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There were five of us leaving Vientiane for Savannakhet. I met Ali for breakfast and then we joined Dan, Becky and Andy at the bus station. We were there by 10 past 9, but already the 10am bus was full. The thought of standing for 9 hours did not appeal, so we decided to get the 11am bus to Pakse, which went via Savannakhet. This was a little more expensive, but worth it to have a seat. We spent the next hour and a half jealously guarding our Seats.

Needless to say, this bus was overcrowded as well. Standing near us were some students who were going all the way home to Pakse, an 18 hour journey. They were only going for the weekend. They had an English exam, so they got Dan and Becky helping them with it. There were four seats at the back of the bus, and four of us were filling them. Some of the Laos were obviously not to happy at this inefficient use of seats, and at one point the conductor decided he needed a sit down, so he motioned me to move to one side and plonked himself in the middle. Later on, after being on his feet for over 6 hours, one of the students made a motion like he was going to dive at us, Dan and I made enough room for him, and almost as soon as he hit the seat he was asleep.

We arrived in Savannakhet more or less on schedule, got a tuk tuk into the town centre and tried to find somewhere to stay. This was more difficult than we expected. The first hotel we tried was fairly grotty and only had two doubles and a single, which wasn't really what we needed. Dan and I went round more or less all the others listed in the Lonely Planet, leaving the others minding the bags. Some of the others were even worse, some didn't have the right rooms, one place which looked OK had a night guy who was asleep and when woken couldn't be bothered to help us. The only place that was nice and had rooms was a proper hotel which was way too expensive. As we were wandering round we got the impression that this was a fairly seedy place, and when we got back to the others at the first hotel there was someone trying to find a room for the next couple of hours, for him and his ladyfriend. In spite of this we decided that Andy and I would share a double here, while Ali would have the single room.

Our next mission was to get some food. This wasn't so easy - it was now close to 10pm and most places were shut. We found a food stall, but all it had was noodle soup, which we were all a bit fed up of. But it had cold beer, so we put up with it, although Becky just had a drink.

It was too early to go to bed, so we stopped off at a tacky looking disco with padded doors. This was obviously aimed at locals, though the people serving drinks understood some English. The music was western style disco with Laos lyrics. At midnight the music stopped, the lights went on, and everyone left straight away.

After a surprisingly good night's sleep we decided to go to the bus station to check the time of the bus to Lao Bao. We walked there along the main roads, and got periodically attacked by people still celebrating new year.

Ganging up on passers by

But at first we seemed to have some success. By dint of running, ducking and weaving and with a little luck, we stayed more or less dry. But then the luck ran out.

The ultimate water party

This was to be no ordinary drenching though. We resigned ourselves to it, and tried to move our cameras out of the way. Instead of throwing water over us, they dragged us into a kind of garage area where they were having a party, complete with sound system and lots of alcohol.

More whiskey, more dancing

Ali gets in the spirit

The alcohol kept flowing and very soon we were quite drunk. We were dancing, drinking and more than occasionally being the target of whoever was holding a hosepipe. Andy asked me if I thought anything was a bit strange, but I hadn't noticed anything. Then the guy who seemed to be the boss took me to one side and started a really weird conversation.

My potential bride is on the right

Once he had finished, a young girl, probably about 17 or so, started dancing with me. I didn't think anything of it, but then reality suddenly penetrated my alcohol sodden brain, the same reality that Andy had grasped some time before. We were being offered young women, whether for the night or for life, I don't know.

Ali dances with her

However this was a good party, and no-one seemed to be getting heavy, everyone had a smile on their face, so the three of us kept drinking and dancing, and of course, getting soaked.

After a while, my 17 year old dancing partner obviously realised that I wasn't interested in anything more than dancing and went away. Within minutes a 13 year old had appeared in her stead and started dancing with me. This was getting weirder.

I think I look disturbingly like George Best in this photo, but in his alcoholic-liver-failure period, rather than in his dashing shagathon days.

But still it didn't get heavy, so we stayed and danced and drank some more, alternating between the garage area and a building over the road which Andy was convinced was a brothel, though I didn't see any evidence of it. Then I didn't see a lot that afternoon.

Andy looking well out of it, as does everyone else.

Eventually we had to go and sort ourselves out for the overnight trip to Vietnam. Andy was heading south, so we said goodbye to him and headed for the bus station. We were there in plenty of time, and so was the bus, though they wouldn't let us on it until it was nearly time to go. This was the most decrepit bus I had seen on the entire trip - it looked 20 or 30 years old, and as if it had had a hard life, which I suspect it had. Ali's ticket had been reduced to a sodden mass during the water party, but the conductor seemed happy enough to accept it. He told the Laos and Vietnamese to go to the front of the bus while we were sent to the back. We grabbed the back seats, threw our bags in the designated area and wished a fond farewell to Laos.

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Last modified on 22nd December 2007 3:31 PM EST

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