Laos

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Don Det

16th April we travelled from Phnom Penh on a public bus to Stung Treng (7.30 AM - 4 PM - no toilets!)

We were very weary and upon arrival decided to just get out of Cambodia and into Laos accepting a minibus which was relatively extortionate to cross the border that same evening. The minibus took us to the border and the whole experience was slightly odd with a little wooden shack as the border control and having to 'tip' the immigration officers for out-of-hours service but we went ahead anyways with no alternative.

Once in the Four-Thousand Islands region we met the Mekong river bank and changed transport to a tiny river boat with a crazy outboard motor sticking out the back, we chugged up the river for a little while and ended up at the small Island of Don Det. As it was now dark we only hunted a little for accomodation before accepting one set of bamboo bungalows on the sunset side of the island as we had read that the sunset side does not get as hot as quickly in the morning! We sampled an alright Indian that evening and then relaxed in our hammocks before going to bed.

The next two days were spent leisuring around on Don Det and relaxing after such long journeys on busses and I (Jon) was feeling a little unwell. We were woken each morning by numerous Cockerals around our bamboo huts and walked around the island a little inbetween meals! When it all got a bit much in the 40 degree heat we relaxed in our hammocks and drank beer 😊

18th April we left Don Det headed for Vientiene (Laos Capital) via Pakse (Transport hub). We left Don Det at 11.30 and got a boat and then a minibus to Pakse. We killed time at Pakse bus station and boarded our sleeper coach for that nights accomodatyion and transport overnight to Vientiene! The journey was hellish - Debbie and I shared a 4ft long bed which was on the top bunk, on a bus... and the A/C was (obviously) broken and hence heating us... alas, we made it to Vientiene bus station the following morning and had picked up Vanessa our Canadian co-traveller who we met on the bus.

Vientiene

We only stayed one night in Vientiene and following our arrival at 7am we got a tuk-tuk to the central region and checked into our hotel with Vanessa. We walked about and ate (Incredible) breakfast at the Scandinavian Bakery. We walked to the morning market and browsed as well as finding out about the public bus to Vang Vieng for the following day. The rest of our time was spent walking the streets (sob story), visiting the Arc Du Triumph replica (unfinished - made from concrete donated by America for the people to build a runway!) and then drinking on the river-front. The heat was almost unbearable so we didnt get up to too much other than eating really and then went to bedfairly early in order to wake up for the next mornings adventure northwards!

Vang Vieng

The bus from Vientiene wasn't as long as we expected taking just 3-4 hours, upon arrival we searched about for a reasonably priced guest house for the 3 of us and then we walked around this weird town stopping off at a few restaurants and watching the endless episodes of Family Guy and Friends.

The main reason Vang Vieng exists is because travellers/backpackers/tourists/flashpackers or whatever you might call us decided that they wanted somewhere to stop off at between Vientiene (central Laos) and Luang Prabang (North). Based around a river the whole town has become orientated around 'Tubing'. Tubing involves renting a tractor tyre inner tube and travelling 3kms up-river of Vang Vieng, boarding said inner-tube and floating down the river pausing at the many bamboo platform bars being 'fished' in by the bar men to drink BeerLao and play on various swings and zip lines or using the volley ball courts - great fun!

We spent the 21st April 'Tubing' and despite the chilly weather had an awesome time, we were all tired from the beer so went to bed stupidly early althought Debbie and I had a midnight feast randomly... as you can imagine we would!

The 22nd April was spent walking about this weird town, eating when hungry, watching loads of films in one particular bar/restaurant and then meeting up with Vanessa's travel buddies in one bar before going to an island bar/club in the middle of nowhere which was... a little odd, not an overly active day but relaxing enough.

We descovered the local street hawker's fresh spring rolls with sweet-chilli-peanuts dipping sauce(D would like to add after reading this through that until she corrected it that read sweet-chilli-peanus dipping sauce - obviously someone has something on the brain!) and ate A LOT of these, but they were 5,000 kip for 3 and absolutely delicious so we were all very well fed and happy! That lunchtime / afternoon we spent at the local (and pretty much only) Vansana Hotel with a pool sunbathing!

