28/02: Attack of the Pukes & first puncture @ the 4000km mark (+38; 4008km)

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After a very long ride yesterday we could use a good night rest. Well.... we didn't get it. Ardan became sick and had to throw up a couple of times during the night. As I don't sleep when Ardan is sick, I didn't sleep very much either. In the morning it was a bit better. We don't really know what it was from, but as I wasn't all that well either, we think it was something we ate yesterday. Not to upset our stomach in the morning we had a very nutricious breakfast (see prove in the picture ;) ).

Luckely we only had 30 km to bike today to get to Savannaketh. There are several guesthouses here, but most of them rank in the categorie of "very basic". Finally we found a good one: Leena's Guesthouse. For anybody looking for a place in Savannakhet this has to be the best value in town. For the rest of the day we didn't do much except some sightseeing and catching up some sleep in the afternoon.

27/02: Sepon to Xeno marathon, crunching k's & burning rubber! (+166km; 3970km)

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Yesterday evening we already figured it had been better to add an extra 30km to the 65km ride to spend the night in Muangphin or even add 40km & spend the night in Xethamouak. From Khe san it is basically downhill all the time until Xethamouak so it would have been an easy 90 or 100km ride...especially making the ride(s) until Savannakhet a bit more balanced. Hell, you can't get everything right, can you?

So today the initial plan was a lazy 30km to Phin or 40km to Xethamouak. All downhill so once there we quickly decided to keep going and hoping to find a guesthouse when we had about 80km orso. Road levels out, but keeps a really little decline almost all the time making it real easy to keep good speed. Take care, this probably slows you down seriously when ridden from Savannakhet to Vietnam! At around 85, 95 & 100 we passed some new looking guesthouses but since we felt strong and had the road in our benefit decided to keep going since we knew there was a guesthouse in Dongkilo (125km). Once there the room & GH restaurant was "expensive" (70.000kip & 30.000kip) so back on the bike...we'll find something in the next town (Donghe(n))...we do, but it's not really nice...keep on biking...:-)...passed maybe 1 or 2 other GH but all in the middle of nowhere & now we have a mission!

Time to shatter the previous day-record of 133km! We target Seno. (thinking it is at 150km based on our map & some roadside sign) Counter then hits 150...no Seno...mmmm, couple km's later we get a new roadside marker...it's gonna be 166km! This certainly shatters the 133 mark ;-). Bottomline, WE ROCK!

Tired & satisfied we check into a GH. Shower, moisturize (a sizzling hot sun all day long) & a bit of rest before getting food. Today was a hard, but do-able, ride. I would not try this in the opposite direction, you'll be battling a constant 0,5-1% incline :-)

Tomorrow leaves us with an easy 30km stroll into Savannakhet (hitting the 4000km mark) where we set up camp for probably 2 days.

26/02: Laos or did we bike into some fairy wonderland? (+65; 3804km)

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We woke up, had two good egg sandwiches each on the road and started to descent to Lao Bao and the border with Laos. We still had to find LAK (Laos Kip) somewhere. Even the bank in Lao Bao didn't want to give us USD or LAK for our VND. "On the border crossing" was their answer. When we arrived there, immediatly we were surrounded by 6 ladies who wanted to change our Dong into Kip. Offcourse at a killer exchange rate ;) They started off with half of what we normally would get for our Dong. After some negotiating we had a better exchange rate, but still it costed us 10 USD. Yeah well, there was no other option, since we needed LAK. Or that's what we thought and these ladies told us. Because at the border crossing, next to the 'visa on arrival - box' you have an ATM and an exchange office. Still not the official rate, but already a lot better than what you get from these kind ladies ;)
So other travellers, if you read this: do NOT change your money with this ladies (unless you want to give them a lot of extra money), do this at the border crossing. Another thing: lonely planet says it will cost you 20USD for a visa on arrival at the Lao Bao crossing. This is nog the case (anymore?). Only Vietnamese get their visa on arrival for 20 USD. All other nationalities have to pay 35 USD or 300.000 LAK. So make sure you have enough money with you. No extra money to get your stamp though, this bordercrossing doesn't look dodgy like some other Laos Borders apparently.

Crossing into Laos we felt very welcome! Like in Cambodia, maybe even a bit more, children come running to the streets screaming their lungs out: "sabaidee, hello, bye", waving like mad and giving you a toothpaste smile! To make it more like a fairy wonderland... It's really hot here, almost no traffic, thousands of butterflies, ladies who are trying to teach you some Lao and a road that almost only goes down (so other way around is a lot up!). We like Laos so far!

Arrived in Sepon (the first real village from the border btw) where you have a lot of choice for guesthouse, probably more than 5. Settled in a room for 50kkip (around 6usd) took a stroll along the market, buy some fruit, some rice take-way for dinner & a couple of Lao Beer. More Lao tomorrow!

