Last days

We woke early as we only had the one day, had brekky then walked out onto the street and hired a tuk tuk. We were amazed at the motorbike towing this tuk tuk, it had a four on the floor gear stick and foot clutch, it was like no other motor bike we had ever seen (I took a pic). I had researched what to do for the day and knew that Buddha Park was 25 km out of town, but I omitted to tell Marty, so after about 20 kms Marty was getting antsy thinking we were going to be kidnapped. 

Buddha Park was interesting & I took lost of pics. Marty didn't find it all that interesting, but what I liked was that we were there all by ourselves, so the atmosphere was quite unique.

We then went to the temple complex, yes I know, I have said we avoid temples, but there isn't much else to see in Vientiane, so we did our usual stroll around, take a few pics and then onto the next place. Which was the markets. For those of you that don't know this about me, I collect dolls from all over the world and always have to buy a doll at each country I visit. Unfortunately Cambodia doesn't have any traditional dolls, but I managed to find one in Laos, at the bargain basement price of $8. Marty also picked up some more T Shirts. It was getting really hot by this time, so we went back to the motel, to once again sit out the heat.

That night we decided on a more expensive restaurant and found a Japanese one that looked good (lots of Japanese which is always a good sign). Had a lovely if not different meal, but it was good to have a change.

Next morning we were up early again and made our way to the airport and had another of those relaxing journeys through the check in & customs. We arrived in KL prepared this time, we knew to change money and buy a taxi voucher before exciting the airport, and had quite a hairy trip to the hotel, at an average of 140 - 150 km/hr. Once again, dumped our stuff and made our way to China Town to do some final shopping and have dinner.

Next day we didn't wake till 10 am, don't know why, but suspect it had something to do with the comfortable bed and block out curtains. We went for a walk at around lunch time and found a decent looking restaurant and had a wonderful breakfast/lunch including a lovely couple of glasses of wine, hard to find in Asia. We then packed and sat in the lobby till it was time to leave, and that is when the fun started. We hired a taxi to take us with plenty of time to spare (yeah right), the driver decided that even though his car ran on gas he would put petrol in it, big mistake. For the next hour he constantly broke down, stopping and starting the car every hundred meters or so. We yelled at him, demanded he get us somewhere to get another taxi, but to no avail. He eventually got to a petrol station and re-gased the car and then drove us at the apparently normal speed of 140 km/hr to the airport. We were probably by this stage 30 minutes later than the check in time advises, but because of that we didn't have to que, and made it quickly through check in & customs. 

Excellent flight home, we managed to sleep till about 30 minutes prior to landing (which was 30 minutes early) and my good old faithful dad arrived and drove us home. Well another wonderful holiday over,  time to start planning next years, hopefully to Europe. We hope you have enjoyed our blog, I know I certainly enjoyed sharing our travels with you.

Till next year :) 

pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/ruthymartyc/KLDay14102009#