Sadly many of the pictures for this blog have vanished
Woolly says – We seem to have walked a lot in Vientiane, so I thought I would be kind to the women and let them take a tuk tuk to our first stop of the day. Without a cloud in the sky it was a lovely breezy ride, it was easy to see the large gold structure from a mile away, as we pulled into the carpark I jumped out eager to take a closer look at Pha That Luang.
Very much a case of the ‘royal we’ as I haven’t noticed the mammoth’s paws doing much in the way of walking!
Woolly says – Originally built as a Hindu temple in the 1st century, Pha That Luang became a Buddhist temple after missionaries from the Mauryan Empire arrived in the 3rd century with what was thought to be Lord Buddha’s breast bone (by my count Buddha had at least thirty breast bones, several hundred teeth and at least five arms!). Completely reconstructed in 1566 to the current structure it had many years of being plundered by the Burmese, Siamese and Chinese, it has been rebuilt many times over the years, giving its glowing golden colour it looked as though it had recently been repainted again. Having paid out a few thousand kip, we walked through the gates and into a simple cloistered area with the stupa taking pride of place in the centre. A few old relics were on show which included a fine looking Buddha head but nothing that detracted from the golden stupa. Remembering the rule of circling in a clockwise direction we ambled round the large base taking in each part of it, through one of the gates I saw a row of small Buddha’s that couldn’t be seen unless you climbed onto the structure which would not be respectful. Each side had a small temple with clay sea serpents guarding the statues inside, it was a lovely place to be and I understood why it is the Laos national symbol.
Having taken our pictures and thanked the ticket lady we made our way through the gates across the road. The walls had the most impressive prangs each one dedicated to a family and beautifully ornate.
Woolly says – The walls were great but even better was the large reclining Buddha, not the biggest we have seen but one of the best, we sat for a while admiring him and wondering if Lord Buddha when alive had really had such a large head! As we continued around the complex we found a large open meeting room which had some of the best paintings showing the great man’s story, each picture was simple in design but so colourful and lovely to look at. It also had a large gong just waiting for me to bang, just as I was about to pick up the hammer I felt a presence behind me and realised that Jo wasn’t going to let me carry out my intentions, she’s such a spoil sport. We made our way past small delightful temples and back onto the main road. Our second stop on the list was a short walk through a small park which had a herd of different sized elephants, not real ones sadly but they were still pretty good and certainly ticked the ‘elephant a day’ picture. We sat down in the shade for a few minutes waiting for the museum to open. The Lao People’s Army History Museum was established 1976 and provides lots of weapons, tools, information and photos of the Lao People’s Army during the revolutionary period from 1950 until the liberation for independence of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic in 1975, as well as a couple of tanks, just what we needed.
Crossing the road, we looked at the sign which didn’t say quite what we expected!
Woolly says – The People’s Security Museum was a new one on me, it was a huge building and had some lovely looking cars and bikes at the front, I could see that Zoe was itching to go in and set off to find a gateway in. It didn’t take long neither did reading he sign which told us it was closed, did we expect anything less! We found a tree to stand under and consulted the map which showed us that the Army Museum was in fact across the rather impressive roundabout we were currently looking at, on we went. With little traffic on the roads it didn’t take us long to get there and as we entered the gates I was nearly overwhelmed with joy to see not just a tank but some planes and a helicopter as well, I knew this was going to be good. I raced over to take a closer look at the tank and left the ladies to sort out our tickets.
We seemed to have hit a problem, having woken the guard up and asked for our tickets he smiled sweetly and said ‘Museum is closed’, I looked across the grounds to see my small friend racing from one armoured vehicle to another before pointing to the sign that clearly said the museum was open Tuesdays to Sunday (the website had also said this), the man grinned and shook his head repeating that it was closed, I wondered if he would still be grinning when attacked by a small dangerous furry beast!
Woolly says – ‘NOOOOOOOOOOOO’, it wasn’t fair nor was the fact that Jo wouldn’t let me hold the man to hostage until he opened the doors to let me in! I was heartbroken and as we set off to walk the three miles back to the centre, even the thought of an ice cream couldn’t make up for my disappointment.