After a week in Northern Vietnam I was ready to be on my way to Laos, a land mythically beautiful and less touristy. Unfortunately, given my current financial situation, my expedition was defined by my budget. This is sometimes a good thing, and sometimes a bad thing. In the case of reaching my destination, Vang Vieng, Laos, from Hanoi, it was… painful. “A 27 hour bus ride from hell”, a fellow passenger later described it.

Eventually, we started asking the Vietnamese soldiers what was going on. They too, had limited English, but they had clearly learned one phrase in tandem with a gesture. “Walk to Laos”, one man said as he pointed vaguely into the mist. “Excuse me sir, I didn’t know that I should have gotten my compass, local map, and thermal goggles out of my bag before I got out of the bus. I figured I would just get them out on this side of the building and then run into the mist looking for ‘Laos.’” No luck. “Walk to Laos.” He repeats again and again while pointing. Our group was all thinking the same thing, “This guy can’t be serious.” Girls were in sandals, guys were in tank tops shivering, it had to be around 32 degrees, and nobody knew to prepare for this when getting off the bus for a pee break. We began our long blind walk into the mist searching for Laos as if it were a single treasure jest. I almost expected to hear somebody to my left or right, “hey guys, I found it. Yeah, it was right over here under this rock the whole time. We are so silly.” But, no. We were looking for a country. After wandering around for about an hour which included a trip back to the man/robot who sent us on this treasure hunt, we found the Laos border. We all bought our visas and found our bus on the other side. I have never been so happy to get back on a bus-- knowing that I have almost 12 more hours to go.
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