As the first bus 28 would depart Vientiane's central bus station at 6.10am, it meant that I had an early start on Christmas morning. There were only three other passengers beside me and I wondered how our measly fare of 25,000 LAK (~1.15 USD) could cover this 30-minute trip.



It's now possible to book Lao-China Railway ticket on its app. However, only users with Lao, Thai or Chinese phone numbers are able to register and I needed assistance from my Chinese friend to get the verification code in order to be registered.

I secured my international train ticket between Vientiane and Kunming as soon as they were available for booking two weeks before my trip; for domestic journeys within Laos, the booking horizon is only three days ahead.

Those who booked the cross-border train online were required to exchange for a physical ticket at the station. I spent some time figuring out which line I should join and it turned out to be counter 6. The same counter also served group bookings and I ended up having to wait around half an hour before I got the physical ticket.



With the ticket in hand, I cleared the security and headed into the departure hall.



CR200J trainset which would take me to Kunming


The carriage was only half-filled when we departed Vientiane.



The crew came around and checked who weren't holding Lao and Chinese passports. She offered both Lao departure card and China's arrival card and copied my passport information onto her manifest.

My seat neighbour boarded in the next station Vang Vieng and coincidentally he's also a Singaporean. What are the chances!

The carriage was filled up after Luang Prabang, Laos' premier tourist city.

Glimpses of the beautiful northern Lao landscape when the train wasn't in tunnels



The train arrived in Boten 15 minutes behind schedule and all passengers had to disembark.



For those of us heading to China, we had to get our tickets checked and bags scanned again before clearing Lao exit immigration.

Waiting to leave Laos



The train to Mohan only took 12 minutes and I was among the first to clear Chinese immigration.

Visiting China for the first time since 2018



I ended up chatting with two European travellers; one's heading to Portugal all the way by train and the other was visiting friends in Kunming.

Holding area



One noticeable difference after crossing border was that the mobile internet is working much better in China when compared to Laos.



Around 4.5 hours later, our train rolled into Kunming for an on-time arrival. Sun had already set by then.



I had to show my physical ticket again in order to get out of the station.



Distance travelled so far: ~3,586km

An 9-hour train ride wasn't most people's ideal way to spend Christmas but it's amazing to reach China without flying.

I also got to witness first hand how obnoxious some of the Chinese boomer travellers could be; I won't go into details but their reputation is thoroughly deserved.

My accommodation for the night was YSSS Hotel through Trip.com (~27 USD). It was only two metro stops away from Kunming South Station and occupied the entire level 24 of a commercial and residential building. The instructions to locate it was unclear and I had to call the hotel reception.

Room 8828



As I had been subsisting on only biscuits the entire day, I headed downstairs for dinner after check-in. There were quite a few options to choose from and I just picked an eatery which seemed popular.

Figuring out my options



Fried rice (13 CNY) and wonton (10 CNY)



After dinner, I spent the rest of the evening doing laundry (free for guests) at the hotel.