Exploring Laos: Vientiane, Wat Phou attractions
The capital of the country, Vientiane, gets less press than Luang Prabang, but has its own quiet charm. And there's even more to explore outside the city
Vientiane: Capital of LaosI never wanted to check out of the Settha Palace, with its handsome French colonial architecture, refined service and stunning tropical gardens. The gold-spired Luang Stupa is the country’s most important and holiest Buddhist site (often pictured on travel brochures), but the Wat Sisaket Museum with its 7,000 weathered terracotta Buddha images resonated most strongly with me. At Wat Simuang, for a small donation, I was blessed by a monk who tied an orange string around my wrist and sprinkled holy water on my head.Word is that the Plain of Jars is seeking UNESCO status to entice greater numbers of tourists. Odd and overlooked, it was one of my favorite attractions: giant stone jars —- some reaching 10 feet in height -— are scattered over 625 miles of U.S. bombed grasslands. The three sites on the plateau remain one of archeology’s unsolved mysteries: are the limestone jars funeral jars or did they hold lao lao, rice whiskey? The stone is not native to the region; it is believed that the urns were rolled here by elephants.
It’s markedly cooler at this higher elevation and the low-hanging cottony clouds punctuate the cornflower blue sky. The countryside is cratered from the bombing during the war but oddly enough, it's gorgeous and there’s not another soul in sight; mooing cows and wind rustling tree leaves are the only sounds. I explore several of the refrigerator-size craters. I walk between two of the sites, past a cemetery, through a rice paddy and over a bamboo bridge beneath a sun that beams, but doesn’t punish. The violence of the Vietnam era may still scar the land, but empty bomb casings have a second, more hopeful life as planters spilling with flowers in a Hmong village. Southern Lao’s big draw is Wat Phou (“Temple on the Mountain”), the splendid 12th century Khmer site that predates Cambodia’s Angkor Wat by 200 years. This “lost city” sits in tangle of romantically overgrown foliage, most of its buildings unrestored and in ruin. It requires effort—specifically a car, a car ferry, another car and foot power—to get here, so Wat Phou is far less visited than Angkor Wat. Admiring the Hindu carvings, I climb slowly up the steep steps, sitting for a long while, surveying the spectacular view. I have to use my imagination to conjure the former kingdom, but there are murmurs of its grandeur in the silence. Myths & Mountains arranged my customized, eight-day itinerary, providing a guide and driver in each city, booking flights and reserving hotels. Read more about travel in Southeast Asia
A former Navy brat who traveled and lived abroad extensively, Suzanne Wright is a fulltime, freelance writer based in Atlanta. She is a member of NATJA,
and has written numerous travel, food and decor features for numerous international, national and regional publications. Her articles have appeared in
Elite Traveler, Wine & Spirits, Veranda, Atlanta Magazine, The Tennessean, Atlanta Homes & Lifestyles, Piedmont Review, Charlotte Place, Where,
On Magazine and others. A suitcase is always packed and her passport always up to date.
Photos by Suzanne Wright
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