Different Towns - Laos? I'm not sure..

The day after trekking I decided to get the early bus to Luang Prabang with my friends Elle and Ben from my trek. Our Tuk-tuk to the bus station was stopped by a minivan driver and we jumped into that instead - it was faster and cheaper than the bus so a good start! We had a great Laos steamboat dinner that night.
Luang Prabang is a UNESCO World heritage site and it is really beautiful. No tall buildings and a great mixture of French and Laos architecture, many historical Wats and temples all on the banks of 2 rivers including the Mekong. It is so clean and nice that it didn't really feel like Laos anymore - it is definitely an international town.
I spent the first day exploring the town on foot and visited a few of the major Wats. I went to a great restaurant Tamarind - run by 2 women - 1 Australian, for lunch and had a tasting plate which gave me a good idea of Laos delicacies - yum.
I had a pretty quiet night as I think the trekking was catching up with me. Sleeping on wooden huts floors hurts your body!
The following day I had a lazy morning (More yummy food!) before catching a slow boat up the Mekong to the Pak Ou caves. There are 2 caves in a limestone cliff that contain thousands of statues of Buddha. We came back via a local village as the sunset over the Mekong...
(I'm not posting photos cause I think you will find better ones on the Internet)
As beautiful as Luang Prabang is, I missed Laos so it was time to move on. The next morning was a minivan to Vang Vieng which is also spectacular but again I don't think very 'real' Laos. The landscape is covered by huge limestone mountains and cliffs but Vang Vieng is also famous for it's tubing down the river - where many young people come and float down the river in tractor tubes, between many bars and the occasional huge slide, or flying fox or swing in the river as well.. So there are many bars and young women running around in bikinis which is not really Laos at all.
I spent my first day on a motorbike exploring the area and many of the caves that are in the limestone's mountains surrounding the town and ate some fantastic food at Vang Vieng's organic Mulberry farm.
I'm going to do tubing tomorrow because I have been hearing about it for so long.. Needless to say I might be off the air for a day or 2 after bar hoping all day long..