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Published: August 1st 2010
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Luang Prabang is just beautiful. Possibly the nicest town in Asia we have visited to date. A proper mix of European (mainly French) influence with the spice of Asia. The town is located on a peninsula - formed by the Mekong and Nam Khan rivers. Great daily night market, lots of temples, excellent restaurants and baguette stalls EVERYWHERE...never eaten so many baguettes in our lives (accompanied by the compulsary Laughing Cow cheese, you have to specifically request for it NOT to be layered on!?). We also ate at a couple of hawker stalls on the infamous, Laos, (tiny) plastic chairs - all you can eat for about 80p. Some of the stuff on the plate was highly suspicious but this is where we were introduced to lovely fried tofu and bamboo - lush! The staple drink throughout the country (and for our time in Laos!) remained the 640ml bottles of Beerlao for about 70p. Heaven.
We did a boat trip along the Mekong to the Pak Ou Caves - known as the 'Buddha Caves'...never seen so many Buddhas in our lives. As interesting as two small 'caves' packed full of Buddha ornaments can be......
We spent a v v
hot afternoon (was about 41c, drank 7.5 litres of water between us with limited use of the monks facilities...totally dehydrated!) at an amazing temple - Wat Xieng Thong, right on the edge of the Mekong. Watched the monks in their orange robes perform their daily musical/chanting ritual. For young lads they bang those drums hellish loud!
Each morning the monks walk the main street of Luang Prabang and accept food gifts from the locals and tourists (as a rule monks are not allowed to buy or request food). You must kneel down with your bowl of sticky rice (without looking up at the monks) and offer your carbs to the orange clad monks. No photos/no chat/banter etc. We really wanted to do this however the ceremony started at 5am.................
Highlight of the trip to LP had to be our two day adventure in the Laos jungle with the elephants. We signed up for a course to become 'mahoots' - elephant handlers! The minibus collected us from the hotel at 8am and off we went to the Elephant Village Sanctuary. The village houses elephants who have been rescued from the cruel (now illegal) logging/timber industry. However they still have to
earn their keep as keeping an elephant is not a cheap business when they can put away 150kg of food a day.
So Elephant Village houses 8 female elephants who are kept fit and mobile via tourists paying for the privilege to sit on their heads for two days.
Initially it was pretty scary being given a 'leg-up' 2-3m on top of an adult elephant's head - even scarier when the elephant actually began to walk! However we soon got the hang of it...eventually. We spent some time feeding them after our initial 'jaunt' - they nearly take your bloody hand off! They love pineapple leaves as well the fruit itself which they eat whole - skin/spikes and all! We stayed overnight in a v.v nice jungle lodge by the river where we ate some great food (including river seaweed - tasty!) and enjoyed great company with the two fab Rebeccas! (Oz and USA!)
Early night however as a) we were shattered and b) we had to get up at 6am to collect our elephants from their jungle homes and take them for their morning bath! The mahoots were with us the whole time thankfully as some of the elephants
were hungry and kept wandering off looking for bamboo. (the mahoots can stay/work with the same elephant for years and years - thus a great bond between handler and elephant). Our journey from the elephant's 'home' to the river was delayed slightly when Darren's elephant 'Mae San' decided to stop to take a HUGE crap in the middle of the path!! However I was not laughing for that long as once we got in the river with the elephants they ALL decided to take their morning dumps at once! We'll not forget bobbing about the Nam Khan river at 7am, surrounded by these beautfiful elephants....and their not so beautiful sh*t! Vintage! My elephant Mae Uak was 30 yrs and a character. Apparently her party piece is to totally submerge herself in the river during bath time. 'Hilarious' when you are sitting on her head, surrounded by floating, elephant turds...
It was such an experience scrubbing the elephants - they totally love being cleaned and pampered - typical women!
Probably for the best we were not aware at the outset, but a few of the elephants were actually blind! Darren's elephant had totally lost her sight through logging - accidents with
tree branches. However this didn't hinder her at all, using her trunk for touch and smell combined with her mahoot to guide the way. Amazing.
The return leg of the trip back to Luang Prabang from the Elephant Village was a 4 (yes FOUR!) hour kayak trip. Not really what we signed up for, but not alot you can do stuck in a kayak on the Nam Khan River in 40c heat and your guide tells you there is still 3h to go.........needless to say our tans came along nicely that day.
Luang Prabang was excellent and a perfect end to our time in Lovely Laos - we will definitely be back! Next stop Hanoi, Vietnam!
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Ainsley
non-member comment
Cleife on an elephant, class!
Guys, Looks and sounds amazing - perhaps not the elephant shit in the water part. Lodges look fab, certainly does look awesome, must have been nice after some of the horrendous places you have stayed!! Gina will drop you an email, missing you lots!! But great for another amusing and informative blog update!! Keep smiling xxxx