Laos- floating down the Mekong

Getting to Laos: We left our large love nest in Chiang Mai via a luxury VIP bus to Chiang Rai (including cookies, water, wet wipes, tv, toilet, a/c!)- 3hours, transferred onto a local bus to the border town of Chiang Khong – 3 more hours, next a short tuk-tuk ride to the border which happens to be the Mekong river, received our exit stamps, got ferried across the river and finally entered Laos.

We paid our visa fee ($35+$1), plus a weird over time charge and found a room in the town- Huay Xai. Laos is definitely more expensive than Thiland (but Thailand is cheap), they generally import everything and slap on a nice charge for foreign products- which is basically everything! The room was decent, the town was drab. We found the ferry point for the morning, scouted the ticket prices ($23 each from the office on the dock- not a travel agent) and called it a night.

Our next two days in Laos were spent boating down the mighty Mekong River; pretty uneventful stuff. We arrived just after nine to get a ticket; we were told it left at 10.30am and get there early to have a decent seat. There were no decent seats, just wooden benches, but we managed to nab two plastic garden furniture ones down the back. We didn’t leave until 12.30pm. The scenery was beautiful, lots of post card scenes. Inside the boat/barge were lots of Australians getting drunk on the very fine Lao beer, chatting up all the girls. Two days on a boat with nothing better to do I guess- I got through a book. Due to the lack of lights on the boats the journey has to take two days so at 6.30 we pulled into a town called Pakbeng and we were released for the night. Thankfully accommodation wasn’t a problem the town appears to run solely on tourism. It’s strange really; this tiny riverside town is full of western looking guesthouses and restaurants with English menus and multi-linguistic staff! We had a nice dinner and sampled the local brew. From a non beer drinker, I have to say it’s quite good; from a beer connoisseur, Mal says it’s excellent!

9.30 the next morning had us back on the boat, unfortunately for us everybody had the bright idea of being early, the boat was changed to a smaller one and there were soft cushioned seats but none left for us! We had to camp on the floor at the back with the luggage; which really wasn’t as bad as it sounds as we got to stretch out and have a little nap. But by 6pm on arriving in Luang Prabang we were more than ready to exit- actually being the first as we were so near our luggage!

You can get a speed boat (yes an actual small speed boat), where you have to wear a helmet because of the very frequent crashes due to the dangerous break neck speed they travel at. If this doesn’t sound like your thing, they have recently improved the roads so it’s possible to take a bus to complete the journey in a day probably in more comfort, or you can fly direct… but it’s the experience that matters!