Hello from Laos!
Today was a day for the books; we said goodbye to Thailand and Bob (our Thailand tour guide), both being extremely hard to do as we had grown accustomed to the beautiful cities and our amazing, psychic, palm reading, meowing tour guide, Bob.
We woke up in our rustic home stay, to an impressive breakfast of toast, eggs and bananas while gazing over the Mekong River to Laos. After a short 5 minute drive to the customs dock, we handed over our passports to be checked and then boarded a boat to cross the river for Laos, leaving Thailand in our dust. It was sad to be leaving such a welcoming country, but we were all looking forward to the second leg of our journey. The customs process was odd – very relaxed compared to that of Melbourne or Bangkok. We literally walked straight through the gates, not being checked or having to declare anything! We then arrived at our private boat by tuk tuk, where Mrs Adams nearly lost her luggage when the driver drove off with it strapped to the roof! It was safely returned after a couple of minutes. Close call!
We then boarded our long boat for our 6 hour boat ride along the Mekong River. We enjoyed the stunningly beautiful scenery and endless rolling hills and spent our time relaxing, played games of cheat, reading, socialising and sleeping. We were treated to tempura fish, curry and vegetables for lunch, which was an enjoyable change from rice.
We arrived in Pak Beng in the late afternoon, a small (and when we say small, we mean small) town of only one road, where we proceeded to go to our separate male and female guesthouses. They were very homely, and each room had a “shower room”- which incidentally is also used for the toilet and sink. These experiences are all part of our Big Experience – experiencing things outside our comfort zone.
We had a candlelight dinner overlooking the Mekong, and were provided with yet another array of tantalising dishes – a whole fish, curry, soup, vegies, spiced omelette and rice. We then got a bit of time to continue looking around the small town, and buy some last minute snacks for tomorrow’s second 6hour leg of our long boat journey. Finally we all returned back to our rooms and prepared for a good night’s rest. The boys all had a good chat and some dessert with Mr Daniels and the girls had hot chocolates and cookies with Ms Werba and Mrs Adams. A nice end to a relaxing day.
Tomorrow we continue our journey along the Mekong River to Luang Prabang where, after 6 days of struggling with our limited choices, we can finally do some washing!!!
By Alex and Matt
