Wayside Guesthouse is our home away from home, although technically we really don’t have a home anywhere else. But after a month doing medical maintenance we have a choice: pay $55 each to extend our visas for another month or go on a visa run to another country. Our trip here to Southeast Asia is itself a visa run from our six-month limit in the UK, so we’ve decided on a visa run from our visa run. Destination: neighboring Laos.
It’ll be the Green Bus to the border for us. Our host Jackie, known to us as Mom, suggested she’d better call her friend to take us to the bus station rather than relying on a tuk-tuk at rush hour. Mom knows best. We made it with a comfortable margin and schlepping our faithful rolling duffel, found bus bay number 20 to Chiang Khong.
Thailand’s roads are legendary so we have girded our loins in preparation for a rough day. Loins are one thing but there’s something seriously wrong with my seatback which insists on pushing my torso into a forward facing vice.
It’s raining before we even get out of town but our bus attendant lady has already passed out a box full of tiny complimentary water bottles and I’m sure she’s accumulated a body full of bruises fetching up against the bus’s seats. I’m spending most of my time searching for a lever or anything to at least get my seat back to vertical.
Parts of the road are fairly recently patched but what I find intolerable is Thailand’s penchant for adding speed bumps to the potholes for which they are already so richly endowed. We lurch from village to village, temple to temple, this Buddha to that Buddha, each covered with gold even though they’re surrounded by people living in little more than lean-tos, but then that’s Thailand. I reach down under my seat feeling for someway, really anyway to recline my seat back, without joy.
Now we are creeping up the beautiful mountains at a screaming snail’s pace only to hurtle down the other side. The Green Bus has a beeping speed warning to let the happy passengers know that the driver is now speeding.
In the meantime, great news: it’s time for the distribution of the complimentary snack which features the only word in English — banana — on the paper wrapper and may include some form of spongecake rolled into a tube. I missed out because I was looking under my seat for the elusive lever to recline my seat. Still no joy.
Now we’re grinding our way up more mountains. I have serious reservations about the health of this poor Green Bus. It’s still beep beeping down the other side though. People periodically begin to depart the bus while the driver opens the door to dart into various businesses dropping off parcels or picking up other parcels. Bear in mind this Green Bus is marked as an express.
In time we found ourselves alone in the Green Bus with just the driver and the bus lady for company. I’m looking at the empty seats to see what could possibly operate the goddamn seatback. We jostled through a dusty country village only to swing around in a lumbering 180 degree turn, abruptly stopping in a cloud of dust, and with that the driver turned and looked at us. My best guess is that we’re not going any further on the Green Bus.
The good news is that after seven plus hours of searching and being pummeled by the Green Bus, I finally found the tiny black plastic knob that marginally reclines the seatback.
We stood up stiffly, claimed the only bag remaining under the bus, and hired a tuk-tuk to take us the rest of the way to Day Waterfront Hotel.
After being sprayed with dust and dirt for a half an hour our driver ended this madness by braking to a merciful stop at the precipice of an ungodly steep hill.
With the muddy Mekong River spread out below us, he mumbled “It’s down there.” I assumed he meant our hotel, so I yanked our loyal rolling duffel out of the tuk-tuk and with baby steps we carefully negotiated the ski jump of a hill.
Finally in our room we divided our time between filling out visa forms and marveling at the sight of the mighty Mekong River valley.
It’s not home but it’ll have to do until morning.
