From Pakse, there is a minibus(es) that leaves at 8 am everyday down to the 4,000 Islands. This bus also transfers people from Pakse to the Laos/Cambodia border (people going to the border transfer to a different bus about 10 miles from the border). Therefore, the bus was completely full – seats are added to the aisle such that in the event of an emergency, there is no way we would have been able to get out without climbing over seats. Only in Southeast Asia! Luckily, Patrick and I were picked up on the earlier side, so we got two seats together near the window. Also, luckily, this bus ride was only 3 hours. About 2 hours and 45 minutes in, we let off the people headed to the border. The short stop was no big deal, or so we thought… 15 minutes later, we were dropped off in a small parking lot in Nakasong about a 5-minute walk to the dock for Don Det Island. This is where we hit our first big hiccup of the trip – there was a bag that looked like Patrick’s on the bus, but it wasn’t Patrick’s. Someone had taken the wrong bag when they unloaded for the border 20 minutes ago! We tried to explain what was happening to the bus driver and fortunately she spoke enough English that she understood. They tried to call the other bus driver to alert him to the situation, but to no avail. We had to try to get the bag back at the border at least since it was filled with all of Patrick’s clothes, some expensive electronics, and most importantly, his malaria pills (bad on us for having them in there in the first place). So, we piled into a tuk tuk to drive to the border. About 30 minutes later (tuk tuks are slow) we arrived to find that no one was waiting on the Laos side of the border crossing which meant that Patrick’s bag was on the other side of the border or already on its way to somewhere in Cambodia. I had read that often bus companies make you wait, sometimes for hours, on the Cambodian side at a few small shops for no particular reason. That was really our last hope. Using google translate, we approached the border control agents and tried to explain what was happening. By some miracle, the Laos agent decided to let us go through without stamping us out of the country (which is what we wanted because we were coming right back). There were two other gates between the two border control officers (one being immunizations), but we just walked right through those with no issues. When we got to the Cambodian side, we again explained our situation, and someone who may or may not have worked there, spoke English and told us to go on through. I think our situation was also helped by the fact that there was no one at the border at this time. Great, so we were now in Cambodia without the appropriate passport stamps and fingers crossed that nothing happens. I started running around the different shops and loading buses just repeatedly yelling “does anyone have the wrong bag?”. No one was responsive, but Patrick recognized someone from our bus, so he walked over to that group, and there it was, his bag!! When Patrick pointed it out, the guy just kind of shrugged and said “S*** happens”. No apologies or anything. We were both livid since we had just spent a bunch of money on the tuk tuk to get here and crossed illegally, but there was no point in arguing with this kid further, so we switched the bags and left. Walking back through the Cambodian border control was fine – the guy was still there that waved us through. When we got back to the Laos side, we were questioned a bit more and for a second thought that they weren’t going to let us through even though the agent we had dealt with was standing right there. Ultimately, they checked our passports and had Patrick open his bag and then let us through. I could not believe we were successful in getting the bag back. We had both been operating on adrenaline, so when I sat back down in the tuk tuk to go back to the boat dock in Nakasong (the driver had waited for us!), I felt so relieved, and that I needed a nice cold beer.
In hindsight, the situation could have been so much worse. For starters, we didn’t even know what was in that other kid’s bag (e.g., drugs), so thankfully no one checked. Also, on further inspection of Patrick’s bag, we realized that the kid had tried to open it. Fortunately, we both lock our bags when they go underneath a bus, so he couldn’t get into it. Note this also meant that he blatantly ignored me when I asked if anyone had the wrong bag because at that point, he knew it wasn’t his. We assume he probably thought he was upgrading (didn’t seem like he cared about the contents in his bag). And that was how we started our trip to the 4,000 Islands.
Now for the better part of the trip. I’ll back up for a second – while there are many islands that make up the 4,000 Islands, there are two main islands that people stay on – Don Det and Don Khone. More people stay on Don Det, and there is a larger “backpacker” (i.e., partying) scene here. While that’s not our cup of tea, we had also read that if you stay on the south side of the island, you can find peace and relaxation. It’s also easy to explore Don Khone from Don Det since there is a bridge at the south side connecting the two. So, we decided to start at Don Det and if we hated it, we could always head south to Don Khone.
