Alarm at 4.15am and pick up at 5.00am. Heathrow 45 minutes later courtesy light traffic,  a minicab driven who took no prisoners even at that ungodly hour of the morning and ignored at least three red lights. Oh well it got us to Terminal 3 early enough to be assigned the emergency seats on the first leg to Dubai.

Fast forward twenty four hours and we landed in Luang Prabang International Airport along with a party of identically dressed (in orange t shirts and white tousers) representatives of a Thai cosmetics company – identical that is except for the ‘Gangnam Styled’ video camera wielding party leader and the sulky, sultry Gok Wan lookalike who clearly wanted to be elswehere.

The Loa authorities could not have been more helpful in organising visas and Louise’s EasyJet sponsored bright orange luggage had arrived safely. We had arrived.