24th April we had booked a tour of a few of the local limestone caves and tubing for the afternoon. We got a Tuk-Tuk to the firsr cave called the Elephant Caves after an Elephant-resembling staligmite and to see the Buddha Shrine which has been built within it. the next cave was very large and we wore head lamps so that we could see the beautiful interior and to help us navigate the sharp rocky entrance. Debbie had a slightly dodgy lamp where the switch didnt work and she had to touch the wires together - very safe in caves with dripping water!There were some beautiful crystal formations and the caves were seemingly untouched by the mass-tourist industry so far which was nice! The Final cave we had to enter on the inner tubes again and floated through in the dark which was quite scary at points and there were crabs crawling all over the place too. We explored this cave system with out head-lamps and then re-surfaced to have lunch before we started our tubing down the river back towards town. Unfortunately the weather wasn't very hot and sunny as would have been ideal so Debbie and I cut our Tubing short so that we could get back and warm up. I indulged in some of the local... 'Tea' which had some interesting affects; 5 dinners later we were back at the Smile bar and danced away before being sent to bed around 12 (the bar closed as they have curfews in Laos meaning the locals all have to be back at their place of residence by a certain time - they are slightly more lenient with tourists however!)

The next day we were blurry-eyed and spent the majority of our time watching films, eating (obviously) and booking our onwards journy North.

Luang Prabang

We said goodbye to Vanessa who was off to Bangkok and got the public bus on the 26th April, North to Luang Prabang featuring a lovely hill-top nature wee-stop for everyone! Upon arrival Debbie and I got a bargainous cyclo into town to find our guest house. The Cyclo was an old Honda motorbike with a bench side-car inwhich Debbie and I along with our ginormously oversized backpacks went. Needless to say that the ride was a little scary but fun!

Sunday 27th April we explored the main street in town and Debbie booked her weaving course for the next day. That afternoon we paired up with an Irish couple and an Isreili Couple for a 25km Tuk-tuk ride to the Kuang Si Water Fall. The waterfall was surrounded by beautiful parks and was an amazing colour, we explored most of the many waterfalls and had a swim - (despite Jon being convinced that fish were trying to eat his toes!) as well as being welcomed to a local families BBQ which was very nice. According to the (slightly inebriated) host, Sundays are very important in Laos and often are spent with friends somewhere nice (the waterfalls) enjoying the BeerLaos and having a BBQ.

Monday the 28th Debbie did her Weaving course involving feeding the Silk Worms, then Dying 3 different silks with Organic Pigments that she ground up herself (I even got to use a machete - not a wise decision!) and then weaving a placemat with some local silk threads under the watchful eye of her 'weaver'! I researched some 'eco-tourism' treks to local hill tribes for our next two days!

The 29th and 30th April we signed up to a two-day trek through the local hills (read: mountains) which started with a 1 and a half hour tuk-tuk ride to our starting point, we climbed a very large hill and got very hot and sweaty but enjoyed the amazing views. Debbie was concentrating on where her feet were going and not looking where she was going and literally walked into a tree - it hurt and she had a huge bump on her head!!!! Unfortunately we also obverved the horrific level of deforestation for rice land which was on an awful scale. The land is completely cleared with fire and then sticky-rice is grown for 2 years on the land producing about 4 crop-cycles and then the land is abandoned because it is too un-productive. The deforestation is apparently illegal but there is no inforcement of restriction because the local people need the money to survive and support their families. We walked into our first local hill tribe village after the large hill and saw why they needed the income of sticky-rice farming. I dont mean to sound ignorant or harsh but they were living in very primative conditions with a very low standard of living, there was one school on the top of one of the hills with 3 class rooms and not all the children could go, Pigs, chickens, dogs and cats were digging around for scraps of food and then we trapse in - with our cameras and expensive clothing I felt kind of awkward but I was very glad to have seen the village and their way of life, also (apparently) our trekking company provided a (relatively) large income for the village which had funded the school and was continuing to go towards supporting the village.

After this first village we walked back down towards sea level through a Semi tropical forest which happened to be the ideal climate for leeches. This part of the hike was HORRIFIC... I was wailing like a crazed old-lady, particularly when I nearly stepped on a red-headed-brown adder which was crossing the leech-infested leaf litter (mum you might have actually died had you been there!). Due to the seemingly endless turf of leeches which were accumulating on our traniers and working their way up our legs we pretty much ran for 45 minutes through the jungle peeling them off, spraying them with DEET-insect repellent and burning them with a lighter before we were back out into the open where it was too dry for them to wave around looking for our blood!

