K's alarm went off at 7.30 but no one stirred till past 9. quick breakfast at hotel in order to catch the 10am shuttle. santi's quote for 5.30 transport to observe monks collecting alms was US$3 a head.
went to LP or royal palace museum, 30K kip. thinking that the king and queen's bedrooms were awfully austere. more of the mosaics of japanese glass against the rich red background of the wall. including a depiction of what looked like a soldier capturing a horse spiderman-style by ejecting a net to nab the creature.
also took in wat souvanhnaphoumanom, notable for the gilded gold relief on the exteriors.
lunch at joma bakery cafe, a pleasant joint with unfinished concrete walls, green window frames and a red awning. melted sandwich on croissant (22K kip), cappuccino (13K kip), mango crumble (15K kip) with a scoop of chocolate ice-cream (6K kip). food's ok, perhaps a tad above average but a welcome change from local fare.
headed west of museum and away from mekong to the south, the so-called trading district. came across stretch of guest houses but lower end. almost walked past wat visoun with its watermelon stupa and wat aham with the 2 banyan trees.
K went off to get a red cross massage. went up phu si hill for views of LP and for that chomsi (stupa) on the summit.
had a crepe of pandan custard and banana (5K kip) and bottle of green tea with honey (5K kip). made on the spot, warm and lightly crisp.
crepe stand is at the front of a provision store which leads to the living/tv room of a home, with the kitchen and toilet beyond it.
met up with K at santi hotel. decided on pak huay mixai on ban choum khong pedestrian street for dinner. night market in the lane next to the restaurant proved to be most fruitful for souvenir shopping - richly-patterned brightly-coloured cloth, bags, pouches, cushion covers, paper umbrellas, lamp shades, coffee, tea, ethnic clothing, drawings. only 1 or 2 stalls selling fake watches and the like.
the lao people are not very confrontational so bargaining was not a pain. bought 6 pouches (the lady even threw in 2 coin pouches for free) and 2 bags of coffee powder (for the lovely bags they came in).
quite a few of the spots were manned by kids. also noticed that they would all sweep the money received from a sale around the other items still on display, for trading luck.
bumped into J and his friend R who had come up from Vientiane and Vang Vieng.
had dinner together. beer lao (light and easy to drink), LP salad (pleasant sweetish sauce), beef stew, deep fried fish with sweet sour peanut sauce (quite thai-like) and LP sausage (no big shakes). about 50K kip a person.