To Savannakhet

We were woken up early by a loud drunk obnoxious American who was having a fight with a tuktuk driver he hadn't given enough money to (who had just brought him back at 4am from a dodgy part of town!). We saw the sun come up and didn't need to worry about missing our alarm clock.

Got to the bus station at 9 as a bus was pulling out for Savannakhet so we were piled on to it. Sat near the back. Lots of leg room and stuff piled in the middle of the aisles that were good leaning / sitting tools! The old ladies liked my insect repellent and after one asked for some they all wanted some. Some great old wrinkly faces. Good trip down interrupted briefly by an overturned lorry with a cargo of turtles. It was righted soon after we got there.

After agreeing with the Rough Guides use of the word 'dingy' for the room we took in the Mekhong Hotel we decided to upgrade to a nice room. Split between two, $7 isn't much more than $4 and it was like a completely different place! Worth the change! We felt like maybe we had somehow missed the centre of the town, but I think that maybe it just didn't exist. It's a very spread out town and has some old French shuttered influences on some buildings. There appeared not to be too many people around, ever. We did find the market and that was good, but it might have taken a few more days to suss out the place. On the other hand, maybe that was it sussed?