To start the day off, Alex, Matt, Frankie, and Lauren joined us in our “VIP minibus” for the journey to Vang Vieng, home of the infamous river tubing. Our VIP minibus was nothing more than a minivan, but it was much better than the buses in Laos! The roads through the mountains in this part of the world are absolutely maddening, with hairpin turns and sheer cliffs disappearing down the far side of the road. Although terrifying at times, we couldn’t have had better travel buddies: we were highly entertained the whole way and the six hour ride didn’t seem nearly that long.
Because it is the thing to do in Luang Prabang, we woke up before the sun to watch the monk procession through the town collecting food for the day. Not knowing what to expect, we were surprised in our still-asleep states when we walked off the steps of our guesthouse and were assaulted by Lao women with bowls of rice. The quite literally wouldn’t let us path without taking the rice (which we knew we would have to pay for), so we accepted a few and then passed it on to the monks. It was a pretty neat experience that was almost instantly marred by the same Lao women demanding more money than was sane. One dollar per bowl of rice was expensive, but we were all willing to pay that and more. The problem was when multiple women asked you to pay them multiple times, seemingly unable to comprehend the facts that you didn’t take any of their rice and that you already paid for what you had taken. It was definitely madness and it was way too early for us to deal with it all!After breakfast, we chartered a longtail boat up the Mekong River to the Pak Ou Caves, a Buddhist shrine with hundreds of Buddha images hidden within a big cave overlooking the river. We soon realized that our boat was much slower than all the other boats on the river, and our driver pulled over and told us it was malfunctioning. We had to climb into another longtail that was already full and sit on postage stamp size pieces of plywood that could not in any way be considered chairs. Even though the ride was incredibly uncomfortable, the scenery was incredible: the Willy Wonka-like river curved around islands and behind each bend there were more impressive cliffs. We can’t get over how green everything is in Laos: from the river banks up to the top of the mountains (other than a few exposed cliff faces) is carpeted in lush green vegetation. It’s beautiful!We stopped off in Whiskey Town for a few minutes to see locals at work making their own whiskey, as well as weaving colorful scarves and chasing chickens around. We were back in the boat for about half an hour before reaching the caves, a very disappointing hole in the side of a cliff that went back maybe ten meters and was more crowded with tourists than Buddha images. The second cave was a little bit better, but if the scenery from the boat hadn’t been so gorgeous this trip definitely wouldn’t have been worth it.Back in town, Matt headed in to take a nap while Frankie and Lauren joined us on a bike ride around town. We went back to the bridge we could see from Utopia and walked around there for awhile. We kept riding onto the other side of the bridge, where it was quite obvious that most tourists don’t travel to. The roads quickly changed from paved to gravel to dirt, street signs were devoid of English, and the locals looked at us like we were lost. We rode through, taking in the scenery and the life, before buying a few bags of rhombutans and mangosteins. On the other side of the bridge, we rode around some more until we found a small wine shop and decided we just had to check it out. “When in Laos”, right? We bought a bottle for seven dollars and sat at a small table watching the world float by in its relaxed, Lao style.We met up with Matt, Alex, Frankie, and Lauren for dinner, but first we headed down to the river for a sunset beer. Alex and Justin took a scorpion whiskey shot that hit hard, and they were quite entertaining. We walked the market some more before finding a woman that charged one dollar for all the food you could pile onto one plate. We ate well tonight!
