Here a Wat, There a Wat, Everywhere a Wat Wat, Louang Prabang, Laos

I've been told the river trip to Louang Prabang from Muang Ngoi is Laos' best and even though the river is barely passable at this time of year I'm determined not to miss it. After doing the required waiting at the boat dock, we're off. This trip only has 8 tourists compared to the dozens on the Mekong and it's much more intimate and pleasant. On the way down we see women in conical hats panning for gold, boys fishing with their enormous dive masks and spears, and little kids always scream, yell and perform some type of jumping acrobatic maneuver as we pass. Halfway to Louang Prabang the boat pulls over, the captain orders us out, and directs us to march downstream. The boat will be waiting, he says, past a dicey shallow section. After several minutes of walking with no boat in sight, we begin to wonder out loud if they've made off with our stuff. I only brought $5 and sunscreen which won't get me too far. Finally, after 30 minutes of walking we finally meet back up with the boat. Phew. Shortly after this escapade we run aground. This time we all roll up our pants, hop out, and start to push. Lots of local boys run over to give us a hand and soon we're on our way again. We reach Louang Prabang shortly before sunset and just in time for my favorite activity: dodging the touts and searching for lodging.

Louang Prabang is a city of Wats. Wats are to Louang Prabang what golf courses are to Hilton Head. You can't travel more than 50 meters without seeing orange robed monks working or sitting near A-framed red tiled roofs with beautiful, though decaying, white stone monuments. My favorite activity here, as in every city so far, is to rent a bike and explore. Otherwise it is great to have a wide selection of restaurants and I always enjoy the $3 massage.

My next stop is Vang Vieng, a five hour bus ride south through at least one mountain pass. Vang Vieng is a miserable town set amongst beautiful karst peaks. By miserable I mean you can't eat at a restaurant without a TV blaring Friends, South Park, or some other American show. Amazingly these places are all packed with stoned backpackers. Opium dens are big here and you can tell many travellers stay a while without doing much at all. Obviously I didn't stay here long, but I did do a day of rock climbing. A whole day only cost $20 and it's clear the company doesn't need to spend any of their profits on insurance. Shortly after starting, the guide tells us he's only been climbing for 3 months. Presumably this was to impress us, because he was quite a good lead climber, but after this information I didn't spend much time looking at the anchors! The climbing was ok, mostly it was nice to get some exercise since a lot of time travelling consists of sitting on buses, boats, trains, etc.

From Vang Vieng I headed another 5 hours south to the capital, Vientiane. It hardly feels like a capital, more like a large town, and it doesn't take long to "see the sights." I stay here one day and then it's time for a flight to Siam Reap, Cambodia on Lao Airlines. All the guidebooks say to avoid this airline and apparently western embassies advise the same as the crash record is fairly substantial. No problems though, I made it to Siam Reap safe and sound.

Thoughts on Laos:
1.) The Lao people seem to be able to spend the whole day in a squatting position with their butts on their heels. I don't see how this is at all possible.

2.) The family structure is extremely important here. Throughout the day you often see large groups huddled around eating. You can see some of the positive aspects of communism as everyone joins in to help is something needs to be done.

3.) This is an extremely poor country. According to the PM the GDP is $500/year which is probably generous b/c he was bragging in the Vientiane Times about how he'd doubled it in the past five years. This is still a communist country and opposing political parties are not allowed. Likewise there is no free press and demonstrations are forbidden. Having said all that, the country doesn't feel as poorly off as I was expecting. I only saw one, maybe two, homeless people. Yes, people outside the cities live in raised thatched huts (raised for wet season flooding) but they don't seem so badly off that you feel sorry for them. For example, while there is no infrastructure for plumbing, satellite dishes and blaring music are common. I wonder if the government somehow provided the infrastructure for plumbing if people would choose that over TV, but probably not as they are very engrossed in Thai soap operas. The one place you feel the inadequacies is with health care. On a long ride in a sawngthaew we picked up a woman in labor who was clearly having some type of complication. She had to endure a 3 hour ride in this truck over bumpy roads; she looked miserable and there really wasn't anything I could do to help. The guidebooks also say if you have a medical issue you should go to Thailand immediately.


Other notes: There is one woman from Switzerland that I keep running into. I met her in a cooking class in Chiang Mai. Then she sat next to me on the bus to the Laos border. Then I ran into her twice in Louang Prabang (biking and at a Wat). In Vang Vieng she had the room next to me at the guesthouse, and in Vientiane I ran into here in the dressing room of a silk shop. Just crazy.

For photos from Louang Prabang and On click here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/39463330@N00/sets/72057594092579282/