I arrived at BKK about 3 hours before my QV flight. Check in was easy, the bag was tagged to VTE-no comment about it being overweight or about weighing my carry-on and I proceeded through immigration. The Louis Tavern lounge allowed me in with my NW World Clubs membership and I spent the time eating tuna sandwiches, drinking Coke Lights and reading the Bangkok papers. When boarding time approached, I walked to the bus gate serving the flight. Nothing unusual in the boarding process except for a dead-heading QV pilot who seemed to know a number of the passengers. We wound around a bunch of wide-bodies of various airlines and arrived at the ATR-72. Boarding was thru the door in the rear. The Flight Attendant allowed the stowage of my carry-on in the space at the rear of the aircraft. In fact, the bag was stowed there on all 4 flights. My seat was in the rear which allowed me to be the first at immigration.

Take off was smooth. The crew were professional and neatly attired. Announcements were in Thai, Lao and English. A snack was served on this slightly more than one hour flight; it was exactly the same as those I have had on PG and AF out of Bangkok. The only was difference was the colorful Lao Airlines plane on the top of the box. A mini-sandwich, weird desert and cup of water. Two beverage passes were made offering orange juice, soft drinks (no diet) and Beer Lao. The plane was clean and looked fairly new. It did not crash. What else could one ask for??

Arrival at VTE required retracing the landing route down the runway. Deplaning was from the rear. Note that VTE has jetways, but ATRs are too small to use them. We marched across the tarmac, no bus here, up the steps of a jetway and all the way across the rear of the terminal to arrival. Visa issuance was to the right and no one was expecting us despite an on-time arrival. Eventually someone showed up. I was expecting 5-7 people to process us in, but only two seemed to be required that day in VTE. The cost of a visa has risen and is now $35 for a U.S. Citizen, interestingly for Canadians it is $42, payable in US dollars, of course. Laos now has a very attractive one page sticky visa which replaced the old stamped one. Maybe the visa fee increase covers the cost of the sticker.

Once I had my Visa, I proceed to immigration and my passport and arrival card were stamped. The departure card was stuck in the passport and I proceeded downstairs to baggage claim. No hassles at all clearing immigration or customs. At baggage claim, my suitcase with flyertalk priority tag was waiting.

The hotel booked for the evening was the Lao Plaza, for Vientiane a pretty fancy business class hotel in the tourist area. It was booked via www.asiarooms.com for $80 inclusive of tax, service and breakfast. There was an individual from Lao Plaza with a sign without my name. I could have ridden with them, but it was easier and faster to just go to the taxi stand and pay my $6 for a taxi to the hotel. This is not Europe, no Mercedes cabs, this one had no AC and it had a few hundred thousand kilometers on the speedo, but it go me downtown in about 15 minutes. Check-in was easy, they expected me, the room was OK ($80 was too much IMHO). I did much better on the return at the Tai Pan Hotel ([email protected]) www.vientiane-hotel-link.com for $60 all in. They neglected to charge me $7 for the transfers, but that might have been because of the Japanese couple who shared the van with me.