Vang Vieng: Safety first!

Welcome to Vang Vieng, safety capital of Southeast Asia! Did you sense my sarcasm?

Vlog #6: Contiki Big Indochina Adventure :  Vang Vieng, Laos

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pee1QGuFxNk

Tubing in Vang Vieng

Vang Vieng has pretty much placed itself on the map for backpackers as a major hot spot to visit when traveling around Southeast Asia. Unfortunately, it is for all the wrong reasons.

Tubing in Laos is summed up like this: Bar hoping along the river in tubes. It’s a drug-fueled party on the river full of sketchy scaffolding bars and dangerous rope swings and slides. All of which becomes “accidents waiting to happen” the minute you add alcohol-and there is LOTS of it here.

There are multiples bars along the river that you can float around too, and all the bar managers try to get you to stay at their bar to drink more so they hand you free drinks. You think you’ll be smart and not do anything stupid, but as soon as you’ve consumed a few to many that sober rationale flies right out the window and you get caught up in the music. That is when stupid things happen; this month alone 3 backpackers died while tubing.  That’s not even mentioning the countless other accidents that happen; a quick scroll through town and you can spot a few of them. One drunken river party is not worth it in my opinion.

So instead of tubing our group voted for sober kayaking; probably not nearly as “fun” for some, but I feel like we had a much better experience:

1. We got to cruise down the river at a quicker, more desirable rate. Plus still take in all the scenery.

2: We visited a wicked cave.

3: We still saw the tubing and we actually stopped at one of the bars for a single, quick drink.

4: We all made it back to the hotel safe and sound. It’s just a shame all the craziness of tubing has taken away from the eye-dropping scenery that surrounds Vang Vieng.

View from our hotel room on the river.

Hot Air Ballooning

Thanks to my lovely guest vloggers Krista and Chris, I am able to show you the hot air balloon ride in Vang Vieng! I was feeling a bit exhausted and wanted to have a sleep-in day since we had 2 days to spend in Vang Vieng.

Vang Vieng from the air.

I’d say they did a pretty spectacular job! I should think about having guest vloggers more regularly :P