Adventurous Laos in 12 days: Nong Khiaw, Konglor and the Bolaven
This is the route for people who want the parts of Laos that do not appear on a first visit: a river village under limestone cliffs in the far north, a seven-kilometre cave you travel through by boat in the centre, and coffee country on a plateau in the deep south. It reaches from one end of the cou
- Duration
- 12 days
- Pace
- Active
- Hotel changes
- 6
- Best months
- Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb
- From
- $1,860 per person
It is also the hardest itinerary in our Laos library to build well, because two of the three regions are a long way from anything. There are two internal flights and two long drives in here and we are not going to pretend otherwise. Everything else has been arranged to protect those days.
Twelve days, six hotel changes, two flights, one railway leg and about eighteen hours of road across the whole trip.
Who it suits: walkers, climbers of steep short things, people who have travelled Southeast Asia before, and anyone who found a standard Laos itinerary too quiet. It is not a technical trip and it needs no previous trekking experience, but you should be comfortable with four to six hours on your feet on rough ground and with accommodation that is sometimes basic.
Your specialist: Paz Prosianoy or Osnat Angerman, with our Hanoi office on the ground.
Day by day
The north, days 1 to 6
Day 1: Arrive Luang Prabang. Transfer, nothing scheduled, a night in the heritage zone.
Day 2: Luang Prabang. The alms round at dawn, briefed properly the night before, then a guided morning through Wat Xieng Thong and the Royal Palace Museum. Afternoon at the UXO Laos Information Centre, which is the right preparation for the rest of this trip, and an hour that changes how you read the landscape for the next ten days.
Day 3: Luang Prabang to Nong Khiaw. About 87 miles (140 km) north and three and a half to four hours, which is the sentence that explains Laos better than any other in this document. The road climbs and turns the whole way. You arrive at a village on the Nam Ou river between two walls of limestone, and you stay in a bungalow with the river underneath the balcony.
Afternoon free. Most people sit still.
Day 4: Pha Daeng Peak. The viewpoint climb above the village, roughly 1,500 feet (450 m) of ascent on a steep, rooty, occasionally hand-over-hand path. Two hours up if you are fit, closer to three if you are not, and the top has three separate viewpoints over the river bend and the whole valley. Down by lunch. Afternoon free, or a short boat upriver to Muang Ngoi in the late afternoon.
Day 5: The 100 Waterfalls trek. By boat upriver, then a walk that goes up the watercourse itself rather than alongside it: five to six hours of scrambling on wet limestone through a chain of small falls, with a guide and a rope on two sections. Wet feet from the first ten minutes. This is the best day of the trip and it is not suitable in heavy rain, so in green season we hold an alternative.
Day 6: Nong Khiaw to Vientiane. Back down to Luang Prabang in the morning, station transfer, and the afternoon train south. About two hours. Evening in the capital, and a proper meal.
The centre, days 7 to 9
Day 7: Vientiane to Thakhek. COPE first thing, which is the companion piece to the information centre in Luang Prabang and one of the most worthwhile hours in Laos. Then south on Route 13, about 210 miles (340 km) and five to six hours with stops. Flat, hot, and genuinely dull for long stretches. We break it at Paksan and we do not pretend it is a scenic drive.
Thakhek is a small Mekong town facing Thailand and it is the gateway to the loop that motorbike travellers have been riding for twenty years.
Day 8: Konglor Cave. Three hours north-east into the Phou Hin Poun limestone, through the karst valleys that make the loop worth doing, and out to Konglor. The cave is a river tunnel about 4.5 miles (7.5 km) long that goes straight through a mountain. You travel it in a long-tail boat with head torches, in complete darkness apart from your own light, with the boatmen dragging the boat over shallows in two places and a single lit chamber of formations in the middle. Out the far side into daylight, then back through.
It takes about two hours in the boat. It is the strangest thing in Laos and almost nobody on a standard itinerary sees it. Night in a simple lodge at the cave village.
Day 9: Konglor to Pakse. The long one. Back out to Route 13 and south, about 250 miles (400 km) and seven hours with a lunch stop, or we fly you from Savannakhet when the schedule allows, which we check at the time of quoting. Arrive Pakse in the late afternoon.
The south, days 10 to 12
Day 10: The Bolaven Plateau. Up onto the plateau, which sits at around 3,300 feet (1,000 m) and runs roughly 10 to 15F (6 to 8C) cooler than the lowlands, and which is where Lao coffee comes from. A working farm in the morning: arabica and robusta, picking if it is the season between November and February, drying, roasting and a proper tasting rather than a demonstration.
Afternoon at Tad Fane, twin falls that drop about 400 feet (120 m) into a gorge, and Tad Yuang, which you can swim under. Night on the plateau.
Day 11: The plateau villages and Tad Lo. A walk between Katu and Alak villages with a local guide, which is done properly with a community that has agreed to it and not as a photo stop. Then down to Tad Lo, a smaller waterfall with a village around it, for the afternoon and the night.
We stay on marked paths on this day. Salavan and Sekong are among the most heavily contaminated provinces in the country and the rule is not negotiable.
Day 12: Down to Pakse, and out. Wat Phou at Champasak on the way if your flight is late enough, which is a pre-Angkorian Khmer temple on a hillside, listed by UNESCO, and quiet in a way Angkor stopped being decades ago. Then the airport.
What is included
Accommodation with breakfast throughout, the Luang Prabang to Vientiane rail leg in reserved seats, one internal flight where the schedule allows, private air-conditioned car with English-speaking driver on every road day, licensed trekking guides at Nong Khiaw and on the Bolaven, the Nam Ou boats, the Konglor cave boat with head torches, all entrance fees, a picnic on trekking days, a day-by-day document with honest drive times, and a WhatsApp group with your consultant and our Hanoi office for the whole trip.
What we would change, and when
- Want to ride the loop rather than be driven it? We arrange guided motorbike sections around Thakhek with a support vehicle, for experienced riders only. We do not put an inexperienced rider on Route 13.
- Only ten days? Cut the centre. Nong Khiaw and the Bolaven with a Luang Prabang stay is a strong ten-day trip and it removes both long drives.
- Want the Plain of Jars instead? Swap Konglor for two nights at Phonsavan, reached by air from Vientiane. Megalithic stone jars, clearance markers everywhere, and the bombing history at its most concentrated.
- Green season? June to September we would move this trip. Not because it cannot be done, but because the 100 Waterfalls walk is the best day on it and heavy rain takes it away.
Honest notes
Day 7 and day 9 are long drives on straight, hot road with little to look at. There is no railway south of Vientiane and no reliable flight into Thakhek. If long drives are a problem for you, this is the itinerary to say so about, and we will build you the ten-day version instead.
Accommodation at Nong Khiaw, Konglor and Tad Lo is simple. Fans rather than air conditioning in some rooms, hot water that depends on the sun, and power that goes off. It is clean and the settings are extraordinary. It is not comfortable in the way the Luang Prabang hotel is.
On unexploded ordnance, we repeat what our guides will tell you on the ground. In Khammouane, Salavan and Sekong you stay on marked paths and on cleared ground, and you do not wander into fields or forest edges because the view looks better from over there. This is the most heavily bombed country in history per head of population and the ordnance is still in it.
The Pha Daeng climb is short and genuinely steep, with loose ground and a few sections where you use your hands. People underestimate it because it is only two hours.
Built by Paz Prosianoy, our Southeast and Central Asia specialist, and checked by our Hanoi office before it goes out.
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