If one looks at a map of Southeast Asia to figure out which border crossing to use to go from Sapa, Vietnam to Luang Prabang, Laos, one would most likely to choose the Dien Bien Phu (Vietnam) – Tay Trang (Laos) crossing since it is the closest one from Sapa. Opened just a few years ago, this border is not commonly used by travellers (yet), so we didn’t expect a perfectly smooth trip. However, we didn’t know how bumpy, literally and figuratively, it would be. The journey from Sapa to Luang Prabang turned out to be a 3-day adventure.
When we inquired about the Dien Bien Phu – Tay Trang border crossing to a travel agent in Sapa, he gave us a hesitant look and said that he could only book a bus for us from Sapa to Dien Bien Phu (the Vietnamese border town). He warned us that we would ride on a uncomfortable local bus to Dien Bien Phu and advised us to take a taxi instead for US$150, which was WAY over our budget. So, we researched the internet and read anecdotes from people who went through the crossing, which didn’t sound appealing at all (stories of road closures due to landslides, bus breakdowns and busses on the verge of falling off cliffs abounded). We also researched on the internet for other options. Flying would be the fastest, and also the most expensive. Using the more common southern border crossing would necessitate going back to Hanoi via train, which would be time consuming. In the end, we opted for the original plan of crossing the Dien Bien Phu – Tay Trang border. I was ready for an adventure, expecting the worst and hoping for the best.
In reality, Day 1 (Sapa to Dien Bien Phu) and Day 3 (Udomxai to Luang Prabang) were pretty uneventful, with most hours spent on busses. However, I shall never forgot Day 2 (Dien Bien Phu to Udomxai) because of the sheer comical absurdity of the whole day.
Day 2-Dien Bien Phu to Udomxai
Day 2 started dark and early, as the bus to Laos was scheduled to leave at 5:30 am. Needless to say, we were still groggy from the 11+ hour bus ride the day before when we arrived in front of the bus station at 5:15 am to buy our tickets and board on the bus. Having logged in many, many bus rides in Southeast Asia the past few months, I learned that having a stash of snacks was crucial to prevent starvation and crankiness, so I went shopping immediately after getting my ticket. Luckily, there were a few entrepreneurial locals selling food and drinks nearby at that ungodly hour who were happy to accommodate my needs. My group then stood patiently in front of the bus station, waiting for a bus station employee to walk us to our bus. The chance of this happening seemed slimmer as 5:30 am was approaching, so we decided to go into the bus station to search the bus ourselves.
The bus was a sight for half-awoken eyes. Actually, “minibus” is the more accurate word for what it really was. The top of the bus was practically stacked with passengers’ backpacks, boxes of supplies, and bags of food for transport into Laos. The bus was already filled to capacity with more backpacks, boxes of supplies, bags of food and PEOPLE! Just as we thought that we couldn’t get on the bus, I was told by the bus guide to hop on and sit in the back. The problem was that all the seats were taken. The guide then pointed at a backpack on the floor which was to be my seat, and I was supposed to walk on the taken seats (and people) to get there. I thought to myself, “Oh, so that’s how it works. Once all the proper seats are taken (some people shared seats), the rest are placed to sit on any available space that’s not taken up yet by a person’s buttock. Sitting uncomfortably for 10 minutes is fine with me, but for the next 12 hours?!”
We were literally packed like sardines when the bus left the station. As the sun was rising, the bus drove merrily to the border as I counted 35 passengers on the bus which had a capacity for 15 people. Needless to say, we were all very uncomfortable, even the lucky ones with real seats as they had to share their precious seat space with another person. The rest of us who were sitting on backpacks or bags of rice had to adjust our bodies once in a while to relieve the aches that developed from the twisting and bending we did to be able to sit. Incredulously, the bus stopped along the way to pick up more people!! Whenever it did, there was a collective “No!” from the passengers, which I’m sure made the new passengers very welcome. Somehow, we were able to fit everyone on the bus, even though having this many people would have been illegal in the developed world. Fortunately, some people also got off the bus along the way.
We were happy to exit the bus at the Vietnamese border checkpoint for a breath of fresh air and some stretching. Getting stamped out at the checkpoint was relatively easy and quick. One immigration officer was offering to exchange Vietnamese dong for Laotian kip at a ridiculously high rate. However, in retrospect, maybe I should have exchanged some of my money there, since I would later find out about the difficulties of not having local currency in rural Laotian villages. After getting stamped out of Vietnam and waited idly outside the checkpoint building for a quite a long time, our bus appeared and we all boarded on the bus. Well, the people who sat on backpacks and rice bags clamored onto the bus as we scrounged for real seats. It’s amazing how quickly human beings can turn into primal beasts to fulfill basic needs.
On the road between the Vietnamese and Laotian checkpoints, it was easy to see where Vietnam ended and Laos began, because the section of the road that is owned by Vietnam was perfectly paved and the section of the road that is owned by Laos was NOT. In fact, the Laotian side was so rocky and dusty that the bus stopped at the end of the paved Vietnamese side, simply because it could not drive any further. We were told to get out of the bus and walk to the Laotian checkpoint. I would have worn better shoes instead of my sandals if I knew that we would have to walk 3 km to the checkpoint since I managed to cut one of my toes from a sharp rock.
There were no surprises at the Laotian checkpoint other than my needing to pay for processing and H1N1 check fees. Fortunately, the immigration officials accepted US dollars. Much of the time there was spent waiting; waiting for immigration officials to process everyone’s passports and visas, waiting for our bus to appear (to this day, I don’t know how the bus managed to get itself from the end of the paved road to the Laotian checkpoint), and when it did appear, waiting for the bus driver to start driving again. I think we spent about 2-3 hours there. To test our humor, two MORE people were added on the bus! One of them, David, is Vietnamese-American and was later really good at translating back and forth between the passengers and the bus driver and guide.
