10 hours ago we sat down for breakfast in sight of our estimated bus stop. It's not a labelled bus stop, just a dirt track on side of the road in small riverside town called Nong Khiaw in northern Laos. We checked with the restaurant that this was the right spot and in her stilted English we managed to convey our destination. She hurried off to find a board to make a sign for the bus driver, engaging the travel agent across the road to help. We were relieved to be in the right place, and be armed with our sign and with a few locals looking out to help us.
Sadly, 9 hours later, we are still waiting for said bus. After 4 or 5 hours they informed us the afternoon bus probably wasn't coming, but there was a night bus. The travel agent even kindly phoned the bus station in Luang Prabang to confirm. We're hoping it will arrive around 10pm as expected, but are desperately considering what our back up options might be otherwise. In a more remote place like this, there aren't many.
We've become a bit infamous in the town. Everyone has seen our sign. When it was clear we had at least 5 hours til our second chance bus, I went for a massage up the road (still within 100m of our bus stop). I started chatting to the owner, and he knowingly smiled when I said we were heading to Sam Neua (close to Vietnam border) - "I've seen the sign".
The travel agent closes in 1.5hrs, and he hopes we'll have gone by then. The restaurant owner keeps popping over and chatting to us in Lao before writing down numbers - we think these are bus times and her way of conveying. I have a habit of looking up every time a vehicle passes now with a hopeful grin, though it's making it hard for me to concentrate on anything else even though I know we've got at least another hour. I speedily return every time I go to the toilet even though I know there's plenty of time. We'll keep watching and waiting til our bright lights come to collect us.
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