Blogs from Luang Prabang, West, Laos, Asia - page 13

From the hustle and bustle of Hanoi, we made our way to the laid-back setting of Luang Prabang. Here, as has come to be routine, we explored a bit of the countryside by motorbike, stopped off at various stalls to try out some local specialties (mostly an amusing venture of Russian roulette, where we often don't know what we are signing ourselves up for: hits - Lap, misses - unknowingly ordering a tall order of pork skin), and meandering around wats. Luang Prabang is also where we signed up for our most tourist-oriented activity - visiting an elephant reserve to be mahouts for a day .... which, to fellow M's dismay, mainly meant WE PAID an organization to wash THEIR elephants :-) While it was pretty good fun for me, the lady pachyderms didn't seem to ... read more

Luang Prabang is quite nice to visit, the night markets are very much all the same gear which was a bit disapointing. It'easy to get around & the footpaths are all done in paving bricks so you don't have to keep looking down as they are in good condition. We missed out on a sunset river cruise as by the time we noticed the advertisment for it , it was our last night & we 'd missed the 5.30pm sailing. That was the only thing we would have liked to do as the temple has 368 steps before you get to see the view over the city & we did'nt think we'd make it up them.Also our hotel was so lovely we sent a lot of time there enjoying the amenities especially the pool. All in ... read more

After waiting almost 2 hours to cross the border at Friendship Bridge, we made it by taxi into Vientiane.Glad we got a taxi, cost 200 baht, as it was teeming down.The Vientiane Garden Hotel was much more modern than we had thought as all the ground floor rooms have just been refurbished & they are starting on the top floor. At the front of the hotel is Si homme guesthouse which was full of backpackers who were on their way to Vang Vieng. We found a nice restaurant overlooking the Mekong called Mekong Balcony, you have to walk through through Mr Minimart to get to it but its very nice inside. Unfortunately it rained most of the time in Vientiane & as there's not a lot to see there it was the best place for us ... read more

"On Aug 4th, we flew to Luang Prabang, Laos. In the hotel, we did not stay too long because we went to two temples. One of them had a museum where the king and queen sit down, sleep, meeting rooms, and all that kind of stuff. In that temple it also had a room with very old cars. The next temple had this really cool room with a Buddha and a statue of an old monk. Finally we went back to the hotel and took a shower. After that we went to the night market and of course it was at night, duh. At the night market, my dad bought me a bracelet and a shake that had dragon fruit in it. It was good. Then I started to get hungry. My dad and I already ... read more

We had read a lot about the slow boat trip from Huay Xai to Luang Prabang and heard some great and bad stories so I knew our trip wouldnt be uneventful but I didn't expect it to merit it's own blog. Yet here we go... Prior to the slow boat journey we crossed over into Laos by a large open canoe type boat from Chiang Khong, an hours songthaew and hitch hike from CS. Obtaining 30 day visas the other side then quickly visiting an atm for our Lao kip we then headed to the slow boat port just in time to meet everyone else piling in. I estimate about 100 on board, some on wooden bench seats, some on car seats, some on the floor. Day one on the boat would be around 6 hours ... read more