Nong Khai to Vientiane Visa Run

[dirtydog]

From Khon Kaen passing Udon Thani and onto Nong Khai is a 180km journey, all have nice main roads of 2 lanes on each side.

Nong Khai and The Friendship Bridge is where you want to end up, The first picture is taken on the banks of the Mekhong River, in the distance you can see the Friendship Bridge, the main road here is where all the locals come to eat of an evening and to be entertained, the place does seem to have an abundance of restaurants where you have to cook your own food, never really seen the point of that myself but it seems quite popular in Asia.
The "Meeting Place", is probably the most popular expat hang out in Nong Khai, probably due to the farang food that is available, Pizza, Burgers etc.

More Visa Runs and Border crossing Points can be found here (Thailands Border crossing points)

In Nong Khai main town centre you will find a load of Visa agents to get you a visa for Laos, if you use an agent it will cost 1,800baht to 1,900baht, save a bit of money and do it yourself I reckon is the best bet, although if you have your Thai wife or girlfriend it's probably a good idea for them to get their border pass there, for the border pass into Laos they charge 100baht, they can get a border pass at immigration for 30baht but this is a bit of a pain, all they need is their ID card and 1 photo.

From the Thai Border at Nong Khai it is 22km to Vientiane.
The Friendship Bridge closes at 10pm.
Vientiane does have a Thai consulate but are not very cooperative in giving out multi entry visas of any sort, and even cause problems with non immigrant visas if you don't have every bit of paperwork needed.