Laos Travel Guide
The People’s Democratic Republic of Lao (or Laos as it is usually known outside of the country) is the only landlocked country in Southeast Asia, surrounded by Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar and China. Its relative isolation and lack of major tourist attractions means it is usually one the last countries in this region to be visited by travellers.
However, that’s not to say that Laos doesn’t have a lot to offer visitors. In fact, its laidback pace of life and lower number of visitors compared to the countries around it makes it an appealing destination for older travellers looking to enjoy nature and experience local culture in an environment that is not as busy and overrun with tourists to the same extent as many other places in Southeast Asia.
Most travellers head to northern Laos where Luang Prabang, Vang Vieng and the capital Vientiane offer accommodation and dining options to international standards, but outside of those three destinations visitors will find facilities a lot more basic. Flying into Luang Prabang and then travelling south to Vientiane gives you the options of either flying out of the capital or continuing overland into Thailand or southern Laos.
Travelling overland between the three main cities/towns in the north used to be an uncomfortable experience because many sections of the highways in Laos are not in good repair and badly potholed. However, in December 2021 a high speed rail link was opened between Vientiane and Luang Prabang which cut travel time from 8-10 hours to just over two hours.
The golden hues of the That Luang stupa in the capital Vientiane.
The Vientiane to Luang Prabang rail service (which stops at Vang Vieng) currently only operates once a day in each direction and is usually booked out weeks in advance, so to include this in a travel itinerary requires some advance planning.
Southern Laos is very much off the beaten track and involves a lot of additional mileage. It’s mainly a region visited by backpackers but there are a few places like the southern colonial city of Pakse, the historical ruins of Wat Phu and the riverine archipelago of Si Phan Don that older travellers with time to spare might like to research when planning an itinerary.
Luang Prabang
This small city set on the Mekong River amidst forested hills used to be known as Southeast Asia’s “best kept secret”, accessible only by road, river ferry or propjet flights from Vientiane or Bangkok. However, after the airport was upgraded in 2013 to accommodate jet aircraft, direct flights from six Chinese cities and about the same number of other international destinations resulted in this former French colonial town becoming Laos’ top tourism destination.
That’s not to say Luang Prabang is not worth visiting – it definitely is. But the days of peaceful strolls down quiet tree-lined streets between coffee and croissants in a French bakery and a relaxing massage in a boutique spa are long gone. Luang Prabang is a tourist town and you’ll be sharing experiences with a whole lot of other people. And prices are about 20 percent higher than elsewhere in Laos.
View over Luang Prabang from Phousi Hill. Image: © Sintaya Laoor
If you like Ubud in Bali or Hoi An in Vietnam, then you will enjoy Luang Prabang. Despite the crowds these days, you’ll find plenty to do for a few days or even a few weeks. Aside from sightseeing at the many temples and monasteries and watching the sunset from viewpoints along the river and on the hills (Phousi Hill in the centre of the city is one that can be tackled by most reasonably fit older visitors as it involves climbing only around 350 steps) there are several museums and an impressive Royal Palace that will keep history buffs occupied. Luang Prabang is a UNESCO World Heritage Site so there’s a lot of history there.
The Night Market with its colourful range of indigenous textiles, handicrafts and souvenirs is another must-visit (but be prepared for crowds) as are the night-time street food stalls near the tourist information centre. The number of stand-alone eating places in Luang Prabang offering gourmet food is not as large as Ubud or Hoi An, but there are some excellent restaurants along Sakkaline Road. There are also several places offering Lao cooking, yoga and meditation classes.
The Kuang Si waterfalls near Luang Prabang. Image: © Wassana Lampech
Even with so much to do, some visitors just prefer to enjoy the luxury of one of the many boutique hotels and spas in and around the city. Others like to get out of the city and explore the nearby countryside. There are many nature spots within easy reach of the city including some picturesque tiered waterfalls at Kuang Si, about 10 km to the southwest. There is also a butterfly park and bear rescue centre nearby.
Further away, Nong Khiaw, about four hours drive to the northeast of Luang Prabang, is the start of the famed backpacker route into northern Vietnam. From Nong Khiaw you can take a slow boat up the scenic Nam Ou river to Mueang Khua and then by road over the mountains to Sapa in Vietnam. The further north from Luang Prabang you venture, the more spectacular the scenery becomes and the fewer tourists you will see.
Vang Vieng
This small town about halfway between Luang Prabang and Vientiane was another of those “best kept secret” places turning into a tourist trap. But for this town it was hordes of young western backpackers looking for a place to misbehave that caused the problems – not tour groups from China. From about the late 1990s Vang Vieng became known as a party town where there were no rules.
Bars selling alcohol and drugs sprung up along the Song River and western backpackers from over the world travelled there to party, get drunk and smoke marijuana. But every year more and more backpackers were dying from alcohol and drug-fueled accidents on the Song River. In 2011 a total of 27 tourists died in Vang Vieng. The following year authorities cracked down on the hedonistic activities and now things operate at a more sedate pace.
Tubing on the Nam Song River at Vang Vieng. Image: © Don Mammoser
Vang Vieng’s famous river tubing rides are still what attracts most travellers to this scenic town, but now they are controlled as are its many other outdoor adventure activities. For older travellers it offers more leisurely pursuits such as hiking through rice fields, bicycle tours through ethnic villages on flat dirt roads, and sunrise balloon flights (in the dry season) from which you can enjoy magnificent views of the limestone karst scenery.
The town has repositioned itself as an eco-tourism destination and several new luxury boutique hotels and spas have opened in recent years to supplement the budget accommodation. Even if you are not into the adventure activities, Vang Vieng is an excellent spot to spend the night to break the journey south between Luang Prabang and Vientiane if you are travelling by road.
Vientiane
Many travellers say that Vientiane is the least interesting of Southeast Asia’s capital cities, but that’s more because of its relatively small size (the population is less than a million) than a lack of things to do. The gold Buddhist stupa of That Luang and the Patuxai Victory Monument are the city’s best known landmarks, and there are several good museums including the Lao Textile Museum where you can learn about the history and culture of the country.
Despite being the country’s capital, most things are cheaper in Vientiane compared to Luang Prabang, and there’s a good night market held along the riverfront every night where you can buy both handicrafts and street foods at very reasonable prices. Vientiane is also a good place to try Laotian traditional massage.
Visitors in the Buddha Park just outside Vientiane. Image: Somsanith Chanthaseng
The Buddha Park, a couple of kilometres downstream from the Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge over the Mekong River is a fascinating place to visit. It has several hundred Buddha statues, carvings of Hindu gods and other sculptures. Many of them look centuries old, but they are in fact less than 60 years old. There are a few demons thrown in for good measure, so photographers can have a lot of fun in this park.
Whilst in Vientiane, you may like to drop by the COPE Visitor Centre to learn about the ongoing tragedy that Laos endures. COPE is the acronym for the Cooperative Orthotic and Prosthetic Enterprise which helps Lao citizens who lose limbs from UXO (unexploded ordnance) to rebuild their lives. Between 1964 and 1973 the United States dropped more than two million tons of cluster bombs over Laos. The UXO from those bombs is still killing and injuring hundreds of people every year. With only one per cent of the country cleared of UXO, it’s a tragedy that will continue for decades.
Nam Kan National Park
If you consider yourself an adventurer, are still reasonably fit and don’t mind roughing it a bit, there is one other place in Laos that you might like to consider for an experience that you will undoubtedly remember for the rest of your life. It’s ‘The Gibbon Experience’ in the Nam Kan National Park, near the town of Huay Xai on the border with Thailand, about 50 km to the northeast of Chiang Rai.
Huay Xai can be reached from Luang Prabang but it’s a long journey (8-10 hours by car or bus, or 8-14 hours by river ferry/speedboat) so The Gibbon Experience is usually best incorporated into a northern Thailand itinerary rather than a northern Laos itinerary unless you are intending to travel from one to the other.
One of the treehouses built by the Gibbon Experience project. Image: © The Gibbon Experience
The Gibbon Experience is a tourism-based conservation project in one of the national parks that make up the Bokeo Nature Reserve – a region of tropical jungle that is home to critically endangered gibbons, tigers, elephants and bears. The project accommodates guests in what is claimed to be the highest treehouses in the world enabling them to see gibbons in their natural habitat.
The treehouses are only accessible by zipline, so the experience will only be suitable for older travellers who are fit and preferably familiar with ziplining. The three-day ‘Classic’ tour offers the best chances of seeing gibbons with the least amount of hiking.
The Gibbon Experience gets mixed reviews from travellers. Those reviews are predominantly positive but getting from Huay Xai to the national park and back is an uncomfortable ride, and the food and sleeping arrangements are very basic. This blog post provides an excellent overview of the whole experience and will help you to make up your mind if it is something you want to add to your bucket list.
Best months to visit Laos
As is the case with many other countries in Southeast Asia, the best months to visit Laos are the cooler months of the dry season from November to February. If you are planning to do a lot of river travel, then November and December are definitely the best months because there is more water in the rivers than in January and February.
March and April are dry months but as you get into March temperatures start to soar and April is usually very hot. May sees the transition to the wet season and it’s usually the most uncomfortable month with high temperatures and high humidity unless you are in one of the highland areas of the country. October is the other shoulder month with the rain progressively easing during the month.
Most of the rain in the wet season comes in the form of afternoon and evening thunderstorms, but there will be occasional days where there will be rain all day. Travelling in the wet season is definitely more comfortable than in April and May, but the rain can disrupt travel schedules especially in areas subject to flooding or landslides.
There’s not a lot of variation in the climate around the country (aside from the impact of elevation on temperatures) but northern Laos around Luang Prabang is usually a few degrees cooler than destinations in southern Laos.
One other factor that photographers and those with any respiratory conditions should consider when planning a trip to Laos is the smoke haze that Vientiane and Luang Prabang usually suffer around March. The smoke is from fires that farmers set to burn off the remains of dry season crops in preparation for planting when the wet season rains commence. Sometimes the smoke haze starts as early as February and sometimes it extends well into April.
Currency and exchange rates
The kip is the currency of Laos and it’s been relatively stable for the past 10 years with an exchange rate of around 8,500 kip to the U.S. dollar – although it did depreciate to around 9,250 kip during the course of 2020. It’s not a hard currency so you won’t be able to buy kip outside of Laos.
Although U.S. dollars and Thai baht are widely accepted in Laos, you’ll need kip for shopping in markets, small food and drink transactions, taxis and in places where traders may not be carrying enough change for large dollar or baht notes. For larger transactions, dollars or baht are usually preferred, despite these currencies not being recognised by the government. Ironically, the visa on arrival fees are priced in U.S. dollars!
There are ATMs all over Laos enabling you to draw from foreign accounts in both local currency and dollars, and money changers in most locations visited by tourists, but credit cards are not widely accepted outside of Vientiane or Luang Prabang. Remember to exchange any surplus kip back into your home currency before you leave because it’s unlikely you’ll find any money changers outside of Laos prepared to exchange kip.
Kip notes come in denominations from one kip to 100,000 kip, although you’ll rarely see any notes below 500 because of their low value. Be careful with the 20,000 and 50,000 notes as they are similar in colour. It’s best to travel with 50,000 and 100,000 kip notes in one pocket, purse or wallet and keep smaller denominations separate to ensure they don’t get mixed up.
Header image: © Guitar
