Waterfalls

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We met Jane & Adrian for breakfast at the lovely Luang Prabang bakery (good chocolate danishes but not as good as Vientiane's!). Then headed up Fousi mountain to see what we could see. It cost us 10,000 kip ($1) each which seemed steep but there were loads of things up there. Namely, a couple of wats, a buddha cave, buddha's foot print, many buddha statues including cross-eyed & fat-bellied. Unfortunately, there were also 2 stump-tailed macaques tied to some tree branches, for some unknown purpose. On our return to the main thoroughfare we decide to arrange a trip to the nearby waterfalls. This involved very amusing haggling between Luke, Ade & a minivan driver that ended up with us paying a "Special shhhhh secret price" where we couldn't tell anyone else on the trip how much we had got it for. Luke & I then headed to Nazim's for more curried produce & attempted to find good secondhand books in L'Etranger. Then it was back to Mr Secret Price for the ride, which was particularly neck-jolting & very fast (although not on a Cambodian border scale). Luckily the waterfall was beautiful & well worth the 30km of dismal road! The water was a fabulous turquoise blue. We climbed up to the top & over the mouth of the fall. They had precarious wet steps going up & a narrow, tricky path to follow but, of course, as we were slowly winding our way up several small local kids overtook us at a speedy pace as if it were a normal pavement. It was then we realised that this was not a pleasant trail for tourists but a thoroughfare for distant villages to reach the other side of the hills. They must be so fit!
We also noticed the limestone build up on the trunks & leaves; quite spectacular. Further down were a series of fab swimming areas & picnic tables but it was far too cold to utilise them. They also had 4 asiatic bears & an Indonesian tiger named Phet seemingly for more conservational aims than the poor monkeys.
The journey home involved the obligatory Hmong village, which again was suffering from a pants shortage. There were also a poor string of little girls trying to sell bracelets. They started at 1 for 5000kip & as our group walked away went to 2 for.., 3 for.., 4 for.... Others just went for the more conventional approach with direct demands for cash & pens.
Evening was spent at our fav massive-menued restaurant, Nammer Yampha (?), with Jane & Ade before another trip to the night market - at which I bought my fab tat cat & a great embroidered sunglasses case both a dollar each, oh yes.

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