On to Laos . . . Eventually

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As I made my north through Thailand, I pondered the numerous travelers that had raved about Laos, and decided to change my itinary and push on to Laos.

However, as Laos is not reknowed for its transportation infrastructure, leaving Chiang Mai by minivan was merely the beginning of a long trek to get to Luang Prabang in Laos. In Chiang Mai, I was picked up by a minivan, with the events immediately following leaving me with a certain sense of foreboding about the upcoming ride. Right after being picked up, the young women sitting next to me worked herself into quite an elaborate tantrum when the driver asked her to close the window in a way that wasn't polite enough for her tastes, however, the driver wasn't rude, he just spoke broken English. As I sat next to the fuming princess being consoled by her boyfriend, another passenger piped up that she had forgot a mobile phone at her hostel. We eventually stopped to sort things out, and my luck changed, my neighbor - the princess, and her keeper - decided to bid an early adieu, leaving in a huff over the perceived offense. The result was an empty seat next to me. As we struck out, a women cracked a quip that got the entire group to laugh, and we all began chatting amicably along an unexciting ride that brought us to a nondescript border town on the Mekong for the night.

The next morning I, along with 99 others, boarded a boat for a 7 hour journey up the Mekong - this being merely the first of two days on at boat. Though it sounds romantic, and I must admit that the views were spectacular, after about 2 hours on the narrow uncomfortable seat it became clear it would be a long couple of days. The ride was tedious, but I enjoyed the scenery, the whole time while pondering another day on the boat. Eventually we were disgorged at a miniscule town for the night, but ironically, for some reason the employees never told us anything after picking us up the first day. So after the first ride we spent a night in a small village, with no instructions as to when to go down in the morning for the second ride, or how long the next day's ride would be. These two subjects became a hot topic of conversation that night (yeah, there's not much to do in Pakbeng) and we narrowed pick up time down to between 7:30 am and 9:30 am and somewhere between 6 and 9 hours for the ride.

I was pleasantly suprised the next day when the boat turned out to be much more comfortable, and found myself surrounded by a cheerful talkitive bunch. About 30 minutes out, I heard a ripple of laughter, and looked back to see a lighthearted British guy creating a pool for how long the ride would take. So, we all tossed in 1,000 kip (10 cents) and guessed a time. The rest of the ride was uneventful and much more comfortable than the previous day. We successfully made it (in 8 hours 9 minutes, with a young Swedish woman winning) to Luang Prabang in the evening.

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