About the 4000 islands
4000 islands is a large group of islands and are located along the Laos-Cambodia border. Surprisingly it doesn’t actually consist of 4000 islands and only 3 are inhabited, the rest are just basically rocks. Of those 3 inhabited islands, Don Det is the most well-known.
Don Det is about 130km south of Pakse, so it’s common to pair the two together. Don Det has a very lazy and laid-back atmosphere which is a nice change from the chaotic South-east Asian cities. There is not an abundance to do or see, rather a place to sit back and relax.
Fun Fact: It blew our mind to find out that the connection between Seoul and Jeju island is the busiest air route in the world.
How to get from Pakse to Don Det
There are two ways to travel from Pakse to Don Det. But either way you will need to get a ferry there, since it is an island, and this operates from Nakasong (town along the Mekong). So you will have to get a bus to Nakasong then ferry across. There are two possibilities to do so, you either purchase a combined bus + ferry package through Green Paradise travel. Or you do it yourself by taking the public bus and then ferry.
Combined package
This is by far the best option (you’ll find out why soon). It takes around 3 hours and should cost around €10 per person.
This option only runs twice a day and leaves at 9am and at 12 noon. It leaves from the Green Paradise travel office in Pakse and will take you straight to Nakasong, where the ferry leaves. The ferry ticket will be included in the price so you just hop straight on.
Wanting to book?
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You can book this online or at their office. If you book online, you should do so at least 1 day before as it leaves at 9:00am. Ticket should cost 220,000 kip (€10) each.
Public bus and ferry
The second option is by taking the public bus and then paying for the ferry separately. This takes 4-5 hours and should cost around 90,000 kip (€4) each for both the bus and the ferry ticket. Here’s a breakdown;
Bus to Nakasong – the public busses run quite frequently. There is no real timetable, so you just have to show up and one should depart soon. However, the busses are very poor. They are basically large tuktuks (called Songthaews) which carry locals and whatever they might be transporting. When we went someone had a rooster sitting next to them and someone else had a large bag full of live chickens.
The buses leave from 8KM Bus Terminal in Pakse and drop you around 500m from the ferry in Nakasong. The bus tickets are around 70,000 kip (€3) each. There are no set fees, but this is what we paid for our tickets. When you arrive at the bus terminal you will be bombarded with people trying to sell you a seat. Just tell them you’re going to Don Det and take your pick.
Ferry to Don Det – after being dropped 500m from the Mekong in Nakasong, you should walk to the ferry after getting off the bus. You can buy a ferry ticket on the spot for 20,000 kip (€1). You will be taken over to Don Det in a tiny boat. This final part takes around 15 minutes.
From Don Det to Pakse
Similar to the way there, you can either book the combined package or go with the local bus. The pick up/drop off locations are all the same so just follow the same route, but in reverse! We took the combined package and were so glad we did. We took the public bus from Pakse to Nakasong and this was a very long and memorable trip (not in a good way). Read more about our experience below.
Our experience
We weren’t aware the package deal only ran twice a day. When we arrived at the Green Paradise office, the 9am minivan had just left and their next option was only 2:30pm (this is now changed to 12:00noon, check here for updated times). Since we didn’t want to wait 4.5 hours for the next bus, we decided to take the adventure of going there the local way.
To Don Det
The 8KM Bus Terminal is far out of town, so you’ll first have to take a tuktuk here. This cost 100,000 kip. Arriving here was absolute chaos. Many people approached us wanting to sell their seats or street food. We hopped into one of the songthaews and waited until it was full.
There was a lot of stuff on board. One kid brought a rooster which was quite funny. When the songthaew finally took off, the first stop was the fuel station 200 meters away. Because why would you get fuel before all passengers get on?
The trip was long and very intense. We were pressed against other passengers and the seats were very uncomfortable. The tuktuk drove very fast and the road was extremely bumpy. We stopped several times, for people to jump off and others to jump on, or for the driver to buy some food.
After around 4.5 long, sweaty, uncomfortable hours we finally arrived in Nakasong. The songthaew dropped us 500 meters from the ferry. Getting a ticket was easy and cost 20,000 kip each. We waited 10 minutes until a guy came to bring us across to Don Det. The ferry was narrow and did not have much space, but it only took 15 minutes.
To Pakse
Having learnt from the intense way to Don Det. We were sure we wouldn’t do that on the way back. So we booked tickets online for the Green Paradise package. You can either do this online or at their office in Don Det. This cost us 220,000 kip (€10) for the ferry and bus. This was much much better. The minivan was way more comfortable and took only about 3 hours to bring us back from Nakasong to Pakse.
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