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Published: February 1st 2015
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So finally we arrived in Luang Prabang after a great journey - the scenery was pretty spectacular with green, dense mountainous forest. Unfortunately the Mekong is one of the most polluted rivers in the world and is the colour of a caramel milkshake.....
Luang Prabang is small town with a mixture of ancient French colonial charm, great food and tourists looking for adventure (mainly elephant trekking). The royal palace (though the sign was written as loyal palace - no joke) was the main residence of King Sisavang Vong, but the brief Kingdom of Laos was dissolved in 1975 and replaced by a communist regime that pretty much continues today. In fact we even saw Kim Jong Un and his minions in a blacked out car leaving Luang Prabang as we arrived! We saw the 83cm gold alloy Pha Bang Buddha, after which the city is named, in a small temple within the grounds of the Palace.
The weather has been amazing and we kayaked down the Nam Kan river with our guide Mr Lan, who happens to be a national pétanque player and Mr I who apparently dribbles as fast as Ronaldo. Mr Lan's skills as a guide however
were called into question, as he failed to direct us away from some very shallow water, and allowed us to run our kayak aground whilst he was busy on his phone 200 metres downstream. Mike and I also argued for the first hour as I wasn't paddling correctly - I beg to differ and when I was rowing without him the boat wasn't rocking and we didn't zig zag down the river ( but he'll tell you something else I'm sure or he may blame Mr LAN's instructions - left then light).
We went to an Alms ceremony at dawn during which monks form a line down the Main Street to receive donations (ie food) from the town. We had already seen this in Myanmar and were the only tourists there to see the very spiritual and important daily ritual of the monk - there are things you can't/shouldn't do i.e. talk / approach the monks, cross in between them, and only donate if it means something personal to you! Unfortunately our wonderful Chinese friends are bussed in for the occasion and don't observe any of these rules. I have taken a photo of a chap having a selfie
with one of the monks.... Sums it up really. It's become a very popular attraction and we estimated there must be nearly 500 hundred plus people giving food to a much smaller amount of monks who end up taking it, then chucking it out of their bowls as they have no room left to accept more food. I guess by going we added to this circus but we felt very uncomfortable being there and I wouldn't want to do it again.
From Luang Prabang we took the VIP bus which was "interesting" and I'm sure those of you who have travelled to S E Asia before have sympathy. We were told and shown piccies of a nice new 50 seater bus, told they had toilets, water and snacks and lunch. We rocked up and found an old rickety bus, no toilet, no seat belts, cracked bumper, no suspension, and overbooked by about 20 people. They were told to wait 6 hours til the next bus or sit on the steps of our bus..... The journey was 168 km and it took 7 hours which works out to 15 miles an hour - due to the mountain range we passed,
poor road and the fact the bus was in first gear almost the entire way. We felt really encouraged when they stopped twice and hosed the brakes and wheels due to overheating.
We then arrived in Vang Vieng which is a pretty grotty 2 street town which until 2012 was a backpackers haven, whereby tourists tubed down the river in rubber tractor tyres drinking, taking drugs whilst visiting copious bars down the river. I remember being told that alcohol and swimming don't mix and as at least 27 tourists died doing just this in 2011 the Laotian government clamped down and shut the tubing and river down. It appears to have re-opened but there are only a handful of bars and you can see remnants of the old party scene - empty bars, rotten zip line platforms etc. As the river was so low we fancied trying it out (but we paid a guide to kayak near us) and gosh it was amazing! We spent 4 hours slowly drifting down the river in lying in the sun, watching the mountain range pass by - definitely a highlight. We stopped at one bar - met with the type of people
that would have loved tubing in 2011.... Maybe if we were 15 years younger we would've liked it too!
Just FYI - Papaya salad is probably one of the best (and occasionally hottest) dishes ever......
Then instead of using a VIP bus we minibused it (hoping it would be safer) to the capital Vientiane. It was safer in so much as it was a modern vehicle and we had seat belts, but the driving was appalling and we felt glad to arrive and be on solid ground. The young girl sat next to Mike, who had vomited eight times during the journey, was also relieved her ordeal was over.
We visited the COPE centre, which is a non for profit organisation that supports the victims of unexploded bombs dropped by the U.S. during 1964 -1973. Did you know that more bombs were dropped on Laos then in Japan / Germany during WWII? I didn't even know there was a war here! Well there wasn't really but the U.S wanted to stop the North Vietnamese using the Ho Chi Min Trail to bring in weapons to support the war and there was a Laos resistance army in the
north of the country fighting against the monarchy and its relationship with the U.S. Anyway - I'm not getting into the politics but a staggering 70 millions of these bombies (cluster bombs I think) FAILED to explode and hence people are still dying / losing limbs as a result - most of them children who are just playing! This organisation help to educate children in these villages not to touch the bombies and report them so they can be detonated, and they also provide rehabilitation for amputees and provide prosthetic limbs. There was a display of prosthetic limbs that had been handmade by the locals prior to being given support - it was humbling to see how they had coped and adapted using everyday objects to help them get around. It's mind blowing that these people must live in daily fear that whilst planting vegetables, tilling the land, building houses, playing in the fields, they could explode a 40 year old bomb.
I was really excited about coming to Laos as the people are renowned for being friendly, but I have to say We've both been really disappointed. I think passing through so quickly we haven't met the real
Laotians and just ones who like to get as much money out of tourists as possible. It continues to be a developing country and I can't see things changing any time soon - I have seen few children engaging in education even in the main cities, there is a really poor infrastructure, little health care and no social care. Public safety, especially tourist safety in everything we have done here trekking, kayaking, caving, taking any form of transport (boat, coach, van, tuk-tuk) is non existent.....
Anyway we are off to Cambodia for a week so will let you all know how we are doing then.
Ps - if any of you are jealous of the weather we are currently having - the rain in Borneo hasnt stopped since December so all the tan will be washed off when we return!
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Alan Barbarian
non-member comment
Cool!
Glad you are both enjoying things..... and surviving! :) Awesome blogs! x