25/02: Bike (& Run) to the hills (+63; 3739km)

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First of all maybe correct the feeling described yesterday that Dong Ha is still a bordertown dump...when heading more west actually there was a bit of town that looked fairly nice & enjoyable. As usual the bit closer to the Hw1 doesn't do the town a lot of justice.

So today we biked into the hills. Our last good day of riding in Vietnam, heading west of Hw9 (of which parts used to be in the original Ho Chi Min trail) to Laos. The scenery quickly turns into green fields amongst the upcoming mountains. First bit of the route is ups&downs but nothing to seriously. After about 50km the mountains really kick in & the road goes up & up for the remaining 15km, slowly meandering upwards, deeper into the jungle towards Laos. It's hard work with the blistering hot sun & long 6-8% climbs, but you get rewarding views if you stop from time-to-time (which you need to anyway ;-))

Suddenly Line also had to run to the hills next to the road & camp there for about 20min due to a sudden rush of serious crapper activity. First we tried asking a couple locals if they had a toilet...without succes cause they just laughed and waved at something, somewhere...or if you ask us nothing & nowhere...?? Saved from problems until now, our last vietnamese morning noodle soup certainly won't be a kill-joy? Luckily after feeling pretty bad for 30min Line felt better again & we could continue our climb to Khe San.

Khe San checks all the boxes of a crappy bordertown, although Lao Bao is the real last bordertown that we will pass tomorrow & will probably also score a 100% on the bordertown examination. 1) It has a dodgy market where they don't want to give you back money when you buy something (if you do not have exact change) but they just keep wanting to give you shit you don't need instead so you can spend it all...?? 2) Everybody starts by charging 2x the already inflated white guy price. 3) No bank wants to exchange dongs to usd or Lao kip (other way around is not a problem though). Their pitch is to go to the market and exchange dongs to usd at a rate about 50% down the official rate...pure theft. So it is spending, keeping or burning the money ;-)

Bit of a problem cause we have to get some usd or lao kip to make it west through Laos to the first big city where we can get a visa cash advance...we hoped to exchange our remaining dongs...but that seems to be out of the window...our usd supply is low & some left over thai bahts are maybe only usefull once we get more west, closer to the thai border...mmm, hoping for some white guys leaving Laos with kips at the border so we can change dongs with them...otherwise we'll have to be winging it 'till Savannaket...fingers crossed!

Khe San is a former US base town, famous due to a big assault on it from the VC...although it was only a diversion attack to draw away attention to preperation of the Tet offensive. For this they where smugling big loads of goods down the Hcmn trail running through this area. I can only imagine how challenging the old jungle trail had to have been looking into the surroundings from the road. Anyway, Line now feels really happy we followed the coast instead of the Hcmn highway, all this up & down is just too hard biking :-) So we spend the afternoon napping, tucked away into the shade of our room.

Anyway, we think Laos will be underconnected to the web vs the other countries we've been too (but we hope to be proven mistaken) so maybe news will be bit more slow for the month to come.

24/02: Into the DMZ! (+71; 3676km)

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Following the Hw1 from Hue to Dong Ha is unremarkable, totally unremarkable. On my map this strech of road is even nicknamed "route sans joie", probably cause it leads into the DMZ (demilitarised zone) that seperated North- & South vietnam prior to the war and was very heavily bommed. Since the end of the war it looks like not much "joie" has made it back. No pleasant towns, no nice scenery...totally unremarkable. Luckily 1 little doggi (yet another one) spiced up a coffee pitstop. Line loves the doggi.

Arriving in Dong Ha it is easy to understand why this "city" still has a bordertown feel to it, although it isn't a bordertown for several decades. Some buildings alongside the dusty highway. Most of it looks a bit rundown & edgy, bordertown written all over it, but no border ;-)

We found ourselves a guide + extra moto to ride into the DMZ & visit the Vin Moc tunnels (about 2km of tunnels spread out from 12-23m depth) where at some point a village of 600 was living underground to survive the relentless carpet bombing on this border area. Everything but demilitarised! (Thanks for this months gift guys!) Anyway, our guide 'Bin' actually is a South Viet veteran. He didn't elaborate too much on the matter, but did answer any question we asked him. Not wanting to interrogate him we asked a couple but then let it be. For him it was very clear that the Vietcong won the war...I think for everyone in Vietnam who opposed the VC this is an everyday (painfull?) apparant fact. He told us that still today in the south schools teach english whereas in the north they get chinese & russian. Commi stick to commi, kapi stick to kapi? For him vietnam today was a bit alike china...commi-kapi-1-party government...mmmm