Pakse, Laos
Tad Fane Waterfall outside of Pakse
The lowdown
For our first destination in Laos, we stopped in Pakse – a lesser known destination in Southern Laos. We would have liked to spend time in the 4,000 Islands (we’ll have to go back), but we found a cheap flight from Pakse to Luang Prabang so had to take advantage of that.
Pakse is a small town on the Mekong and was the perfect introduction to Laos. The town itself isn’t much of a destination, though it is sleepy and rather charming, but its outskirts are what makes Pakse an awesome place to spend a day or two. We had an awesome day exploring the Bolaven Plateau around Pakse and literally chasing waterfalls. It was the first time that we rented our own motorbike and we’re now hooked!
Day 1: Border crossings and new friends
Normally, travel days are pretty uneventful, but our journey from Cambodia to Laos was anything but. We were a little hungover from our previous evening’s escapades with Panha (read: too much homemade rice wine), so weren’t looking forward to spending 13 hours on a van.
We congregated at the Asia Van Transfer office with our fellow travelers and somehow got to chatting with the people around us immediately. We met a lovely German couple that was traveling around Southeast Asia for a month and a Croatian/Argentinian couple that was also traveling for a year. We ended up chatting with our new Croatian/Argentinian friends – Santi and Andrea – for all five hours of the journey from Siem Reap to the border of Laos, making it easily the most fun and fastest five hours of travel ever.
We stopped for lunch at a sneaky good spot that had delicious and insanely large banh mi-esque sandwiches and ramen noodles with veggies. When we paid, they tried to give us a $2 bill (Cambodia uses USD) in change. We were initially surprised and somewhat skeptical as $2 bills are uncommon in the US (though they are still being printed). When we felt the actual bill, we knew it was fake – it felt like a stronger version of Monopoly money. As if lunch couldn’t get any more interesting, Doug walked back to a group in the back of the restaurant and saw they were watching cock fighting on TV and gambling. A hilarious stop.
After lunch, we hopped back in the van and spent another hour driving to the Cambodia/Laos border. We had been told that we would have to pay $3 for an exit stamp on the way out of Cambodia and another $2 on the way into Laos (in addition to the visa cost). We had never heard of having to pay for an exit or an entry stamp – this was just a legitimized bribe.
Doug got firm with the Cambodian border agents when they tried to give us Cambodian riel as change for $10 USD (we were leaving Cambodia so would have no use for riel). The guy insisted he didn’t have $4 USD in change, despite having just taken at least 10 “payments” (read: bribes) in single dollar bills from the people before us. SMH.
We walked over the border with our new friends and reflected on the ridiculousness of this legitimized corruption. On the Laos side of the border, we saw a USAID stamp right next to the border agents that were asking for the $2 “processing” fees in addition to the visa and couldn’t help but laugh.
We made a quick stop in the 4,000 Islands to drop off our new friends, said heartfelt goodbyes, and got a glimpse of an amazing red sunset. Then, we continued on for several more hours until we reached Pakse, chatting with a Cambodian friend we had made on the van. We were thrilled to get off the van after 13 hours of travel from Siem Reap to Pakse!
We spotted a Korean place – aptly named Lao Korea – right across the street from where we were staying. After checking in, we walked across the street and had a delicious Korean feast – our first Korean food since Samarkand in October. The kimchi pancake was the star of the show, but we also enjoyed jap chae, spicy noodles, and ban chan. Though the cuisine wasn’t Laotian, it was definitely a successful first meal in Laos!
Day 2: Chasing waterfalls
We started our day relatively early, eager to get on the road and avoid the city-wide power outrages from 9am-12pm in Pakse. After some spicy noodle soup for breakfast, we excitedly walked to the main drag to rent a motorbike. The first place we stopped was out of bikes for the day, so we walked next-door to Peter Pan Motorbike and got a new 150cc Honda bike.
We did some trial driving around the street and then we were off! Doug took the helm first as the Chief Transportation Officer of our nomadic household. The feeling of being on the bike was incredible – we felt so free, independent, and mobile!
We drove ~40 minutes outside of Pakse before coming up on the first waterfall we planned to go to. We went down a very rocky, steep dirt road (a new adventure on the motorbike), only to find that the gate to the waterfall was closed. Not the biggest bummer as we had dramatically increased our confidence on the bike!
Our first successful stop was Tad Fane – an insane pair of waterfalls that fall 120 meters. At first glance, there didn’t appear to be any hikes that got us close to the waterfalls. We were intrigued by an alternative option – a series of ziplines that would allow us to cruise across and get close to the epic falls. After a cost/benefit analysis, we decided to do it… only to be rejected because our dollars (that we got from a Chase ATM in the US) had marks on them and wouldn’t cut it. Sigh!
We were eager to do more exploring closer to the falls, so we consulted our friend maps.me and found an “overgrown waterfall view” path. It was definitely the road less traveled with plenty of untamed flora, but it was a fun adventure and led us slightly closer to the falls. We sweat all the way back up and hopped back on the bike for our next adventure.
Stop number two was easily our favorite waterfall of the day – Tad Yuang. We grabbed an 80 cent cone of soft serve to quench our thirst and started on the walk down to the waterfall. Tad Yuang reminded us of the waterfalls in Iceland – cascading falls surrounded by dark rock and lush forest. We were some of the only people at the waterfall, so we found a rock close to the water, sat, and enjoyed the sight and sound of the water coming down. If (when) we get stressed at some point when we’re back in reality, we’ll have to think back to those peaceful moments.
Last but not least on waterfall tour was Tad Champee. We took a long, somewhat dicey, but somehow idyllic dirt road a few kilometers down to get to this waterfall. On the way, we passed Laotian kids excitedly waving and shouting “hello!”, beautiful farms, and no other adults, all the while hoping Google Maps wasn’t leading us astray. Luckily, we made it and enjoyed an hour hiking down to the waterfall, walking around the cave behind the waterfall, and getting misted.
After a successful day chasing waterfalls, we zoomed back to Pakse, much more confident on the motorbike than we had been six hours earlier. We spent the rest of the day walking around the quaint town and the banks of the Mekong and watching the red sunset from the roof of our hotel. What a day!