It was approaching lunchtime and people were beginning to get hungry. There was a rumor floating that we would stop for lunch about 30 minutes after the bus took off from the Laotian checkpoint. 30 minutes turned into 1 hour, which turned into 2 hours, with the bus not stopping at all. The drive was long, rocky and windy as we drove through mountainous terrain on an unpaved, unsealed, and ridiculously narrow road. I occasionally looked out the window to look at the beautiful scenery but had moments of terror when I looked down through the window and saw a 1000-ft drop off a cliff edge with hardly any road space between the bus and the drop. There were some moments when I felt that the bus was teetering delicately off the edge and felt my heart racing.
The only times the bus stopped was when it had to because of a road closure due to construction. We encountered 3 road blocks that day, and we had to wait patiently until construction ended before the bus was able to continue driving on the road.
The second road block we encountered was the most memorable one from that day. Imagine being in the middle of nowhere in Laos surrounded by mountains, feeling cranky from hunger and stuffy from sitting in a crowded bus with no windows open to prevent hot dusty earth from entering in it. That is how we felt when the bus stopped in front of a road closure. Most of us exited the bus to get some fresh air. We were notified by David that the construction was going to end at 4 pm, so we had a few hours to kill. A couple decided to take their bags and hike around the area during this time.
Many people were starved at this point; one was so hungry that he wanted to eat my apple peel that was I going to discard. There were several thatched wood structures on top of a hill on the side of the road behind the bus. Many of us started walking quickly toward the buildings, hoping that perhaps one of them was a store that sold food. But in front of the building structures was a huge billboard sign welcoming us to a drug rehab center, a joint program between the Laotian and German governments. But that still didn’t deter us from entering, since we thought that since it was a rehab center, they HAD to have food, right? And maybe we can buy food from them? Alas, that wasn’t the case. However, no officials told us to leave the center (actually, I didn’t see anyone who worked there, only saw residents behind bars) and there was a nice shaded area with tables and benches, so a big group of us hung out there while waiting for the road construction to end.
The road constructors decided to stop a for break early and cleared out the road around 3 pm to let the bus go through. Hence, there was a chaotic dash by everyone to climb back on the bus. As we continued our journey, someone asked, “Where’s the couple who took off?” Indeed, they weren’t on the bus. However, the bus couldn’t turn back because were already so far behind schedule. For a while, we were looking out for them, hoping that they were hiking along the road. But after a long time, we gave up. So, on top of everything else, we also lost two people that day in the middle of rural northern Laos.
At this point, even though we were famished, we somehow kept our sanity and good humor. After everyone exhausted and shared their food supplies, some of us noticed that there was a box labeled “Choco Pies” in the back of the bus. We joked about convincing the guide to sell the box to all of us. The joke went on for about a few hours, until David actually asked the guide in Vietnamese if we could buy the box of Choco Pies. After the guide answered, David told us that the box didn’t really CONTAIN any Choco Pies. The disappointing, loud “Aw!” from all the passengers sounded so pathetic that it was immediately followed by laughter.
After a while, the bus did stop at a village for a restroom break (which means peeing by the side of the road). Most were too exhausted to get out of the bus and waited inside. However, David did get out of the bus and wandered around. Some of us watched as he entered back into the bus with a ….. COKE. This excited everyone as we asked him “Where did you get that?!” When he pointed to one of the thatched wooden structures on the side of the road, many of us exited the bus and dashed into the store. I don’t think that the shopkeeper has ever seen so many eager tourists in her store wanting to buy everything she had that was edible.
This is where the dilemna of not having local currency came in. The village was very rural (I don’t think it even had electricity and so obviously no ATM). Luckily, Katrina had some local currency when she got change at the border from paying her visa and other fees. So, she gave our group a limit on how much each of us could spend. Stale shrimp chips and the artificially-flavored orange drink never tasted so good as it did there.
At sunset, the bus almost reached its destination, Muang Khua. I added “almost” because just as we thought that we completed our journey for the day, we realized that there was a river we had cross to actually get to the village! The bus did drive through a few streams during the day, but this river was too deep for the bus. There were a couple of narrow boats ready to take us across, but to pay for that service, we needed local currency that very few of us had. Luckily, Katrina had enough money for our group to ride across the river. So, we collected our backpacks and balanced onto the boat one at a time to prevent falling off from it.
After crossing the river, as we were contemplating our next move, David was negotiating with a local that owned a truck who offered to drive us to Udomxai. We figured that since Udomxai is actually on the map we had of Laos, and it has an airport, it’s bound to have an ATM, right? So, we decided to immediately go to Udomxai immediately instead of staying at Muang Khua for the night. Luckily, the truck driver accepted Vietnamese dong and US dollars, which all of us had.
After a stuffy 12+ hour bus ride, riding on the back of the truck at night was refreshing. It was so refreshing that it got chilly towards the end. The truck did stop at the next village for dinner (real food, at last!), where I ate my first bag of sticky rice which I instantly became a fan of. The ride itself took about 2 hours and we arrived in Udomxai at around 9 pm. The truck did also stop at an ATM which we quickly emptied out.
Once in Udomxai, we did the usual routine of going from guesthouse to guesthouse to find a room and preparing for the trip tomorrow to our next destination, Luang Prabang. I’ll never forget this crazy day.
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- Road Closure Due to Construction-Day 1
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- Waiting by the Road Side-Day 1
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- Vietnam Border Checkpoint-Day 2
Tags: Dien Bien Phu, Laos, Luang Prabang, Muang Khua, Sapa, Tay Trang, Udomxai, Vietnam
