Jarrod and Sara’s Site

  Hey everybody, we’ve re-entered civilization in Luang Prabang, Laos after a lot of travel and hiking days. Going to try and catch up on the blog right now…. hope everyone is doing well at home in the snow.

So after a long bus ride and a quick night in Chang Khong (Thailand), we crossed the Mekong River via a huge canoe type boat that I am amazed didn’t sink on the journey across… and landed in Huay Xai, an official border crossing city, and went through customs (very simple, pay them, and you get in).

Once across, we boarded a “slow boat” that would take us to Luang Prabang via the Mekong River. The boat was shaped sort of like a really long, skinny oversized row boat (pointed in front, flat in back) and it had wooden seats in rows of two along each side of the boat that would comfortably fit about 70 people (all in seats). When we boarded there were about 90 people on board and we (actually luckily) were told to sit in the very front on the floor with the bags. This actually wasn’t bad since you could move around a little and occasionally stretch out your legs or even lie down if the ten or so people in that section were positioned correctly… It was an interesting experience that would never ever have flown in the U.S.. There ended up being about 120 people scattered around every possible spot on the boat and if more people had turned up, I’m sure that they would have fit more people on.

This was a little aggravating at first as we had specifically heard, “the trip down the Mekong is gorgeous and really fun, as long as they don’t over crowd the boat, which they often do…” but as we got used to the seats and got underway, it wasn’t quite as uncomfortable as is sounds. What made the trip so worth it though was the view. It was just incredible. Basically for 8 straight hours we traveled through non-stop bright green lush mountain ranges on a beautiful river. It wasn’t mountains here or there, it was the entire time. The only time we weren’t seeing a beautiful mountain range was when we were seeing an amazing village propped on stilts on the edge of the river bank, or impossibly maintained farm lands on steep hills and river banks, or small fishing boats, or kids running up and down the banks and playing in the river.  Needless to say, by the end of they day while we were enjoying cold Beerlao (22 oz bottle - $1) coming into the first night stop on our two day trip, we really didn’t mind too much that we were cramped together and uncomfortable (Beerlao’s helped this) and had thoroughly enjoyed the trip.

Our night in Pak Beng was fairly uneventful as we were pretty exhausted and sore from the trip. We took a quick walk through town (very, very small) that had a wild west feel to it for some reason (one long road with restaurants, bars, general stores and people milling about looking like they were up to no good) which was pretty cool. We had a really good dinner on this cool porch overlooking the river (I am convinced that there is not a single restaurant in Southeast Asia that is not mostly outside, its awesome) and went to bed hoping that many of the people on our boat had gotten lost and wouldn’t be joining us the next day.

No such luck. This time we got seats, which we decided were a little better since your space stayed the same and you didn’t have the constant mind game of how can I take over that person’s leg room and how can I go to the bathroom without losing my leg room. Today was more of the same (another 8 hours of stunning landscapes, villlages, etc. that our pictures cannot do justice but will hopefully give you an idea), but by the end of this one we were really, really happy to be done. Even with the most beautiful scenery and very good beer and weather, sitting on a wooden bench, crowded like cattle, for eight or nine hours…. it gets old. So we were really happy to pull into port at Luang Prabang and the end of the journey and check out the coolest city that we have been to so far (more of the city later).

Again, hope everyone’s doing great and please keep in touch. Sorry about not getting back to a lot of you in a while as we haven’t been around the internet in a while, but we’re going to try to catch up in the next couple of days. Hope everyone’s enjoying the holidays… very weird missing it, although some restaurants seemed to have adopt Christmas and are forcing their Laotian staff to dress in Santa hats (will try to get a picture of this as it is quite amusing).

May start writing now or later tonight about the trek we just got back from… talk to everyone soon.

Jarrod and Sara