Laos and Tigers and Bears, oh My!

We left Thailand through Chiang Khong, got a ride across the Mekong, and entered into Laos uneventfully, thankfully. There are no roads linking northwest Laos with the rest of the country (hence the importance of the Mekong River), so we took a 2 day slow boat from Huang Xai to Luang Prabang. It was an intermittently uncomfortable, mostly relaxing, and always stunningly scenic way to travel into the heart of Laos.

Some pictures of our trip down the mighty Mekong River:

Water buffalo taking a dip on the shore.













Enjoying the view from our guest house in Pak Beng, our overnight stop on the two day trip.












After arriving in Luang Prabang (henceforth L.P.) we settled in at our guest house and promptly searched out the nearest baguette. Laos, like most of Southeast Asia, was a French colony and maintains a lot of French influence in their architecture, language, and to my delight, baked goods. Here is a representation of our 4 days in L.P. in pictures:

Wat That Pho Si sits atop a hill in the middle of the city. It served as an orienteering device, exercise medium (we ran up the stairs most mornings), and great sunset viewing location for us while in LP.









The view east from atop Wat Pho Si hill at sunset. This isn't the Mekong, but another river that joins the Mekong just north of LP. One of the places we stayed was on the banks of this river on the right side of the picture.









A view of LP from above.













There are a few other monuments and temples on the Pho Si hill. There's also this incredible tree all over Laos, Cambodia, and northern Thailand...I don't know what it's called but it's beautiful. It's flower ranges from fire engine red to construction cone orange.














We spent one day roaming around in the Royal Palace and National Museum. The most fascinating of the exhibits was an incredible photo exhibit on Buddhist monks in meditation, called "The Floating Buddha". There was also an interesting documentary on the land mine and UXO problems in Laos today (read below). This is the view out the front of the Royal Palace.






We rented mountain bikes one day and rode 32 kilometers south of LP through mountain villages to the Tat Kuang Si Waterfall in the jungle. We were yelling "Sabadee!" (hello) to everyone we saw and got lots of smiles and "Sabadee!" back. Every time we were rode through a village, throngs of children would run up to the road to give us high fives as we rode by. I felt like Lance in the Tour de France...except that I had to stop and take breaks in the mountains.




We had some competition on the road with our bikes.












The Tat Kuang Si waterfall. There were 4 or 5 different natural pool tiers that you could hike up to and swim in...we hiked up to the near top of the picture. The water was cool and powder blue. I can't describe how refreshing it was after our grueling bike ride.














Just chillin' at a jungle waterfall, no big deal.


















There was a conservation project for Asian black bears near the waterfall!












Also for the SE Asian tiger!













The only bad part about Laos was leaving it after such a short period of time. We wanted to explore other parts besides the central region around LP, like the Plain of Jars (a mysterious large plain with 1-3 meter high ancient clay jars just spread out on the ground), and areas hit by the U.S. Secret War, but didn't really have time. Just for some historical reference though, the U.S. dropped 2 million tons of bombs on Laos during the "Secret War"/Vietnam because the north Vietnamese were hiding throughout parts of Laos. It's estimated that 30% of these bombs didn't explode, leaving the Laos countryside littered with a quarter of a million UXO (unexploded ordnance) that are still active and injuring, killing, or dismembering people on a regular basis. Despite this dim recent past and being the unfair target of a lot of other country's bad shit, the people of Laos were incredibly friendly, kind, and laid back.

We mostly survived off of a road side vegetarian buffet for 5000 kip ($0.50 USD!), baguettes with cheese, fruit shakes, pastries, and iced coffee. We read, we played cards, we drank BeerLao, we exercised, we relaxed, we watched a movie or two at a local bar, we took afternoon naps in the heat, and then we caught a flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia.