Arriving in Sa Pa, we waved goodbye to Gary and Caroline and had an hour before our next bus. On our way we heard a voice calling us from over the street... Cho Cho! What a sweet lady, giving Mandeep motherly affection while wishing us well on our travels.
The next bus was a night bus, more cramped than the last one we took. Mandeep slept through this one but i can tell you the ride was ROUGH. There were times when I looked out the window to see the dirt track we were on, large rocks and potholes scattered all over it and a dark abyss beyond the edge of the road - maybe a cliff edge or a river? I didn't indulge too much in the sight, preferring to keep my eyes shut to try and ignore the ride.
During a rest break in the middle of the night a few passengers needed the loo. It was situated down a dark alley, so Mandeep went in a group of 3 girls. There was a sign saying 'personal hygiene' pointing to a door, when Mandeep knocked a group of men answered telling her to come in. She wisely declined... At 5am the driver decided to put some really loud music on to wake everyone up! Arriving at 6.30 am, we had a half hour transit time before our next bus.
From 7am to 7pm it was another rough sleeper bus ride. We were lieing down the entire journey and many times we were 'power slammed' in our beds when the bus went over a pothole. Our bodies literally completely cleared the beds for a split second! Stopping for border controlls we had to pay admin and visa fees and couldn't help feeling cheated... and they didn't accept our dollars! We're yet to have a positive border experience over land! On the bus the woman next to us was sick on and off for her entire journey. I'm going to make a general announcement here to the world: leaving a bag of sick on a bus is not cool. It doesn't matter what country you're in - some things are acceptable in Asia that are not in Europe... but leaving a bag of sick next to some passengers who still have a couple hours journey time is not acceptable in any culture. Glad we've got that cleared, so it shouldn't happen again.
Arriving in Oudomxay, Laos we had a 2 hour wait before our final bus to Luang Prabang which arrived at 11pm. The final leg was scenic enough, but there is no denying that we were totally knackered by this point! The following day we'd learnt of a plane crash between Bangkok and Laos, a plane which the person who told us nearly took... we shared in their moment of realisation. Never forget the imminence of death.
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