28 March, 2010

Laos

Laos, once the Kingdom of Lan Xang or "Land of a Million Elephants" is one of the most spectacular countries we visited on our trip. We expected to see one of the poorest county in the region but thanks to the reforms (yes, done by communists!) and enormous increase in tourism (from 14,400 tourists visiting Laos in 1990, to 1.4 million in 2007) Laos is changing really fast. Electricity is reaching village by village, all the main roads are paved, the prices in high profile destinations are rising and the most common car is Toyota Hilux 4x4! Fortunately not the whole country seems to be not spoiled too much with all the tourists (like Thailand). It's still great to travel around and visit the cultural centres, colourful tribes or jump on one of the old noisy river boats :)

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