Having sampled enough beer Lao and watched a few ‘Friends’ episodes, we thought it be good to start heading home! It would take a week – but full of laughs and a little bit of shopping to finally fill up our packs.

We decided that the best way to get from Vientiane to Bangkok (for out flight to Singapore) was to do the reverse of our entry into Laos. This time, In order to save money we would do it by public transport (lots of public buses and then a flight) rather than private transfer (operated by Nok air) or direct bus.

Our aim to beat – Vang Veing to Udon thani, Thailand
Direct bus ( 165,000 kip = $21 US 8.50 hours)
Mini bus + Nok air transfer (40,000kip + 550 baht = $22.60 US 6.5 hours)

We set off earlier from Vang Veing to Vientiane, by mini van which took only 3 hours due to the break neck driving speed (40,000kip 3 hours, VIP bus 50,000kip 4hours). As we had become accustomed to, it dropped us at a seemingly random bus station (north bus station), 12km away from the city centre. Having meet a fellow kiwi on the bus, we ‘group’ hired a very old flat bed truck for a lift to the morning market/local bus station (60,000kip for 4 people). Despite stalling the truck at every intersection (we think he was running on petrol vapours), we made it in good time to catch the local bus to the boarder which was half pulling out of the station. We had previously taken the number 14 (6,000 kip each, leaves every 30min) to see Buddha park, only to find it went straight to the border with Thailand (the friendship bridge) – Exactly where we needed to go. Instead of paying 150,000 to a ‘cartel’ style tuktuk driver from town, we took this cheap air conditioned option all the way to the immigration post ! For some bizarre reason this bus route was run using donated publish school buses from Japan.

At the boarder we grabbed a quick snack – ice tea and a baguette. One mustn’t rely on getting an decent meal here though. None of the official money changers would change Lao ‘Kip’ into anything – it’s a pretty useless currency. I eventually convinced the post office lady to do a conversion to Thai baht for our remaining 20 dollars worth; abit at a pretty awful rate.

Immigration was a breeze ! Welcome to no mans land – home of the taxi tout and dirty trader. Many offered private cars across the boarder to neighbouring thai cities ( 1200 baht to Udon Thani – our destination). We went with the 40 baht bus across the bridge, which dropped us outside thai immigration. Unlike coming Cambodia this was a surprisingly seamless affair – no touts, no rip offs, no queues.
From immigration we got a truck for the official posted rate (50 baht each) into Nong Khai bus station (its hard to argue with a poster outlining the prices ). Nong Khai is an industrial boarder town which serves as the end point to the Thai railway. Getting out at the bus station we jumped straight into a minivan heading the 51km (1 hour, 50 baht) down the road to Udon Thani. Our driver was great, dropping us at the railway station in town rather than the larger bus station. We only the had to walk a few blocks away to our accommodation for the night.
Seamless !

In the end, we saved 2 hours and $5.32 US dollars when compared to the direct bus. Taking into account the 100 baht TukTuk to the airport the next day, we saved $3 US dollars compared to the Nok air transfer

Motto of the day – do it independently !!