Crazy Journeys from Hell: Koh Phangan to Vang Vieng

This was one of the more memorable experiences of my life.  The first half went smoothly, but the second half… well, read on and you’ll find out…

It was my 12th day on Koh Phangan (home of the infamous Full Moon Party).  I was sitting with a friend in a restaurant, eating chicken & cashew nuts; I looked over at him and said “I need to get the F*CK out of this topical island, and I need to get out fast.”  New Years Eve was only a few days away, and I wanted to be somewhere awesome; my visa was set to expire in 2 days.  Vang Vieng, Laos seemed like the perfect place for to continue my Southeast Asia journey.  I stood up without hesitation, walked over to the nearest travel agency (which was conveniently located 10 seconds away from where I was sitting), and booked a ticket.  The next morning I was set to leave for Bangkok; I decided that I’d book a train ticket from Bangkok to Laos—I wanted to save money so I didn’t book directly to Laos from Koh Phangan.  A ticket from Koh Phangan to Bangkok cost me 800 baht.

The following morning I woke up, checked out of my bungalow, walked across the beach with all my possessions, and went to the travel agent to escape the drug and sex laden hell hole (Haad Rin) I had called home for the past week and a half.  I took a taxi to the pier, rode a ferry to the mainland, then a bus ride straight to Khao San Rd, Bangkok.  Overall this was a good experience; I had no complaints.  The price was right.  When I had arrived in Bangkok things got interesting…

I arrived in Bangkok at 5 AM and was dropped off by Khao San Rd.  I had gotten about 2 hours of sleep the night before.  First thing I did was hire a taxi to drop me off at the train station.  At the time I did not like Bangkok, (but my opinion of Bangkok changed as I spent more time there), so I did not want to waste any time in Bangkok, especially on Khao San Rd.  I rushed to the train station to catch the next one to Laos; I did NOT want to wait for longer than I had to.  I was in for a treat….

In order to save money I purchased a 3rd class seat.  In retrospect, this was a horrible, horrible decision.  It was one of those experiences that taught me not be such a cheap-ass in the future—I’ll never learn… My train was scheduled to leave 14 hours after I booked it…I had some time to kill.  So much for rushing to the station to save time.  My day basically consisted of me attempting to sleep in the train station, eating delicious food all day, and sitting around checking out girls.

It was finally time to board the train.  I had absolutely no clue what I had gotten myself into… I was assigned a specific seat on the front of the train.  Imagine two benches facing one another, each bench was meant to fit two people (but in reality, only large enough to accommodate 1 western person), and about 2 feet of legroom to be shared with two people.  Words cannot describe how unpleasant this train ride was for me.  Here is a fun list of reasons why I wanted to stab myself in the eye with an ice-pick by the time the ride was over: 

-I was sharing a small bench with another human, and had absolutely no leg room.  The bench was made of hard plastic and did not recline.  At times it was more comfortable to stand up rather than sit.

-My seat happened to be directly behind the head car, so every 10 seconds I’d hear the screamingly loud train horn going off.

-Since I was in a 3rd class cabin I was literally the only tourist there (although I think it’s cool to be the only one).  Every 5 minutes people were getting on and off the train, and at every stop people would get on the train trying to sell food to the passengers.  This, and the fact that this woman’s dog was barking every 2 seconds made for an obnoxiously loud ride.  All of this loud noise, plus an uncomfortable seat allowed for me to get a solid 10 minutes of sleep that night.

-I did not know that Laos can get cold at night.  I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt on the train.  Things got pretty cold that night.  My goose bumps were hardcore.  Also, the fact that it was night time meant that I wasn’t able to see anything out the window.

It was morning time; I had just stayed awake pretty much all night.  I was supposed to get off the train at Nong Kiaw, the last city in Thailand before the Laos border.  A bunch of people were getting off the train, so I assumed that I was also supposed to get off too; I asked a local person “Is this Nong Kiaw?”  Of course she said yes… she probably wasn’t even listening to my question, but the fact that people in Asia are into “saving face” meant that she had to say yes so she would not look stupid (“save face”).  I got off the train and realized that I made a huge mistake.  I explained my situation to the guards; luckily they were nice enough to let me get on the next train for free.  Thinking back, I’m lucky they didn’t ask me for a bribe or make me pay for another ticket.  The guards must have felt bad for me… One benefit of traveling to a country that gets a lot of tourism means that it’s possible that local people with have sympathy for you if you make a mistake.

I ate breakfast and sat around for another hour waiting for the next train.  The next train came by, and I was put in a sleeper car.  Had I spent the extra $10 for a 2nd class sleeper car, this is what I could have had.  It was SO comfortable!  Wow… Anyway, at least I managed to catch a few minutes of sleep.  Too bad we were only an hour away from Nong Kiaw; I could have used some more sleep.  The train arrived, and all of us on the train transferred to another train.  This train took us across the Friendship Bridge on the Thailand/Laos border, and we arrived on the outskirts of Vientiane.  Now it was time for immigration…

                    

A 30 day tourist visa cost me $35.  I had no cash on me so I had to hire a taxi driver to take me to an ATM.  Kip is a funny currency… 1 USD is the equivalent to about 8,000 Kip.  I had no clue what the conversion rate was at the time, so I withdrew about 500,000 Kip from the ATM, and assumed that I had taken out several hundred dollars.  The taxi driver charged me 50,000 for the ride to the ATM and back to immigration.  I was extremely confused at this point so I agreed to his outrageous price.  Luckily, this was the only time I can remember getting blatantly scammed in Laos.