Having had enough of tubing and partying, It was time to move on to the former capital and now World Heritage site Luang Prabang. Nestled in the mountains with the bus only being able to average 35 km/h, it would have taken us seven hours to complete the 230 km journey if there hadn’t been one eager other bus driver in a rush who almost pushed us off the road. I tried to get some sleep so I was not an eye-witness of the incident but here is what others passengers have told me: Apparently we approached a narrow bridge and slowed down to let an oncoming truck pass by. Another bus didn’t see the bridge (or the truck) and overtook us. The other bus and the truck collided and the bus crashed into our side, almost pushing us over the edge of the road. If we had been any faster we would have definitely overturned and fallen into a river.
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| close to the ditch |
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| This bus triggered the accident |
Nobody, except for the bus driver (he had some minor cuts from splintered glass) was injured and so we prepared for a long waiting period and even speculated with going back to Vang Vieng. After about 75 minutes another bus appeared on the other side of the bridge and we were told to get our luggage as the journey would continue. I didn’t expect that so soon, I must say, especially in Lao. No further incidents occurred on the remaining trip and so we arrived in Luang Prabang after a total of 10 hours. I was really glad everything turned out well for me and that I didn’t have to spend the night in the rice paddies or, even worse, get injured in a road accident. Medical care is not that great in Lao and serious injuries need to be flown out to Bangkok. Make sure you have medical insurance when travelling in countries like Lao. If there is an accident and an aircraft has to be involved, the charges can mount up easily to several thousand Dollars. If you are covered by insurance it is free for the price of a Beer Lao per day.
On the bus trip I sat next to Emanuel (big shout out) from Bern who is on a two-month trip around Cambodia, Lao and Vietnam. We teamed up for the time in Luang Prabang and visited all the sites together.
It took me some time to find an affordable room with wifi. Some guest houses (they were not even hotels) quoted me unbelievable rates like $30 for the night. I finally wanted to book my flight back to Australia and don’t feel comfortable doing that in an Internet café. So, on February 2 I will fly back to Oz which gives me a little more than 6 remaining weeks in Asia.
Luang Prabang has a certain charm that makes you like the place immediately. You can do a lot of things in the area and the town itself is a gem too. There is hardly any traffic and even in travel agencies you are advised piecing a trip together yourself rather than booking it through the agency, as it will come out much cheaper for you. Never seen a travel agent in Asia who is not desperate to sell his tours. It is also much colder than anywhere else in Asia so far. While it is nice and warm during the day, I had to put on long pants in the evening. Havent done that since Perth some 4 months ago.
As mentioned before the town was once capital of Lao and so first thing on my agenda was to visit the Royal Palace Museum. Much smaller than its equivalents in Bangkok or Phnom Penh The Museum just shows how the monarchs used to live and its highlight is a gold standing Buddha (called Pha Bang) after which the town is named. Not that impressive.
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| Golden Hall at the Royal Palace Museum |
Wat Xieng Thong is the most magnificent temple in town as it features a 12m high funeral chariot drawn by the seven headed serpent naga and carrying the urns for the royal family.
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| Funeral chariot with the naga |
Phu Si is a small temple on a hill and supposedly good for watching the sunset. After climbing 322 steps you have a nice view over the city if it is not as foggy as it was when we were up there.
One day, a procession moved through town to celebrate 15 years of…well, I don’t know. Several people tried to explain but their limited vocabulary prevented me from getting the point. The entire town was there to either participate or to watch the “spectacle”. I realized quite late that there is something going on and so I was only able to watch the last 5 minutes but at least I didn’t miss the elephants.
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| elephants taking part in the parade |
After shopping around we booked a day tour to see the waterfalls of Tad Sae. Those are not the best waterfalls around Luang Prabang but you could easily combine it with other activities in the area. The day started at 8:30h with a 40-minute tuk tuk ride to a remote village. After 10 minutes I had to sit next to the driver in the cabin as it was freezing cold in the back. Having arrived in that village we fought our way to the river on a small path that had to do more with climbing than trekking. The travel agent said we would be fine with thongs but it proved harder than expected. At some points the vegetation was so dense that you couldn’t even see your feet and where you were going. Luckily it didn’t rain because otherwise we wouldn’t have stood a chance to get there in one piece. The way was quite slippery and steep but a great experience. Once we arrived at the river we set up our kayaks and paddled 10 minutes to the waterfalls. Before looking at the falls we rode an elephant for 40 minutes and sitting up there it looks much higher than from the ground. After a short stroll through the woods we went to the falls where the elephants would take us through the water. Great experience. but the "drivers" were to rough on those poor elephants.
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| riding the mighty elephant |
All of the waterfalls are not any higher than two meters but it is the number of falls that makes this heavily vegetated area an amazing place. You could walk around for quite some time and still discover new falls, ponds and streams.
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| Tad Sae Waterfalls |
We returned to our kayaks and went home via the river. The tour took us the better part of two and a half hours which was the perfect duration to get comfy with the equipment, marvel at the passing landscape and get completely wet in the several rapids. We had anticipated it to be a nice cruise on the river but in order to make it on time we had to paddle throughout the entire trip. As you can imagine it was quite a challenge to lift you beer glass at the end of the day ;-).
Rather than taking the classic backpacker route and booking a two day cruise on the Mekong River back to Thailand, I opted to fly back to Bangkok because I didn’t want to loose 3-4 days. Additionally, I have been on many boats on this trip already. The flight wasn’t cheap but this will be my Xmas present. Once again my plane was an air-screwed ATR 72.
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| ATR 72. Same as from KL to Banda Aceh, Indonesia |
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