Lovely Laos. ‘The Land of a Million Elephants’, or so they say. Personally, I saw two. It is however, at this time of year, the land of umpteen trillion butterflies which are very beautiful except when you have to constantly clean them off your visor.

click here to see the Lao roads

We’ve really enjoyed Laos. The country is stunningly beautiful -verdant jungle, misty mountains and spectacular waterfalls abound. The roads are great, or at least most of them are, there are also some mud-pits from hell during the rainy season which has definitely affected the route we have taken. Despite the dual purpose tyres a fully loaded TDM ain’t no dirt bike.

click here to see women fishing

Laos has the dubious distinction of being the most bombed country, ever. During the inaptly named Vietnam War more bombs were dropped on Laos than all the bombs dropped by all the combatants in World War II. The legacy of this is lots of UXO (unexploded ordinance) - an estimated 20% failed to explode and still lies scattered in the fields and forests. Sadly this still leads to hundreds of deaths each year 30 years after the war finished, but the bonus is that it provides a free source of scrap metal. We’ve seen bombs recycled in many inventive ways - used as everything from boats to flower-pots to fence posts.

Click here to see an explosive candleholder

Laos is a sparsely populated country - only 6 million people in an area slightly larger than Great Britain and still is for the most part covered in jungle and forests. This has led to some interesting road hazards. Twice now we have had 2 metre snakes burst out of the jungle just in front of us making for the safety of the bush on the other side of the road. We managed to avoid the brown one that tried this in front of us on a sealed road with some heavy braking, but sadly ran over the electric blue/back fella that tried this on a dirt road. I just saw him in time to lift my feet in the air, then had a few moments mad panic checking it was still on the road behind us (writhing in pain unfortunately) and not wrapped up somewhere in the bike.

click here to see a patriotic billboard

Despite my cunning planning before we started our voyage we’ve managed to arrive in Laos during the start of the rainy season - not a time I would normally choose for motorcycle touring. We have however been very fortunate with the rain - for the most part we have had lovely sunny days and the fact that there has been some rain around has meant the air is clear and cooler. We have often seen towering thunderheads looming ominously in the sky around us and have on occasion been treated to some spectacular lightening storms.

click here to see what the weather was like

Twice however, we have encountered the full force of the monsoon. In the space of a few minutes the sky turns really dark and then all hell breaks loose. The first time we were 5 kms short of our destination for the night when the skies opened and the rain came down so torrentially that we were soaked in seconds and had to find shelter in a petrol station forecourt as we couldn’t see more than 3 metres in front of us! The next time was just as we arrived in Vientiane. Thankfully we had just parked up but we still had to wait an hour before we could look for a hotel as the streets were swirling knee-deep in water.

click here for another image

For the most part Lao people are living in small villages leading a very simple life. We love the way most people, the children especially, smile and wave to us as we pass. Not all though. A few times we have seen children run and hide in the bushes or shelter behind their siblings when they catch sight of two alien looking beings on a demon bike.

click here to see rush hour in Pakse

The towns, especially the capital Vientiane, provide quite a contrast to this rural idyll. There is much beauty in the faded splendour of the old French colonial buildings, at least in the towns that weren’t bombed off the map during America’s secret war. The French also left their mark in the culinary sphere. Baguettes, pastries, strong Lao coffee for breakfast and the cheap French restaurants in Vientiane are a gastronomic delight. Not to belittle the Lao food, we have also really enjoyed their cuisine, but we haven’t had food like we found in Vientiane’s French restaurants since leaving Europe all those miles and months ago.

click here to see Tha Khaek

Those map-readers out there that want to know our route may be interested to know that we entered the country via the southern-most border with Thailand then worked our way north-west back up country - totally the opposite direction we should be taking to get to New Zealand!

click here to see a roadside village

We crossed in at Pakse, went down to the Cambodian border where the Mekong cascades in huge waterfalls and spent the night on tranquil Don Khong island. We then made a loop up through the lush, cool, coffee growing Bolaven Plateau staying by the scenic Tat Lo waterfall. It seems few of Laos tourists make it further than Vientiane and Luang Prabang so it was nice to have this to ourselves.

click here to see us at Khon Phapheng falls

From there it was a straight-forward blast up Route 13, the excellent road running the length of the country to Vientiane with one 2 day side excursion out towards the Vietnamese border and back along Route 8 through beautiful limestone mountains and dense jungle.

want to know what is happening to the forests? Click here

Then up to the north of the country where we found some of the best riding so far on our trip. Or at least I though so, Lisa started to suffer a bit of motion sickness from the constant cornering. The road out from Route 13 to Phonsavan is a riders dream - 100 miles of perfectly surfaced winding black top following ridgelines through scenic villages with smiling, waving children and a slalom through the cows, pigs and chickens that seem to spend most of their time on the road. I had a smile on my dial the whole way.

click here to check out the ride

We then spent a day checking out the enigmatic Plain of Jars and the surrounding area. Several meadows are covered in these huge stone jars - the largest weighing 6 tons - and no-one is quite sure who made them or what their purpose was. The most accepted theory is that they were some sort of sarcophagi, but that still doesn’t explain anything about the civilisation that left them or how they managed to move such huge blocks of stone the 180 kms from where they were quarried. The only other thing this civilisation appears to have left behind is a stone circle very similar to the ancient stone circles that dot the English countryside.

click here to see Lisa at the Plain of Jars

Leaving Phonsavan we did a loop north through dense jungle on a small undulating road then proceeded west on Route 1. Any notions we may have had that the country’s Route 1 would be a quality road were soon dispelled. After 20 km the pristine new tarmac gave way to a stony, potholed track with the occasional remnants of what had been a sealed road many years before. We bounced our way along this for another 30kms or so wondering if the road would improve or if we might find our progress blocked further ahead - we still had another 200kms to go to get back to good old Route 13 and Lisa was beginning to seriously question my sanity in choosing this route. Fortunately we met a couple of cyclists that informed us the road improved after the next village (they neglected to say how far after though) and that we only had to cross one small muddy patch - about 50 metres of axle deep goo and deep slimey puddles. Lisa went from being unimpressed to very unimpressed about the bike potentially getting stuck in this goop in the middle of nowhere.

Want to see a mudpit? Click here

After picking my line and laying down some branches over the most slippery part I gave it a crack and all was OK.

Another days ride along this back road took us to Nong Khiaw, a pleasant village in an idyllic setting on the banks on the Nam Ou river. We spent a day here relaxing and checking out the nearby caves that were used as the district headquarters for the Pathet Laos during the war, before riding down to Luang Prabang.

Click here to see a Lao petrol station

We loved Luang Prabang and probably stayed there longer than we needed to, it being a very laid back small city with lots of gorgeous old Wats and plenty of old French colonial buildings set on a spit of land between the Mekong River and the Nam Khan river.

We spent our time looking around the Wats, exploring the lovely shops and cafes, the nearby Pak Ou caves containing over 4500 Buddha statues and watching the sun go down from the banks of the Mekong. Very enjoyable. We treated ourselves to a massage at the Laos Red Cross and each gave them a pint of our blood.

click here to see Pak Ou caves

We rode down to Vang Vieng, a popular back-packer hangout with lots of caves in the surrounding mountains, but unfortunately the same mountains appear to be rain magnets and the day we spent there was too wet to do any exploring.

And now we are back in Vientiane. French restaurants and lively pubs to watch the All Blacks annihilate the English rugby side - another favourite pastime of ours. A little more sightseeing here and a last look around the shops for Lisa then we are back to Thailand to finally start making our way south, but not before one final detour back up north……

Thought our bike is carring a big load? Click here to see how bikes can be loaded