Vietnam to Laos

The sleeper bus to Hue was interesting. I had a very close call in the first 20 mins of the trip when i got stomach pains and felt very very sick. But luckily it was a short sickness and threw up once and then felt fine. Was worried I was going to be sick the whole trip, but very thankful I wasn't. I have been trying to wash my hands a lot more, but it is difficult traveling like we are to be clean. Didn't manage to sleep too much, but the beds were kind of comfortable. We got off in Dung Ha about 2 hours outside of Hue to eat breakfast and found out they did vietnam military tours there and decided to stay for a tour and get a ride to Hue later. It was a great decision. Our tour guide was a local to the area and was 11 years old when the American War started (as they call it). His family had to give up their restaurant during the war and move to the next town over because the town was turned into a military base. Dung Ha is on the south side of the boarder, out of the 65,000 American soldiers who were killed in the war, 12,000 were killed there. He took us into a field where American bunkers were and we got to see a few of them, also saw some unexploded bombs that were missed by the mine clearers and the locals just leave them because many people have been injured by trying to remove the bombs. There was a trail and we made sure to stay on it! We then visited a cemetery of soldiers. After that we made our way to the boarder of North and South Vietnam and walked across the bridge and visited the war museum. Finally he took us to the underground tunnels. The North Vietnamese near the boarder had to live underground because of bombings. The tunnel we went through housed over 400 people. There were 3 different levels, the first 12 meters deep the second 15 meters deep and the 3rd 23 meters deep, we got to go into each level. Families had their own living quarters which were about 4 feet by 5.5 feet for up to 5 people. The tunnels were about 3.5 feet wide and 5.5 feet high. They had designated rooms for kitchens, bathrooms, and medical care, all very small. It was very cool to get to go through them. I could not imagine living like that.

From Dung Ha we went to Hue and spent the night. The next morning we got a bus to Savannahket, Laos. During this bus trip I saw some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen; lush green jungle like mountains and rivers and small mountain huts. In Savannahket we walked around a bit, then saw a bar where people were playing a game outside so we went there. It is a game pretty much like bochie ball, with just little differences. We ended up staying there and playing the game with the locals till midnight, and then went back to the hotel to sleep, it was a lot of fun.

This morning we caught a bus to Pahket, Laos. This bus was a local bus and parts of the ride were on dirt roads. The local bus was a smaller version of a school bus with less comfortable seats and no air conditioning. It is probablly in the 90's here too. The bus would drive and when it got to a small town it would beep a lot and then locals would come out to the road and hop in. It was hot and uncomfortable, but really cool to experience.

Today is Wed, and our flight leaves Cambodia on Sunday morning, we we don't have much time left. Siem Reap is a day and a half bus ride, so I think we are going to take an hour plane ride to Siem Reap so we get to spend a full day in Laos. The coffee here is amazing! Tomorrow we might take a tour to the plantations and pick some coffee beans and try different fresh brews of Laos coffee, or we are going to rent motorbikes and head out 30Kilometers to waterfalls, still haven't decided yet.