From Vientiane, our next destination was Thakhek, a town in central Laos. Thakhek is fairly well known for "The Loop". This is a motorcycle trip which takes people anywhere from two days to a week, exploring some of the wonderful back roads of central Laos and usually starting and ending in Thakhek. Instead of catching a bus to Thakhek and then doing the loop from there, we decided to kick off our own "Unloop" from Vientiane and ending in Thakhek, while still taking in most of the same sights. This adventure turned out to be one of the highlights of our time in Laos and we would highly recommend it to anyone travelling from Vientiane to Thakhek who's considering doing the Loop.

We hired a Honda Baja XR250 from Jules Classic Company which was definitely the best motorcycle rental outfit that we’ve come across in South East Asia so far. The bike came with full insurance and good quality, new helmets. Owner Thierry has even had the pillion foot pegs on his bikes lowered to make the ride more comfortable for passengers. We arranged with Jules Classic to have our luggage shipped to Thakhek for a small fee and agreed to drop the bikes off with their agent when we arrived in Thakhek.

For the first day was a long day’s riding at around 280km and took us to Na Hin. We rode as much as we could off Highway 13, using a good condition dirt road which runs alongside the Mekong for some of the way. Head for Buddha Park and continue straight along this dirt road. Eventually this joins back onto Highway 13, a fairly boring ride until you reach Highway 8. Riding eastwards on Highway 8 was spectacular. We wound up and down steep mountain passes on an excellent quality road, passing amazing mountain views and strange karst limestone clusters.

Once we reached Na Hin, the guesthouse that we planned to stay at was full and they directed us to the excellent Sainamhai Resort where we stayed in a very nice new bungalow. The resort is very new, and is not yet in any of the guidebooks, but we highly recommend staying here. Free coffee, excellent food with fabulous portions and very friendly staff made for a perfect rest stop. Ask a local in Na Hin for directions to Sainamhai, as it’s fairly tricky to find.

The following day, we headed off to one of Laos’ hidden wonders of nature – Tham Kong Lo – a cave which runs 7km through a mountain and has a river running through it, linking two villages. The road to the cave was only built a few years ago, so it is still very unknown, but we reckon it will become a major tourist attraction in Laos over the next few years. For now it remains very low key – just a few tourists and local villagers.

To explore it, we hired two guides and a long-tail boat. It is pitch black inside, but using a torchlight you get a glimpse of the massive proportions of the cave. Every now and then, we had to get out the boat and wade through shallow water as the guides carried the boat up mini rapids. Halfway through, we stopped; one of the guides flicked a switch and lit up amazing stalactites and stalagmites. The lights have been put in by a French organisation and are very well done. We then continued through the cave for about an hour until we emerged to a village on the other side of the mountain where we had a drink before heading back. Definitely worth a visit if you are in the area.

The following day, we continued on “The Loop”, but found ourselves at our next planned stop over Lak Xao at 11:30am. The town looked pretty awful after the magic of Na Hin, so we consulted the map and decided that we could easily make it all of the remaining 160km to Thakhek before it got dark. From Lak Xao, we headed south on Route 1E. Shortly after leaving Lak Xao the road deteriorated. We slowed down dramatically as we navigated a very badly maintained dirt road – after about 2 hours we’d only gone about 40km and we started to get worried – at the current pace, we wouldn’t make Thakhek until well after dark. And then all of sudden, the road turned into a fantastic road – still dirt, but in excellent condition. This was a relief as we could speed up and get back on track again.

Shortly after this, we rounded a corner and were confronted by an incredibly eerie sight – black water, perfectly still, spread in front of us, and out of it were hundreds of dead trees – all black, like the water. It turned out that the Nam Theun Dam had been built a few years before and what we were seeing were the forests that were flooded when the dam went in. Of course, this is also why the road was being so well maintained.

The rest of the trip was uneventful and we arrived in Thakhek well before sunset, but what an amazing adventure it was!