It's laos time

Hello from Laos! After a very long slow journey I am now happily sitting in an internet café in Luang Prabang. It was a rather unique experience to get here. Actually, I suppose it wasn’t that unique at all as most people who come into Laos via Chang Mai come this way, but I didn’t want to say interesting again. The mini bus ride from Chang Mai to Chang Klong took about 7 hours. The minivan was supposed to be air conditioned, and well I suppose the air was conditioned, it just wasn’t conditioned cold. It actually wasn’t that bad though as I was sitting at a window and with all of the windows open it was actually quite pleasant. I couldn’t help but to think back to family trips when I was little and 5 of us were all pilled into the 5 person sunbird. I seem to recall my dad joking at the time that the car had AC, you just had to roll down the windows. Well, it was a very similar experience again although with a little less sibling squabbling.

The border crossing itself was pretty painless. The one thing I found odd was that a Canadian visa for Laos was $43 US (42 during the week) making it the most expensive visas out of all of the countries. I’m really not sure why this is as we didn’t try and blow the country back to the Stone Age… Someone told me that it is expensive to get a Canadian visa so other countries are getting us back, but being that I will never have to pay for a Canadian visa that’s a little difficult to confirm at this point in time.

The slow boat itself was boat very nice and very trying. The first day was about 7 hours long most of the time spent sitting on a wooden bench, and the following day was another 7 hours on an even more cramped boat before we finally got to our destination. One of the disadvantages to the slow boat is that you have to spend a night in a super sketchy town that the power goes out in at 11pm. I’ll just say I slept with one eye open and was a little more tired and cranky the next day on the boat. Luckily I met more friendly Canadians and we passed a good chunk of the time playing cards, including of course Euchre. We did however get reprimanded by an older New Zealand women and a younger Auzzie couple for having too much fun. I guess we got a little too into our cards (we also partook in some guitar playing and singing the day before) and they had simply had enough and told us. What really got me about the situation wasn’t so much that we were bothering them but the way in which they informed us about it. Had they said they were trying to sleep could we please try and be quieter things would have been fine. I know everyone was tired and worn out from the long journey and we were probably a bit noisy. Instead however, we were basically told to shut-up followed by some whispering amongst themselves as to how poorly Canadian’s behave. Oh well, you can’t please everyone I suppose.

The city of Luang Prabang is a really neat little place, the entire town has been classified a world heritage site. It is a weird cross of old French architecture and newer Laotian. The food also has a very French influence and they even have some decent wine, bread, and cheese! Ok, not quite as much good cheese as I had hoped for but I’ll take some good cheese over none at all. The only downside to this town is it does seem to know what sort of tourist destination it is. Almost every item you could buy or place you could stay at is a uniformed price across town. Prices are also a little over inflated, although not as bad as the south of Thailand, so being here on a shoestring is a bit tricky. Still, I think I’ll wind up spending at least 3 nights here before heading up to the plane of jars with a group of people.

As for today itself we (my fellow countrymen and I) decided to head out of the Kuang Si Waterfall. I wish the internet here was fast enough for me to upload some of the pictures because it was stunning. This time we actually got to swim around in the pools at the base of the waterfall and in behind and then hike up the top and look out over the falls and into the valley. An overall great way to spend the afternoon!

Well, that’s all I’ve got for now. I think it’s time to venture out back into the thunderstorm that has just started in search of some dinner.