This video show where we are at right now; placing our bikes on the roof of a bus for overnight transport up to Vientaine from Savannaket after four unsuccessful attempts to get into Thailand from Tha Khek and Savannaket, alas, we threw in the towel and had to come back up to the main border crossing. $30 later we are here deciding whether or not to sell the Minsk and continue by public transport or continue with the Vietnamese bikes into the rather westernized country of Thailand without perfect papers, motorcycle drivers license, so forth and so on. The last couple of days have been rather taxing, banging our heads against the proverbial wall of beaurocrasy, however, while sitting around quite uncharacteristically, we have been able to meet many interesting travelers. This morning we sat by the Mekong river after arriving in Vientaine at 4am with two South Korean students. We gathered bottle caps and I taught them how to play checkers on a chess board; they were quite good for never having played before, nevertheless I proceeded to beat them both!
