Luangprabang Bus Station — Local services in Luang Prabang

There is no longer local bus going to Nong Khiaw. Now they sell air-conditioned minivan ticket, 100k. Different from the sign saying the departure time being 9:30, now it's 9:00 a.m.

According to the sign there should be bus/van going to Kuang Si waterfall, but now they don't have it.

Also they sell minivan tickets to Vang Vieng at 250k, but different from the sign, there's now only one time per day, on 8:30 a.m.

Nearby there's a place selling train ticket. According to the sign they don't accept cash and there's a 20k extra fee for every ticket. I can't confirm with them as they're not open yet when I was there.

Is it worth to come all the way to buy a railway ticket here? I wasn't coming for the train ticket but since I'm here and I can do some calculation. In my case, assuming they really don't accept cash, taking union pay as the payment method, they have a transaction service fee 1.2%, and just like any bank they have a discrepancy between the official currency exchange rate and the market rate (13.5% in my case, my card currency is HKD). Plus the minivan fee from town to the railway station is 60k, in total it becomes 217k. And it turns out to be a bit more expensive than the cheapest railway ticket (including the minivan ride from town to station) I can get in town. Of course, if your currency and transaction service fee are different, the outcome would be different. But probably not...

MINIVAN RIDES: be aware that these minivan drivers are so greedy that they CRAM 15 people into one van! They make people sit on these “half seats” that are just cushions between two other seats, with nothing to support your back, so three people are crammed ridiculously close to one another for the whole drive. 3/4 hours to Nong Khiaw. No personal space and it is UNSAFE! How they are allowed to do this, and why they continue to sell tickets after every single actual seat is filled, is beyond me. So if you want an ACTUAL seat, get there at least 30 minutes before your departure time. And if you get carsick, sit towards the front or the passenger seat at the very front. And buy an herbal inhaler to sniff on to help with nausea. These two girls today were crying about having to be crammed in the back, saying that they were surely going to vomit on the drive. Yet they didn’t have the sense to ask if there were any other vans available to Nong Khiaw. There were. Shame on these drivers for being so greedy and compromising safety and overall comfort of the people they...

• Dec 2024 *

This is the correct location of Luang Prabang South Bus Terminal to Nong Khiaw. We bought tickets one day in advance while we were on the way to Kuang Si Waterfall. The ticket costs 120K per person (on 12GoAsia sells double price)

The minivan leaves daily once a day at 9AM. However, it was actually left at 8.30AM when it was full and arrived Nong Khiaw at 12PM with a short break for toilets. Our minivan got 4 rows and 3 seats on each row including the driver. It was pretty small minivan so it wasn't comfortable for tall people.

This station is much closer to the town center than the North Bus Terminal. Getting a car picked up from the center to this bus station costs around 60K...