81 km

We had a long, fast descent soon after leaving the guest house this morning. We flew downhill for about 22 kilometers to the river bottom, then turned up the other side and climbed back to almost the same elevation. Again, the grade was mostly 5%, only getting as steep as 10% here and there as the terrain required. So we just got down to a rhythm and focused on the scenery and saying “Sabaidee!” to the kids as we slowly putted through small hill tribe villages of Hmong people.

The village at the bottom of our descent.

We thought we’d be cruising downhill all the way to town, but we still had some good riding to do for the last 20 km of the day, and Dave got a flat and we had to stop while he fixed it. We’ve had quite a few flats on this trip between his bike and mine. Most of the causes were glass on the road, as it was in this case, and some of the tires held up better than others. We’ll be writing more tire reviews when we get back.

We found a great little guest house just behind the main road near the night market. It’s across the street from a guest house listed in the Lonely Planet Laos and as we have found before it offers more for less. There are so many backpackers who will go straight to LP-listed guest houses and pay whatever they ask without looking around at alternatives. Often, those nearby will cost less or offer more for the same, and the owners are more attentive and happy for your business.