Ngoi Neau - lights out, all out!!

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So, on the morning of March 2nd we headed to the bus station with our tickets for the public bus to Nong Khiaw. The public bus turned out to be a large tuk tuk (sawngthaew). So, with almost 20 of us crammed into the back we set off on a dusty and cramped journey to Nong Khiaw. Four hours later we had arrived at the bus station in Nong Khiaw where we got a lift to the river for our boat ride up the river to Muang Ngoi Neau.

Ngoi Neau is 25km upstream from Nong Khiaw. It's a small village perched on the banks of the river in a beautiful valley where the river winds its way through the limestone karst landscape. On our arrival we found a place to stay and I had to go to bed. Either some bad food in Luang Prabang or the fumes from the Tuktuk had made me feel ill. Whilst I stayed in bed, Anna went for a look around and chilled out in a bar by the river - for me that day was a write-off.

I was feeling much better the next day after a good night sleep and a comfy bed with a great duvet. However, the walls and windows of our guesthouse kept out no noise and so we were awake early but managed to snooze all morning. We finally dragged ourselves from the bed and walked the 20 metres to the riverside bar where we spent the whole afternoon relaxing and reading with a beautiful view of the river to distract us from time to time. In the evening we joined Jane, Philipp and Yan (who Anna had met the evening before) for dinner at an all you can eat buffet similar to the ones in Luang Prabang. By now, it was dark and the village was lit up on it's rationed electricity. The electricity only runs from 6 pm to 10 pm. The rest of the time the village goes without it. It's quite nice for a few days to live like that, it brings it to our attention how much we take electricity for granted. We bought some candles so we could read a little getting into bed for an early night.

The next morning we awoke to the usual sound of boats and the river, roosters, dogs, people and the sounds of our neighbour - either in huge amounts of pain or enjoying himself greatly. After listening we discovered that he had hurt his back and his moans were infact caused by pain, not pleasure. After snoozing until lunchtime we headed back to the riverside bar to finish reading our books before taking a walk outside the village along a dirt track by the river and through the forest in search of an elusive Neon Tiger. It was a nice stroll with loads of brightly coloured butterflies along the path but we couldn't find any neon tigers. That evening we watched the sunset behind the mountains and headed off for another all you can eat buffet for 20.000 Kip.

In the morning we ate breakfast, bought our tickets for the boat back to Nong Khiaw. Three nights in Ngoi Neau was enough for us and we needed to head north towards the border. It was a relaxing couple of days on the banks of the Nam Ou river. In Nong Khiaw we bought our tickets to Oudomxai. At least this time we were going to be travelling on a real bus but the road that lay ahead would be hell.

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