Here is the story of my visit to Laos from July 13th-18th. It was just 1 week, but I saw many things and had a great time. Some of the highlights would be: the crazy fastboat to Luang Prabang, the nearby waterfalls, the village opium smokers, the beautiful mountain views, taking a bus without power steering on the mountain roads, walking through the rice paddies, caving, and the love letter.
The morning of Friday July 13th I awoke in the sleepy Thai border town of Chiang Khong and high tailed it across the river to enter into Laos. This is located in the north of Laos and I was headed for Luangprabang in the middle of Laos. Unfortunately, there are no official roads connecting the north and travel is limited to planes and boats on the Mekong River. This turned into a real thrill ride. Rather than spend 2 days floating down the river in one of the slow boats, I opted to take the fast boat which covers the distance in 7 hours. When I arrived at the boats I saw that they are about the size of a row boat with enough room to carry 6 people. Note that I've included 2 pictures of these speed boats with this email. And these boats are made for serious speed. The back of the boat supports a fully exposed car engine with a propeller shaft coming right out of it into the water. You get in and dawn you crash HELMET and life vest with your knees close to your chest (The sides of the boat are only about 8 inches high!). So then we take off and I found out just how seriously fast these boats go. Have you ever watched those hydroplane boat races with the boats with jet engines? Okay, just imagine this row boat sized thing screaming across the water making the sound of an indy car! So off we go at about 70mph across the water fishtailing alittle and spraying a jet of water behing us. Actually, the ride was really exhilerating and smooth. It felt like you had a cushion of air beneith you and were just gliding across the water. The Mekong River for most of the way was a very wide boiling pot of water. This made for a pretty great ride because the water is mostly flat and calm on top, but the circular ripples (like the surface of a simmering pot of water) come up all around from the turbulant water below and betray the seemingly calm surface. Sometimes huge trees floated by which we dodged and giant whirlpools created surprisingly low depressions in the water that occasionally caused the boat to slam onto the water and skip across like a skipping stone. Throw in some occasional rain pelting us later in the day.
All of this was contrasted by the verdant mountains all around with dense untouched jungle beginning where the water ended. Usually there were no other boats in sight, but from time to time we would pass small hut villages, village fisherman in longtail boats, and see groups of naked kids swimming near their village. I felt the remoteness of this place the whole time I sped past in my rocket boat. But really, nothing is that remote anymore; Cotton button down western style shirts, flipflops, and nike shoes can be found at the furthest reaches of this globe. After a short stop in the village of Pakbang, we went on to the final destination of Luangprabang.
There is one more thing I'd like to mention about the Mekong river. The Naga fish is a bizzare eel like fish worshiped as a god in Lao and even Thailand. During the war the US Army managed to catch a monster sized Naga fish (over 20 feet long) that would almost make one believe there is a Loch Ness Monster. I've included a picture of this fish being held up by about 20 of the Army guys that caught it. You see this posted in many places in Laos, but I've never seen it anywhere else. Supposedly, they took the fish back to the US and is held in some museum.
Luang Prabang is a small city that is quite well preserved with a mixture of French colonial architecture, ancient Buddhist temple complexes called "Wats", a few cozy guesthouses, and a local and hilltribe market. All of this is situated on a spit of land at the confluence of another river with the Mekong. I happened to find a room at a really cozy guesthouse run by a 23 year old Irish fellow by the name of Kingsmul and his lao girlfriend/fiance Suan. So I stayed up and had a nice chat with them and the next day visited Suan's brother's sight of a new guesthouse out in the jungle. We visited the sight using Suan's Brother's jeep. In fact, this jeep was a US Army patrol jeep from the war. You don't see too many of these relics driving around, but they do exist. At night I would relax outside the front of the guesthouse where they have a outdoor cafe setup and watch movies, eat, drink, and converse with Kingsmul, Suan, and whoever else was about. Oh yeah, Laos is known for their local beverage called Laolao. It is a wiskey I believe that is quite common. Kingsmul gave me and many others our first taste of this alcohol. Had I been with it, I would have bought up some of the local handicrafts in Luang Prabang before I left. I didn't see such a nice selection after I left this town. The silk woven skirts and baskets are quite unique.
On the second day I went out to visit the waterfalls with 4 british travellers. We had Suan's Brother take us out in the Jeep. He arrived with two rattan chairs sitting in the back for us to use. So we set out down the road with two of us riding high in these chairs, two others along side, and the two in front. Now you must imagine the 5 of us sitting such that from the front you see these white western faces arranged such that the 2 in the chairs are above the 2 in front and the 2 in on the sides are sticking out. Everyone we passed stopped, smiled, and usually giggled. I thought we looked like some stupid boy band being paraded around town. Either way it was a riot just watching the locals reactions. Half way there we picked up a family that was friends with the driver so then we had 3 more in front and two sitting on the hood of this jeep. It was quite a scene. Yes, I did get a picture of this but will scan it later.
