Laos and Luang Nam Tha trek

Well much has happened since our last post!  I am happy to report that I got in on the Songkran fun!  I met a Malaysian couple throwing water at the front of our hotel and they invited me to join them.  We were joined by two local kids afterwards and so I can say that throwing buckets of water at people is waaaaaay more fun than the reverse.  The next day, as planned we did head off to Laos.  We took a local bus (that was packed tight!) to Chiang Khong, and let me also mention that being on a local bus does not render you immune to the festivities of Songkran!  There were people throwing buckets of water into the windows as the bus drove by, and given that some of the windows didn't close properly, we got wet despite being on a bus!  There was this really cute little girl on the bus though, (she was the driver's daughter) and when he would wave people to not throw water she would too, except she had a water gun in her other hand!  When we got to Chiang Khong, we took a tuk-tuk down the looooong main street to the border where there was (another) crazy party and arrived at the border soaking wet.  Well, that was when we finally found it.  It was the wierdest, sketchiest border I have ever been to, and we wandered around for a while because it was unclear as to where it actually was!  But we finally found an official looking guy to stamp us out of the country, and walked to the beach (that's right, the beach), where we hopped on an old longtail boat across the river to Laos!  We got our Visas arranged no problem (although it's the most expensive for Canadians!) and then sat down for a bite to eat before venturing into town to find a place to stay.  We had a lovely supper on the Mekong River and watched the sun set.  It is very quiet in Laos compared with Thailand!  So far we are quite surprised by the difference!

We were trying to decide whether to take the two day boat trip along the Mekong to Luang Prabang or take a bus to Luang Nam Tha...the latter won over because we decided we wanted to do a trek.  The owner of our hotel arranged a minibus for us with a group of other travelers, which was convienent because the bus station was 8km out of town and the minibus was only 2 dollars more than the local bus, plus it made the journey pretty painless.  We found a great place to stay almost immediately, got some lunch, and then quickly realized that because of the holiday (and maybe because it's Laos?) that everything was closed and spent the rest of the day reading and relaxing.

The next day we took a motorbike 60 km north to a town called Mua Sing that was amazingly, quieter than Luang Nam Tha!  The drive was beautiful, through the mountains.  There are so many tiny villages along the way with people living in simple homes made from bamboo.  There are monks riding bicycles, families on motorbikes, kids running down the street and waving hello, just all the really great simple SE Asia stuff that everybody falls in love with.

We spent the past 2 days on a trek through the jungle and to spend the night at a local village (Khmu tribe).  We both had a very nice time, and I can say that I felt it was much better arranged than the one I did in Thailand 5 years ago.  I didn't get that horrible "human zoo" feeling, and felt that we had very little impact on daily village life.  I mean I still think it must be wierd for the villagers that trekkers are passing through, but it seems that the company tried hard to ensure that foreigners are not overly intrusive on daily life.  They also give the village 35% of the profits which is nice.  Our guide was very informative, and we learned a lot about the villagers way of life, and of course it was really amazing to see it first hand.  Just to actually have to walk the 8km into the village (which was quite a climb into the mountains) and realize that it's only accessable on foot and when they want to buy something or sell something from the village by the road they have to hoof it there and back!  And they have so much knowledge about the environment around them, passed down from generations, I really have a lot of respect for them.  And of course the kids are always great :>)  When we first arrived there were these two little girls playing and fishing in the river...they were pretty cute!  They even caught a little fish!  We even hopped in the river too to clean off :>)  And after hiking 11km today in the sticky heat, we are happy to have had a shower and a nice meal.  I have had my favorite here, roasted peanut Jeos. Sticky rice and steamed veggies that you dip in this spicy roasted peanut and lime sauce...yum!  And despite having a really great experience and feeling like we went with a culturally sensitive company, these treks always beg the question, is it really a good thing for these communities?  I wonder if they feel they benefit as much as we feel we do.

So tomorrow we will spend one more day here and then we are off to Luang Prabang.  Bye for now!

Hanna and Dan

Crossing the Mekong to Laos

Cute kids at the village - they had been fishing in the river