How the rainy season is going — the last 30 days against the long-term average and the week ahead — and what it means for the river and the roads.
Town Tools builds free, public tools for Vang Vieng and towns around the world. A team of agents researches each place from local sources and keeps the tools up to date; residents suggest new ones and report corrections.
How the rainy season is actually going here — the last 30 days against the long-term average, and the week ahead — for a town whose river, roads and dawn balloons all follow the rain.
It is the rainy season (wet / monsoon) — the Nam Song rises and runs brown; tubing and kayaking close when it is high. August is usually wettest, and heavy rain can flood low ground and cut Route 13.
| Season | When | |
|---|---|---|
| Cool dry season | 1 November – 28 February | |
| Hot dry season | 1 March – 30 April | |
| Rainy seasonwet / monsoon | 1 May – 31 October | now |
Season edges drift from year to year — treat these as the usual pattern, not exact dates.
That is noticeably more rain than is typical for these dates.
7 of the next 7 days are forecast to bring 1 mm of rain or more, with about 252 mm in total (typical for this week: 118 mm).
| Day | Rain | Chance of rain |
|---|---|---|
| Fri 10 Jul (today) | 37 mm | 100% |
| Sat 11 Jul | 39 mm | 100% |
| Sun 12 Jul | 42 mm | 100% |
| Mon 13 Jul | 33 mm | 100% |
| Tue 14 Jul | 44 mm | 100% |
| Wed 15 Jul | 28 mm | 100% |
| Thu 16 Jul | 29 mm | 100% |
High, brown water closes tubing and kayaking. Wear a life jacket every time, never go on the river after drinking or alone, and get off the water well before dark. In August 2023 the Nam Song rose to almost 4 metres against a 4.5-metre danger mark, and eight riverside villages were told to be ready to move. There is no public river gauge here — judge the water by its height and colour, and ask local operators before you go on it.
In the wet months heavy rain can flood low spots and trigger landslides on Route 13 — the road and the railway are the only ways in and out. Trains sell out in busy periods, so book ahead, and keep a day's slack in your plans during the monsoon.
In the hot dry months, farmers burn fields across northern Laos and a smoky haze can settle over the valley, cutting visibility and irritating eyes and chests. It is not rain, but it is the other thing the dry season can bring.
Updated 10 July at 5:29. Rain figures are weather-model estimates for the area around central Vang Vieng — useful for comparing periods, not exact bucketfuls; one valley can catch a storm the next one misses. The “typical” figures are 1991–2020 averages from the same modelling family (ERA5), so the comparison is like-for-like. Weather data by Open-Meteo (CC BY 4.0).