Vientiane to Luang Prabang

Saturday, February 16th, 2013 Luang Prabang, Laos
Today we checked out of the d'Rose Hotel in Vientiane and flew to Luang Prabang. First we had another good breakfast in the huge lobby / dining area.

There's a nice new international airport terminal in Vientiane but domestic flights depart from the old airport building which is compact and not that comfortable. We had our passports and boarding cards checked several times but when we went through the metal detector, no-one even looked at us. We could have boarded with a cannon. There was a Korean or Chinese tour group waiting with us and some of them had forgotten that they weren't the only people on the planet. Anyway, it wasn't a long wait and we had a good flight on a new Airbus A-320 with leather seats. With the anticipated increase in tourism, southeast Asian airlines seem to be really upgrading their fleets right now.
It was only a few minutes by taxi from the airport to our hotel in Luang Prabang. We're staying at the Villa Champa, a small guesthouse with 9 rooms. We have the corner room overlooking the street on the 2nd (top) floor with a balcony that goes all the way around the corner, with 2 doors out to it from our room. Not bad. The hotel has all wood floors and nice trim. Everyone removes their shoes at the door to the hotel from the street.

After cooling off in our room for a while, we went out for dinner. We're not really oriented yet, although this is a small town on a peninsula between the Mekong River and a tributary, the Nam Khan River. We looked at a restaurant called L'Elephant but it was too expensive so we walked toward the river and a restaurant we'd seen in Lonely Planet called the Tamarind. Unfortunately, we walked the wrong way to the wrong river and ended up at the Tamarind Tree overlooking the Mekong. We thought it looked a little dodgy so we ordered everything deep fried. So far we're still okay but it was only an hour ago.

The view out over the Mekong is really exotic. There are hills all around and the river looks like it must come up 10 or 12 metres in the rainy season. We're looking forward to exploring the area this week since we're here for 5 nights.