That evening we were staying in a larger village and were fed a really good meal of chicken and sticky rice. Sticky rice is the staple diet in northern Laos and anyone here comes to adore it. To prepare you soak a load of 'sticky-rice' over night in water and then steam in a wicker basket for a few minutes. The result is a very glutinous mass of rice bound together which you eat with your hands and dip in sauce or whatever the main dish is. It is very very filling but also very mooreish! Since our dinner consisted of very fresh chicken - we saw them kill the chicken! After dinner we were served the local Lao Lao which is whiskey made from distilled sticky rice (notice a running theme yet??) we played a game called 'spin the chicken head' which involved our chickens head placed in a bowl with a lid which you shook and whomever the chickens beak pointed at would oblige to a measure of the Lao Lao - a drinking game for sadists perhaps but very entertaining and there isnt a great deal else for the locals to do really!

The same night as we were guests in this local hill tribe village happened to be the occasion of the blessing ceremony of a newly built house. Many people from surrounding villages had come to party and they had a generator, music decks and some very large loudspeakers brought in. Also featuring at this party were some offerings to the souls of the passed members of the village and a cow strung up to the main tree in the village square- you will find out.

After dinner we went to this newly built (and lavishly cement-rendered compared to everyone elses bamboo) house and were invited in by the chiefs and older members of the village to play their own drinking game/ceremony/ritual. Every participant must drink 3 cups full of locally brewed sticky-rice spirit through a huge bamboo straw continuously. This was painful but very fun and the locals enjoyed having their photos taken and seeing their faces on our digital cameras. After several rounds of our drinking obligation we joined in with the dancing outside and copied their preferred dance move - swirling your wrists and hands whilst walking in circles - great fun!

The following morning we were awoken by the local hierarchy of Cockerals establishing their position in the community (Bloody annoying for hangovers) and learnt of the fate of the cow that I mentioned earlier. At 4am the cow was slaughtered and at that time (7.am.) all that remained were the bones which were being scraped for the last risiduals of meat. Fair enough, I believe that the meat probably got shared around that day or that they had a large beef-themed feast pretty soon after we left since there was little means of refrigeration...

That days walking was less strenuous that the previous days and we saw another beautiful waterfall in a rocky valley below one of the mud-roads. Due to one of our party throwing a hissy-fit the day before about the leeches (no it wasnt me) the guides were somewhat cautious with our route and unfortunately we walked mainly along the local mud-roads until we reached our van and headed to a spot for (sticky-rice) lunch. The whole trek was brilliant and whilst the leech/snake experience was horrificic we loved the experience and laughed a lot - mainly at the people who weren't wearing proper trainers! haha!

Thursday 1st May

We woke up (relatively) early (5:30am) and were aiming at watching the Giving Alms ceremony along the main street of Luang Prabang. Obviously we missed it so ate breakfast around 6am and then made way to the slow-boat jetty. Our destination was Thailand and we had opted for the 2-day (very) slow-boat along the worryingly shallow and white-water-esque river North east towards the border crossing. The days were spent lying on cushions and reading or listening to our iPod's or generally annoying one another and on the overnight stop-off we realised that we didnt have nay money left to pay for the next days boat trip nor dinner (shock horror) luckily enough we found some hidden U.S. dollars in my backpack and everything worked out swimmingly.

And so that was Laos, we officialy crossed the Mekong river into Thailand on the 3rd May following yet another slightly dodgy border crossing experience!

A few random facts about Laos:

The for for 'Yours' and 'Mine' is the same in Laos
Officially Laos is the Lao People's Democratic Republic (Lao PDR)
Gained Independence from French Colonial Rule the 19th July 1949
The Government of Laos is one of a few remaining Communist states and began de-centralising control following 1986
BeerLao originated from a joint-venture French-Lao business venture which was started up in 1971 hence why it is pretty nice!
Beerlao is the name of a range of beers produced by the Lao Brewery Company, Vientiene, Laos
Beerlao is made from locally sourced Jasmine rice and Hops and Yeast imported from Germany

The End x

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