest of the day. The equipment is all in varying stages of broken. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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DW: The People’s Army Historical Museum is the main destination today. This is because it is moderately far away and therefore the route needs to be structured for it.
CR: Like the stalls at the night market and the shops in Luang Prabang, there is a heavy amount of repetition in the information tiles of the museum. There’s a lot of ‘this helped the Laotian spirit later in the battle for independence’ and much ‘puppet government’ rhetoric. Some of the literal events are repeated three times which makes me feel like I am going a bit crazy.
However, it does provide some information and a timeline of Laos’ political developments, so it ends up being the best one we’ve visited while we’ve been in the country.
The summary of the modern history: France dominated Laos twice, then American interests under a ‘puppet government’ supported by the royals. During the American influence, Laos ‘puppet government’ bombed its own country to try to eradicate the Ho Chi Minh Trail (which partly wound its way through Laos). This was extremely unpopular and when the Vietnam War ended the royals, who sanctioned the American interests during the war, were removed from power. Since then Laos has been Laos People’s Democratic Republic (LPDR), and is socialist.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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DW: Me pointing out helicopter facts to all my friends. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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CR: Our hotel bar has entertainment for the night. I love the stage set up. Beerlao fridge. A fan. Gaudy pictures (hard to pick a favourite between strobe lights in 2020 and the No Music No Life slogan for a mid range hotel). We were going to have dinner here but the music is incomprehensibly loud so instead we elect to get some Laotian food down the road. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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CR: End of my last day with Dek. We’ve had a fun holiday. We’re both tired. Dek said he didn’t feel like he relaxed during his break but was glad he came. He has a long trip home tomorrow. He flies into Singapore and then has a 9 hour layover before flying out to Sydney. Close to a full day of travel. He will land in Syd around midday Sunday. I already miss my travel bud.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Capital.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2834,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-thailand-laos-cambodia-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2802"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2802\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2837,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2802\/revisions\/2837"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cr.aerowalsh.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}