Don Det boat dock
We arrived back at the boat dock from our border crossing adventure and climbed onto two long boats with a few other people. After about 10 minutes, we arrived on Don Det! We had not booked our housing in advance, so first goal was to find someplace to sleep. We headed south down the east side of the island and made it all the way to Mama Leuah’s Bungalows and Restaurant, which is about halfway down the island. Mama Leuah’s had been recommended to us by someone we had met in Pakse. It is run by a Laotian woman and her German husband (the guesthouses were in her family and now they run it together). They didn’t have any availability for that night but did for a couple nights later. We decided to book it for two nights (no hot water or flush toilets), but right on the water with two hammocks on the deck. Now we just needed to find a place for the next two nights. We walked back towards town and decided on One Son Don Det, which was only 100,000 kip (~$10 USD) for a well-built bungalow (no gaps in the walls, so practically no bugs), flush toilet, and hot shower. It was nicer than most of the places in this price range that we had seen! I’m surprised this place doesn’t fully book usually. Only downside was that it sat on the opposite side of the road, so not on the water. But you still had a small view from the deck. Perfect for us!
By this time is was almost 3:30 pm and we hadn’t eaten. My adrenalin had kept me going for a while, but now we were starving. We decided to walk back to Mama Leuah’s and enjoy pork schnitzel with mashed potatoes and a gravy sauce and a red curry with rice. Our first real western meal since being in Southeast Asia! The view here is great (again, right on the water), so we continued drinking on the patio for a few hours. At one point, all the tables were full, so a German couple sat down and chatted with us while they ate. They had just traveled in Cambodia, so we picked up a few pointers from them. Eventually, we decided to move on and head back towards town to meet up with a friend we had met at the Wopakok Hotel in Champasak (she had come down to the islands a few days prior). We met her and some of her new-made friends at Mama Tanon’s for a beer and then continued drinking with them down the street at one of the only late-night bars in town (a backpacker’s spot). It was a rare social outing for us, especially since we usually avoid the backpacker crowds, but we had a good time!
The next day was a relaxing one; lounging, reading, napping, and eating. Somehow, we ended up eating lunch and dinner at the Jasmine Restaurant (Indian food) and enjoyed two good meals. Before dinner, we watched an amazing sunset (seems like all are here) on the west side of the island at “One More Bar”. Not much else to our day, so the following day, we were determined to do a bit of exploring! We first had to move bungalows, from One Son Don Det to Mama Leuah’s, making sure to enjoy a hot shower before leaving. We rented bikes from town and biked down to Mama Leuah’s to drop our stuff off (turns out Mama Leuah’s also rents bikes, but we didn’t know that at the time). To our surprise, the room was ready (the previous guests had checked out very early). So, we dropped our stuff and ate lunch at Mama Leuah’s again before heading off to explore Don Det and Don Khone! We biked south to the Don Khone bridge and then headed to the Li Phi/Tat Somphamit Waterfalls. Note that we expected to pay a fee to cross the bridge based on blogs/reviews we had read, but there was no such fee when we crossed. There was a 35K VND entrance fee to the park around the falls. Once inside, we walked around and explored the park a bit. There is a zipline course that runs directly over the falls (I think maybe 7-8 ziplines across). It looked fun but was out of our price range. There is also a beach/swimming area (looked a little too stagnant/foamy here for us to swim, but others seemed to be enjoying themselves) and a bar area with free access to bungalows that look out over the river. We hunkered down in a bungalow for an hour or two, reading and enjoying the view. Afterwards, we decided to head back to Don Det. We biked north up the central island road through the rice paddies and farms. Quite different from the east and west sides of the island which are all lined with bungalows and guest houses. We ended up eating at Mama Leuah’s again for dinner – we loved the food and it was convenient for us, so why not? Lutz, the German owner, even gave us free Lao-Lao shots to cap off a great day.
View from bridge between Don Det and Don Khone
We dedicated our last full day on the island to relaxation once again, taking full advantage of the view from our bungalow hammocks. Everyone says the 4,000 Islands are all about relaxing, and we agreed. Since it was our last night, we also wanted to take in another sunset, so we met up with our friend from Pakse again to enjoy it over drinks. Eventually we made our way back to the bungalow for dinner and a good nights’ sleep.
Our next destination would be Siem Reap in Cambodia and we had elected to fly from Pakse to Siem Reap. Another option would have been to take a 10+ hour bus ride from Nakasong to Siem Reap, which involved crossing the border (already experienced this to get back Patrick’s bag) and a few bus transfers, plus the long drive. We’ve been avoiding the long bus rides throughout our trip, and this was no different. So, flight from Pakse to Siem Reap it was! Therefore, that next morning, we took a 20-minute boat ride to the Nakasong and caught a 3-hour bus up to Pakse (same way we got here). Lutz arranged our travels for us, so everything was very easy (and no lost baggage this time)!
