Road from Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng — Laos is mountainous!! We head off in the early morning on a seven-plus hour drive through the mountains. We wind along a tortuous and at times harrowing road switchbacking up, over, and down steep peaks. This part of Laos is pure mountain and the roads are rough – potholed and at times gravel.

The dusty road snakes along steep dropoffs and through small villages that line it, with houses and shops on the road edge. Families cluster along the roadside and pull their small children to them as our bus comes through. In several villages big knots of school children a walking home from school for lunch — to then return to school for the rest of the day. In the breaks between the dust, the villages, and the telephone lines, the views of the mountains are stunning, particularly as we near Vang Vieng. The roads are in a poor state of repair — all along are huge potholes.

At several points we encounter road repair in progress and at one point a road closed while the crew fimished its work. Huge amounts of roadwork and other improvement are needed and the signs of Chinese investment in Laotian infrastructure are everywhere — most noticeably train bed and bridges for the new high-speed train – a Chinese-built tunnel for which was apparent on our drive out of Luang Prabang.

In the late afternoon, we come over a mountain and encounter the massive and impressive kharsts of Vang Vieng for the first time. We finally drop down the mountainside into the flat valleys between the kharsts. At one point, we turn off the road to Vang Vieng and head back up a valley to the village where we will stay for the night. As we wind around the kharsts, we come on spectacular scenes that we hope to have a chance to photograph tomorrow in the morning sun.

We pass through Vang Vieng on our way to nearby Naduang for our homestay with a Laotian family. School is out and rush hour is a wave of bikes, with parasols to shield from the sun.

More to come on our homestay and life in Naduang.