I caught the last bus out of town to Vientiane, Laos' capital. Unfortunately, I had booked the ticket with the same company that had planned my wondrous Halong Bay tour. Again, we were shuttled around in groups, then randomly split up. However, luck was on my side as the two Englishmen I was finally stuck with I had actually met before in Vietnam. After catching a taxi to a shuttle-bus, we were unceremoniously dropped off at a construction site and told to wait. In the distance, we observed fantastic horizontal bolts of lightning ripping across the horizon. Night and the storm were approaching fast, so we took shelter under a concrete overhang and watched as the rain began to fall. Our mystery bus came just in the nick of time, however it didn't actually stop for us. Instead it slowed down just enough for us to hurl our bags into the waiting arms of the copilot and hop in (apparently, they were behind schedule). I managed a window seat and the chair could recline almost fully. Sleep seemed almost certain, except that the passenger next to me, a slightly obese Vietnamese man, persisted to talk to me even though he spoke no English and I even less Vietnamese. Normally, if a person is laying reclined with their eyes shut, you would assume not to bother them. This clearly is a cultural difference as he should no reluctance nudging me awake to try and continue our impossible conversation. What's more, he grew increasing frustrated at the fact that my Vietnamese was not improving. He finally relented and I was allowed to sleep.

When I awoke the next morning, we were stopped. I assumed that we had pulled off sometime in the night due to the raging storm. I was astonished to discover that, in fact, we were actually waiting at the Laotian border along with many other buses. Around 9am, we crossed and made it to Vientiane just as the rain picked up again (Note to travelers, you can't take Vietnamese currency out of the country and can't change it from within Laos. Change it before reaching the border in Vietnam, otherwise you get royally screwed by the one exchange booth at the border.).