The 2nd French Revolution

After a night and day in Vientiane, exploring it's strange architecture (with it's own interpretation of the Arc de Triomphe), eating a wonderful curry and trying not to get too irritated with everyone trying to rip us off, we arranged to catch an overnight bus to Pakse (in the south of Laos). Everything happens very slowly in Laos but when our 7: 30 pick up hadn't arrived by 8:30 we were slightly concerned, especially because our bus was supposed to be leaving at 8:30. At 8:45 a young chap (that I had to really force myself not to strangle) arrived and reluctantly took us off to a packed van. We hopped on and an American looked at me and said 'welcome to hell'. I managed to shove Jackie onto the vehicle but for the 9km ride I was dangling from the bumper. We were drop-kicked onto a bus and forced into 2 seats at the very back, sandwhiched between a french couple and a chap from Nantes. At this stage we were in a bit of a bad mood but during a conversation with our Parisian neighbours that all changed. Sometimes you just get on with people and this was 1 of those times. We chatted for around 2 hours and then snuggled up and went to sleep. When we woke up the next morning in Pakse there was no doubt that we would be travelling together for a while.