Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
journey times between Thailand and Vietnam and, critics say, leave Laos with a crippling
debt to repay.
Aside from being an important junction, Savannakhet also possesses very impressive
ar-
chitecture
, and is a major staging post for
jungle treks
and cycling tours. Savannakhet's in-
habitants, as travellers who have recently arrived from Vietnam are quick to note, are much
mellower than their neighbours east of the Annamite Mountains, despite the fact that a large
percentage of the town's population is ethnic Vietnamese, descendants of entrepreneurs who
migrated to Laos during French rule. Most have been living here for generations and consider
themselves to be more Lao than Vietnamese in habit and temperament.
