I really liked Vang Vien. It was a relaxing stop on our quick tour of Laos. And instead of site-seeing, we got to do things. Our first afternoon we went for a walk through rice fields, following the “blue flaks” (flags) to a cave. It started getting dark, so we never actually made it to the cave, but it was still fun to walk through fields in the shadow of beautiful limestone cliffs. The next day we inner-tubed down the river, at some points having to paddle with my slippers to keep going (it is dry season, so the water was a little low in some places). The sun set softly behind the hills, followed by a ribbon of thousands of insects flying across the horizon. It was really amazing and lasted for about 5 minutes; we saw a repeat performance the next night. On the third day we rented bikes to ride out to another cave. Along the way we were greeted with many sabadi (hello) as we passed through villages and by schools. A couple kids stuck out their hands for a high-five as I rode by. It was fun. Our last day in Vang Vien we switched to a hotel with free internet and spent the whole morning taking turns skyping people back home. All in all, it was a great few days. Vang Vien is at an interesting place as the number of visitors increases each year and the town continues to develop. Only a couple of years ago the main road was dirt. Now it is paved and new buildings are going up everywhere. Having visited similar foreign-tourist only type destinations, it was interesting to see this town in this in between stage of development.