The tubing in Vang Vieng, is simply going down the river on a big tube, going slowly,
For about 4 or 5Km. but what make it famous was all the bars and attraction that there was all along the river. It was a very big party place, with many bars, many rope swing, waterslide and things like that.
It was a “Must do” Activity for all the young tourists in South East Asia for many years, until end of 2012 when the Laos government decided to close down all the bars along the river. As you can guess, very drunk people don’t make a good mix with a river, and many place to jump/slide/swing to the river specially that most of the time the river is not very deep and there is rocks everywhere. So many people died every month doing the tubing, and that’s why they closed every bar and remove all the installation along the river.
Now few bars start to open again, but it is definitely not the same as it was. Before there were 800 people every day doing the tubing, now, it’s not even 150!!! It makes it a much more relaxing attraction, than a big party now.
The first day I was there is did that to relax on the river and see what it was all about, and was interesting to see all the old bars and attractions half destroyed, and I can really imagine how wild it was before !!
The town itself is nice, but nothing really special it is just a tourist center You can feel that the closing of the bars along the river did a very big impact over the entire city, many bars and restaurant are now almost always empty and struggle to survive!! Also a funny thing, all the restaurants are almost all the same, and they all show in loop episodes of friends or family guys.
The scenery around is really good, so the next day I rent a motorbike and went for a ride around to see the surrounding area and it was really cool.
I have seen another big cave that was really cool, and swim in a very nice river to cool down!!
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