The waterfalls were impressive. There were about 4 levels to the falls. At each level there were shallow pools jutting out about 10-15 feet before dropping off to the next level of pools. We climbed up to all the levels and eventually took a swim in the nicest set of pools. Afterwards, the driver took us to a small village where we watched the kids playing a peculiar game similar to volleyball but played with a rattan ball and the players use only their feet to kick the ball over the net. This sport is actually quite popular throughout Southeast Asia and some think it may become an olympic sport before long. We wandered around the village and stumbled upon one hut where some men were smoking opium. They offered some to us, but we just took a couple pictures and left. There are quite a few travellers that do smoke the opium, but besides the personal issues of smoking it, it does little to help these countries sizable problems associated with Opium use and trade. Opium is still used by locals for traditional and medical purposes which makes it very difficult for the government to do anything to control the growth and use of it.
The next morning I travelled south on to Vang Vienne. This is a small town set along the Mekong with beautiful limestone formations jutting out of the flat rice paddies surrounding them. In the morning I set out by bus which was supposed to take about 6-7 hours. Along the way there are some magnificant mountain views. I'd even say that these mountain areas are more beautiful than any I saw elsewhere in Southeast Asia. Unfortunately, the bus broke down midway there. There were mostly locals on the bus, but a few travellers. I was seated next to a smelly drunk which didn't make things much more fun. So for an hour we sat outside the bus in the mountains trying to figure out what the driver and his pals were working on. Soon it became clear that our power steering had gone out! This is not something you want to be without on a curvy mountain road. It was even more alarming that they were forced to use palm leaves to fix the problem! We all hesitantly got on the bus after they tested things out for a bit and went on our way. The bus did break down 2 more times along the way with similar repairs, but we eventually made it to our destination late at night.
The city of Vang Vienne I didn't find very interesting. A dingy outdoor market by the water, a few guesthouses, internet shops, an old abandoned runway built by the US during the war, and restuarants mostly in cement block houses. Nothing very interesting. But the view along the river was very beautiful. The rock formations were a quite stunning backdrop against the Mekong river.
The next day I went with a group to see some caves and float in a tire down a tributary of the Mekong. Our guide took us for a long walk through a hilltribe village and across a maze of rice paddies before we arrived at the caves located at the base of one of these magnificent rock formations. The first cave we visited had several huge cathedral sized caverns. We all walked carefully and tried not to slip as we clambered through. Most of us did slip at some point in one of the caves though. The second cave was a very deep cave that we spent about 40 minutes walking through often up to our waists in water. At the end there was a small small passage that went about 10 meters with water up to your head. Sometimes there are places you have to swim across because the water is so high. So half the group chickened out and the rest of us jumped in and waded through. At the end it opened to a big chamber where we all stood shivering. Afterwards we headed back and had lunch before hitting the river. After lunch it rained quite hard and most of us were tired and realized we would only have about 1 hour in the water so we decided to skip floating down the river.
That night I ate and came back to the guesthouse. There was a Loa/Chinese girl staying at the hotel and she was watching Television when I came back, so I sat and said hello. She said she was going to meet some friends for a drink at the disco down the street and asked if I wanted to come. So I joined her and we went to the disco, but it was quite dead. I had a drink and chatted with her for a bit before we headed back to the guesthouse. I talked with her for a few minutes more and then said goodnight and went on to sleep. The next day I woke, ate, and went back to gather my bags to leave. As I was walking away the girl I spoke with the night before comes running to say goodbye and hands me a note. So I took the note and said goodbye. The note was both sad and funny to me. It was funny because it was addressed to "Lovey Guy" since she obviously could not remember my name, but sad because it said she wanted to be my girlfriend and was sad that I was leaving and hoped I would find somebody better. The annavoidable thing is that a western guy sometimes cannot have a conversation with a girl without causing something like this to happen. Of course some of you may wonder what I said or did to make her feel this way, but honestly it was only 1 hour of innocent conversation.
After 1 day in Vang Vienne I took a bus to the capital Vientienne which lies on the border of Lao and Thailand along the Mekong River. Vientienne is a sprawling city with little of interest as far as I could find. The dusty roads are lined with cement block shops and the riverside is no more interesting than the rest of the city. There did seem to be a spattering of decent places to eat though. So I spent 1 day and 2 nights wandering around. I bought an old opium pipe carved out of bone before I left on the second day, July 18th, to cross the border and take a train back to Bangkok.
That's it for now. Hope everyone is doing well.
-Chris