Riding the Bolaven plateau bike loop

Bolaven Plateau Loop or Pakse Loop is one of the two famous bike loops in Laos, the other one being the Thakhek Loop through karst mountains. Bolaven Plateau Loop is a 350 km loop starting and ending in Pakse, a town in the south of Laos. It passes through coffee plantations, rice fields and has almost 18 waterfalls enroute. This is the Big Loop but it can also be done as a short loop of 200 km in 2 days, but that leaves out some of the most beautiful waterfalls on the route. So we decided to do the big loop. 

However since I went in the end of dry season, most of the smaller waterfalls had dried and the big ones also didn't have as much water. It takes 3-4 days to do this loop, but the villages on the way are so beautiful, I would have gladly spent a week.

Bikes can be easily rented from Pakse, with a choice of semi-automatic and fully automatic. But like most of South East Asia, the passports are kept as a guarantee while you are away with the bike. Miss Noy bike rental is the most famous here. It has great reviews on most online travel forums and is run by a Laotian lady Miss Noy and her Belgian husband Mr. Yves for their professional behaviour, support during the bike ride and ease of communication in English and French. They conduct a detailed briefing session about do's, don'ts, tips about driving the Bolaven loop. We also attended this session where Yves, the Belgian husband of Miss Noy explained all the fine details regarding the route, road conditions, guesthouses on the way, any other interesting places to see on the way, where to park, which waterfalls to avoid so that the bikes don't get stolen.  Unfortunately we didn't get bikes from them, as there were no more bikes available. So on Yves'a advice, we went to Nang Noi Guesthouse, who also rent good motorbikes. We rented semi automatic this time, as they tend to have better control due to the gears. Ariana tried some rounds in the town itself, before she was comfortable with the bike. 

On the bike in Laos, on dirt roads

Day 1:

And then we set off a little after 9 am. Although it was a delayed start, we hoped to make up for time. We had a brief stop at Mr. Vieng coffee farm, known for its ethical and organic coffee farming, to have some good coffee. 

Indigenous tea and coffee filters made of bamboo

The place also has great food at affordable price, but due to language barrier, the lady there didn't understand and said she had no food. We reached Tad Lo village only around 230 pm, a bit tired and famished. Looked for accommodation and had a quick lunch as we wanted to see the waterfalls. There are quite a few guest houses in Tad Lo and some of them overlooking the Waterfall. We took a double room at 60000 kip (around 6 USD), but there are dorms available at 25000 kip per person per night. 

There are three waterfalls to see from this village - Tad Lo, Tad Hang and Tad Soung (Tad means waterfall on Laotian, so all waterfall names begin with Tad). 

Tad Hang Waterfall

Temporary wooden bridge on Tad Hang waterfall in dry season

Tad Lo waterfall

It's possible to swim in the first two. The third one Tad Soung is about 7 km from the village. It was dry when we went but it was fun hiking from the base of the Waterfall to its top and enjoy the views from the top. The hike up was almost vertical and we scrambled up holding some wooden ladders and roots of trees.

The view from the top was worth the hike and the thin stream of water almost created rain like effect.

View from the top of Tad Soung

Sitting on top of a waterfall is quite rare

And on the way back Ariane and I hitched a ride on a local guy's bike as we were tired of walking more than 10 km. Spent the evening drinking beer at the Tad Hang waterfall. 

Day 2:

Next morning we set off again, a bit early as we wanted to go to Kok Phoung Tai village, which was well known on this route for its strange tribal culture. It is mentioned in many blogs and is kind of a must see place on the Pakse loop. The people in this village start smoking pipe at the age of 3, get married at 8 or 9 years and always stay in joint families, which sometimes results in almost 100 people staying in the same house. They believe that foreign visitors bring bad luck to the village, so don't open up to foreign tourists, but Mr. Hook, a guy from this village who speaks decent English, conducts tours twice a day. I thought the tour was overhyped. I did not experience anything additional by visiting the village, spent 3 hours just listening to Mr.Hook, and I had read everything he spoke, almost verbatim. While the village is very interesting, you do not get to actually see much of their daily life or visit a home. You will hear mostly about history of coffee and walk through coffee plantations. Mr. Hook also shows many local medicinal plants. If coffee farm or plants is your interest, then take the tour with Mr. Hook, otherwise just see the waterfalls. However, to really experience the village, it might be worthwhile spending a night in the village. If you have 4 days, you can stay in Kok Phoung Tai, but if you have only three days, then you can stay either in Tad Lo or Kok Phoung Tai. 

After spending around 3 hours in the village, we drove towards Tad Tayicseua, which has almost 7 waterfalls to see. On the way there were two more waterfalls - Tad Faek and Tad Houa Khon. Tad Faek was dry, and we stopped for lunch at PS Garden & restaurant near Tad Houa Khon. This waterfall is approached via a beautiful wooden bridge through a forest. There was not much water, but the place was lovely to chill and relax.

Tad Houa  Khon

The drive after this point till reaching Tayicseua village was the scariest part of the ride as there were anecdotes of bike thefts, attacks on this stretch. So we didn't stop much on the way as per the advice. The last bit of the road to the Guesthouse near the Waterfall was a dirt road with steep ups and downs, and it was getting dark, so it got a little unnerving… But we managed to reach just before dark.
There is just one guest house, almost next to Tad Tayicseua, in the middle of the forest. It has dorms and double rooms in cute bamboo cottages, priced at 50000 kip (5.5 $) per person or 100000 to 150000 per room depending on the configuration. The rooms come with all basic facilities - blanket, mosquito net and I also had the luxury of a hot shower.

The dirt road to Tad Tayicseua

Day 3:

Next morning we hiked to the most impressive waterfalls on this route - Tad Alang, Tad Jarou Halang (which is famous for a rainbow created due to water droplets and sunlight), Jarou Thalaleui and saw others from the viewpoint as some ladders were broken. There are no sign boards for all the waterfalls, but the staff of the guest house will gladly guide you using sign language, as almost nobody speaks English. I had a friendly dog guiding me to all the waterfalls. 

Jarou Thalaleui

Tad Jarou Halang

Rainbow in Tad Jarou Halang 

It was time to hit the road again and prepare for the finale of the waterfalls - the largest waterfalls were to be seen on Day 3 - Tad Fane, Tad Champi and Tad Yuang. There's also good coffee at Jhai coffee house in Paksong on the way - coffee straight from ethical farms.

Tad Yuang with a rainbow 

Tad Champi

Tad Champi from the top

Sitting on a bamboo raft in Tad Champi

Me and my German friend Ariane at Tad Yuang

Tad Yuang 

The ride back to Pakse was full of lovely memories and a great sunset. The roads were in great condition, mostly 4 Lane highway.

Sunset on the way 

We reached back to Pakse late evening…. only to find that we had no place to stay. Our advance intimation to our guesthouse was not enough to reserve a room - so some more walking around the town… We found a room for the night, had dinner and called it a day after 3 days of tiring but adventurous bike ride…. The waterfalls were every bit worth of the riding in hot sun… 

Rainbow and waterfall