In the dark early morning of the 23rd Mike and I checked out of our guesthouse and took a tuktuk to the pier. Along the way we saw the monks of Luang Prabang making their daily alms rounds, all the citizens of the town (and many visitors too) lining the streets with big bowls and baskets of food to offer. It was beautiful to see the long lines of saffron robes in the blue-grey early morning light. Somehow both of us forgot to take a photo.

We were headed to the pier to take a two day boat trip up the Mekong river to Houei Say. As we arrived there were a couple men at the top of the giant staircase leading down to the river. They verbally confirmed that we were in the correct place and told us to go on down, but leave our luggage for the porters to carry down. So we made our way down the steps, slightly worried that our bags would actually make it onto the boat. I couldn’t help but think, they just told me this was the right place, but I really have no proof that it is. It was though, the bags made it down, and I thought about how on one hand one needs to be particularly vigilant about their safety when travelling, one also needs to be able to relax a bit and just let things happen the way they are going to. At times it can be a difficult balance.

The boat:

On the boat we joined a group of 6 French travelers. We waited a few minutes for the boat to be loaded and the final two travelers to arrive, a German couple, and then sailed off. The sun was still rising at this point, and we chugged along through the morning mist drinking tea and eating croissants and baguettes.

The Mekong river is very difficult to navigate. There are many rock formations in the river, often reaching to just below the surface of the water, so the captain must know the river very well, where to direct the boat at any given moment. When we entered a very thick fog a short time into the trip, we had to stop on a sandbar and wait it out. Fortunately it did burn off and shortly we were off again to our first scheduled stop, the Pak Ou caves.

These caves have been used as a Buddhist altar for centuries. There are thousands of Buddha statues inside, all left by people coming to pray, so some are very new and some ancient, some disintigrating:

Our second stop was in a small village of under 200 people where they make rice whiskey (or Lao Moonshine as we came to call it.) For some reason we felt the need to purchase a bottle. Here’s Mike on his way out of the village:

We stayed on a nice hotel in a town called Pakbeng and then left for our second day on the river, once again much too early in the morning.

There was only one stop on the second day, at a weaving village. We got to see the town and witness some weaving and spinning of yarn. After purchasing some of their woven goods, Mike and I returned to the boat, arriving ahead of the other members of our trip. We spent some time interacting with the kids of the town, who had all gathered about the boat and stared at us. We soon learned that the best way to communicate with them was by making them laugh. Mike pulled out some tricks, including the one where you make it look like you are taking off the end of your thumb, which they got a kick out of and spent some time trying to figure out how to do it for themselves. Another hit was taking photos of them and then showing them the images. They found it really funny to see themselves on our cameras.

Since we only stopped in three places, it’s probably clear that the majority of the trip was on the boat. We spent our time gazing at the view, reading, napping, gazing again. It was a lovely trip that I would recommend to anyone visiting Laos. The Mekong River is fascinating.

At the northernmost part of our trip Thailand was on one side of the river and Laos on the other. Even from the river you could see the difference between the two countries, by the sorts of buildings, the density of buildings, use of the land. The two countries are similar in culture, but not the same, and then there are the glaring differences of economic status and population. The Mekong River flows through Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam, ending at the South China Sea. A trip down the whole stretch would probably be incredible.

From Ho Chi Minh City we flew to Luang Prabang on a small prop plane operated by Laos Airlines. After the incident with Vietnam Airlines, and the women on the bus to the plane loudly proclaiming that they had been warned against flying Laos Airlines and that they use bus drivers for pilots, it was a little nerve racking. But the flight was uneventful and actually just fine. The snack was quite good and the pilot seemed perfectly competent.

After going through customs there (where after choosing if you have anything to declare or not there is only one door: nothing to declare) we made it to our lovely bungalow looking over the Khan River and to the farms across it. The town (a world heritage site like Hoi An) is very walkable and full of temples. We were told that Laos is the land of Buddhists and elephants. Good, we like both.

We spent the day wandering around Luang Prabang, looking at temples, checking out vendors, and getting out of the heat. In the evening, the main drag closes to traffic and becomes the night market, which we explored a little bit. Neither of us tend to be big shoppers, but we do enjoy things like this with endless shops repeating the tchochkies of another culture.