Hiheup - Vuenkham - Tha Li border crossing

[Mark Rossi]

A alternative dirt route to cross into Thailand coming from highway 13 in the Laos North, is to turn south west at Hinheup. From Hinhuep make your way over to Vuen Kham on the Mekong river, then ferry across onto Tha Li international border crossing.
Tha Li brings you back into Thailand in Loei province and is a short 30min drive to the provincial capital.
Photo by luke

The ferry crossing at Vuen Kham is one the most dangerous I have been across, the river is wide and fast, the boat is just afloat and very unstable.
Photo by luke

The ferry had to pull to shore as the larger boat past, if we had been on the river at the time the waves from its bow would have surely sunken us

The ride from Hinhuep to the Mekong river is spectacular. The route is very scenic passing through the rice fields with a limestone backdrop. The road surface is smooth and mostly all weather it is possible to ride up to 100kmph on this dirt road.

Photo by luke

Photo by luke

It is hard to estimate a time from Hinhuep to the Thai border, I estimate you would need 4-5 hrs moving time.

 

[KTMphil]

From where you left R13 SW to Tha Li (we carried on south on R13 to Vientiane), you made amazing time to get Loei with those soup mud sections..

Now its dry season, we might try that route next week when we're in Laos.