After a languid breakfast at one of the many cafes along the Mekong, Lauren, Frank, and Matt decided to join us on our tuk tuk journey to the waterfalls 30 km outside of town that Adam and Laura recommended to us. The ride through the countryside revealed more and more stunning views of the towering mountains and deep valleys that form the Laotian landscape. We were amazed by the beauty of the first waterfall, and very pleased to find that each tier outdid its predecessor! The pools all had the same eerie blue green color that those in Kanchanaburi had and the same nibbling fish, although much less in number. After a few pools, we found one that had a great rope swing and the top of the waterfall was perfect for jumping off. This entertained us for at least 45 minutes, and we definitely could have stayed longer!We continued hiking and being impressed by the beauty of the falls until we reached the bottom of the first and topmost falls, a sight that may defy words. Water cascaded over the limestone face at least 100 meters to fall gently to rest in a small pool constantly sprayed with mist. It was gorgeous and so much better than we thought it would be! We decided to hike to the top of those falls, and we were rewarded with a great view of the mountains and valleys beyond, but not much else. We couldn’t figure out how to get to the “secret pool”, but later found out that it was really easy and we were just a little slow! It was a great way to spend a day!Back in town, we found our Irish friends from Chiang Mai and made plans to meet them for dinner before renting bicycles for the next 24 hours as our means to get around. We wandered through the night market with our new friends before heading to Lao Lao Garden for dinner. Justin and I soon realized that Frank and Lauren had witnessed Debbie and Mandy’s elephant debacle from a bamboo raft below! We all knew we would be great friends after a coincidence like that. At dinner, we cooked our own traditional Laotian bar-b-que meal and met up with trekker Alex. We had a blast with discounted BeerLao and a bucket of coals with a grill over it in the middle of the tables. The food honestly wasn’t to die for, but we had so much fun it was completely worth it! Some one had seen on the menu that with parties of seven of more celebrating an event, you get a free cake. Before our Irish friends didn’t show, we thought it would be fun to get Debbie a birthday cake for her recent 21st. Too bad the cake came and she didn’t, so I pretended to be Debbie because my birthday was closest! It was awesome and we somewhat tipsily cycled home at the end of the evening.
We spent a lazy morning reading and blogging before heading to the airport to catch our flight to Luang Prabang, Laos. We were told that the busses and boats to reach this little town from Chiang Mai are hell on wheels and take three days, a luxury we don’t have, so we opted for the cheater way and flew, hassle free. Our lunch boxes on Laos Airlines even said “You’re safe with us!”After getting our visas, we were waiting in line with a taxi and decided to group up with the three English people in front of us for a cheaper taxi fare. This turned out to be one of the greatest decisions we have made! We ended up staying in the same guesthouse in Luang Prabang after Matt successfully communicated with our non-English speaking taxi driver. Matt’s friend had recommended that we go to Utopia at least once while we were in the city, so with nothing better to do, we set off with Matt, Frank, and Lauren to find Utopia. Our wild goose chase led us all over the city, but it was definitely worth it!
We woke up way too early (the bus picked us up at 6 am) to drive out of Chiang Mai to Flight of the Gibbon. This is “the best tourist attraction in Thailand” and is a series of zip lines, repels, and suspension bridges through the canopy of the rainforest, also home to a gibbon refuge. Even though we didn’t see any gibbons, we definitely heard them! Not really knowing what to expect, we had a great time flying though the upper branches of the rainforest and then repelling down to the forest floor. There was a super man zip line, where you literally had to jump off a platform and wait for the line to catch before flying over to a big rope net and pulling yourself back up that to the next platform. There was also a backwards zip line, a “sit like Buddha” zip line, and a buddy repel down one of the biggest trees I have even seen. Our guides were hilarious and played practical jokes on us all day, and it was a lot of fun!As part of the Gibbon package, we were taken to a waterfall that was pretty unimpressive, but we are convinced we have been jaded by the amazing-ness of Erawan in Kanchanaburi. We walked up some very steep, slippery stairs and enjoyed the overview of the rainforest more than the falls themselves. After local lunch and our trip back to Chiang Mai, we decided to meet with an Aussie couple from the adventure that also wanted to spend the afternoon at Wat Doi Suthep.We hopped into a taxi with Gary and Cindy and drove up the winding, never ending road to the temple overlooking all of Chiang Mai. We proceeded to walk up the 300 steps and admire the architecture, the Buddha images, the locals meditating, and the views of the city. While up there, we learned that in Thailand there is a Buddha statue and posture for every day of the week, although Gary and I could only piece together about half of them from memory. We were all blessed by the resident monks before heading back into town.Before heading to the Night Bazaar to wander around, we went to an all you can eat Japanese style restaurant. There were trays upon trays of sushi (which I have been craving for at least a week) and a train that snaked through the whole restaurant with a variety of raw food. Large bowls were brought out and kept hot so that we could cook our choice of raw things in our soup. The food was fantastic and for the first time in Thailand we felt that we had eaten ourselves into oblivion!
