Buses will let you off at Champasak town's roundabout, where you'll find almost everything you need, including a post office (open until 9pm weekdays for phone calls), and a tiny wooden bank , which can exchange cash and travellers' cheques. Salawatphou (tel 031/213280; $25-40), across from the bank, offers tastefully decorated air-con and fan rooms and a moderately priced restaurant. Opposite the roundabout, on the riverside, Saythong (under $5) has basic rooms with shared facilities in an old wooden house, above a restaurant overlooking the Mekong. Across the street, Kham Phouy (under $5) has roomy doubles and triples and a thatched en-suite bugalow in the garden. Dok Champa   restaurant , just west of the roundabout, offers the best selection of Lao dishes in town and also rents bicycles (5000K per day).

Tuk-tuks can be hired for the eight-kilometre journey to Wat Phou. Drivers, who usually charge 30,000K to take up to four passengers, will wait for you while you visit the ruins. When it comes to moving on, three buses pass through Champasak each morning en route to Pakxe (1hr 30min) from Ban Dontalat and can be hailed from the town's main road. For connections to Si Phan Don you'll have to cross the river to Ban Muang and wait for a bus heading south on Route 13, or wait for the boat from Pakxe which calls at around 9am at the Ban Phapin ferry landing, located at the northernmost end of Champasak.