Luang Prabang

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The minbus dropped us off at their station on the edge of Luang Prabang and from there we took a tuk tuk to a guesthouse on the eastern side of town. I decided to take the room for $10 a night, put my bag down and took a walk to the old town about 500 metres away. At first I was quite overwhelmed by the amount of tourists in town but I guess it is high season and that Luang Prabang is world renowned. The french influenced architecture is quite nice and even the new buildings are built in this style. The other thing I liked was the lack of dust compared to Vang Vieng. The old town is full of temples and monasteries so there are plenty of monks walking the streets. The downside was that it was a fair bit more expensive than Vang Vieng with hiring a motorbike for a day being $18.

The following day I walked to the top of the hill in town to take a few photos, paid my entrance fee only to find that the view that I wanted was obscured by trees. Bummer. After that I visited a couple of temples and monasteries and just took it easy. Next day I had booked return transport to Kuang Si Waterfalls which was about 36 kms from town. These falls were very pretty with plenty of photogenic tiers as well as a large drop. I walked around for an hour taking photos and enjoying the view before deciding to go in for a swim. The water was a little cold but I managed to have a few goes swinging on the rope into the water. There was a small bear enclosure in the park with about 6 of them lazing around. On the way back we stopped at a small village where I took a couple of photos and bought a couple of hand woven wrist bands. My last day in town I decided that I would cross the bamboo bridge and check out what was on the other side of Nam Khan river. I didn't really find much of interest so I decided to take a ferry across the Mekong and check the village there. I had a walk around the village for about 20 minutes before catching a small local boat back across the river. That night I said farewell to Lisa who I had been spending a lot of my spare time with in the last 2 weeks. Time to head north.

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