Travellers in Laos tend to focus on Luang Prabang and Vang Vieng. But the southern Champasak Province around Pakse is hugely underrated. Here’s why.
Pakse’s riverside bars
Pakse is the hub town of Southern Laos.
The main city of Champasak Province where the flights to the rest of the country depart from, where the long distance buses arrive and tour companies are based. It’s a fairly unremarkable, but strangely enjoyable town that gets the riverside thing so right.
Stretched along the bank of the Mekong, staring out at bridges and mountains, are dozens or riverside bars.
Pakse’s riverside bars are pretty interchangeable and get perplexingly few foreign visitors. That’s where the charm lies though – hopping between them, knowing that every single one is a genuine local hangout.
Top-rated tours from Pakse
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🌄 Full-day Bolaven Plateau loop adventure: Visit waterfalls, coffee plantations and local villages on this scenic countryside tour.
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🛶 4,000 Islands and Vat Phou tour: Combine culture and nature on a day trip that includes a boat ride, Khmer temple visit and relaxed island time.
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🕌 UNESCO Vat Phou temple half-day trip: Discover the ancient Khmer ruins of Vat Phou, one of Laos’s most significant heritage sites.
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🍃 Tad Fane and Tad Yuang waterfalls tour: Take a refreshing escape to the cool highlands and see two of the Bolaven Plateau’s most stunning falls.
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🚌 Private Pakse city tour: Explore markets, temples and local landmarks with a guide who knows the stories behind each stop.
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The 4,000 Islands
The Mekong in this part of its run from Tibet to the Delta is generally fairly sleepy. But it is wide, and thousands of islands can be found in the middle of it.
The 4,000 Islands are generally fairly chilled, and many offer the opportunity to homestay with villagers.
Of the islands, Don Det is the one that is rapidly becoming a key backpacker hangout. Once the novelty of eating ‘happy’ pizza has worn off, the islands are marvellous for kayaking around.
Khon Phapheng Falls
The gentleness of the Mekong ends in abrupt fashion just south of the 4,000 Islands.
It breaks into a series of cascades before taking the biggest plunge of all.
Khon Phapheng Falls is a marvel of savage, thundering brutality.
The sheer amount of water pouring over every second is staggering, and you can be instantly assured of death if you attempt to surf it over the falls into Cambodia.
Coffee on the Bolaven Plateau
To the east of Pakse, the Bolaven Plateau is a relatively cool highland region with some of the most fertile soils in South-East Asia.
Not particularly interesting, you might think – but this also makes it the perfect place to grow coffee.
And high quality coffee too.
Most of Laos’ best Arabica beans are grown on the Bolaven Plateau, and the walks through the plantations, seeing how the coffee is grown and dried are a delight. There are also tea plantations that are open to visitors too.
Trekking the Bolaven Plateau
The caffeine should be used to fuel a day or two walking on the plateau.
The scenery is almost uniformly lovely, and the area is littered with waterfalls plunging into chasms.
The walks to them can be steep and muddy, but they’re worth it when you get to see the likes of the picturesque Champi Falls and the lofty Tat Fan falls.
Climbing the mountain to Wat Phu
Even if you’re really, really bored of looking at temples in South East Asia, an exception should be made for Wat Phu.
This Champasak temple in the same Khmer style as those at Angkor in Cambodia, but the difference here is the setting.
Wat Phu is built into the mountainside over six levels, and clearly designed to intimidate anyone approaching from the plains beneath.
It’s a consummate marriage of man-made and nature, and was one of the highlights of my journey through Laos.
The ruins may not be as impressive as those at Angkor, but the overall effect is arguably stronger.
And, handily, there’s usually only a smattering of visitors – it feels like a much more personal experience.
