Mekong River Boat
Luang Prabang, Lao Peoples Dem Rep
April 07, 2009
There was another thunderstorm overnight. Ever since Bill has complained about having no rain, it has been raining almost every day! I had been dreaming of creating a magazine for women in their 30's and 40's that was by real women, for real women...
It was raining heavily during breakfast. Bill was able to get potatoes without cheese and baguette. I had an omelet with cheese and ham with a baguette.
We did not have clean clothes as they were still drying at the laundry place yesterday, we stopped by to let her know that we would pick our clothes up in the afternoon. We thought this would help the process, but everything was still damp when we collected them after lunch.
We were at the tour office at 8 am. One of the guys walked with us to the boat launch area up the street. We were put into a boat at 8:30 with a guide and 4 tourists who insisted on sitting near the front and we had to climb over them to get to our seats (this happened almost every time we got on the boat).
At 10:30 we stopped at the whiskey village, Ban Xang Hai. Some Lao Lao bottles are filled with snakes and scorpions along with Lao Lao or black sticky rice Lao Lao. They also sold opium pots, jewelery, statues, sarongs and table cloths in the village. There was not much interaction. There was simply a diagram on how the alcohol was made. In a large oil (reminds me of our burning barrel) drum they add 4 jars of rice and water. It is boiled for 3 hours with a lid on it. Then there is a pipe that leads to a jar with a cloth over it to strain the whiskey. One batch makes 30 L of Lao Lao.
Our next stop at 11:30 is Tam Ting, one of the most revered sites in Laos, which is across from the village, Ban Pak Ou. The caves are 25 kms from Luang Prabang. There is an upper cave and a lower cave. The caves were originally used for Phi spirit worship, until the 16th century when Buddhism was introduced to Laos. In 1975, the caves were not used because religion was banned by the government, but restrictions recently have been relaxed. The caves are filled with hundreds of Buddha images that have been brought here by worshipers. In the upper cave is a replica of drawings by a French guy in 1865-67 with the first recorded drawings of these caves.
On the way back the Australian women convinced the driver to stop at the paper-making village. It seemed very important to her that we stop, so I wonder why she did not book a tour that included it as a stop... Anyway, she did not purchase anything, but I did - a book to use for scrap booking our trip upon our return for 60,000 kip ($10).
Back in town we had lunch on the waterfront at Saffron (my chai tea place) on the lower deck. I had a surly fruit shake (type of apple that I can not find on the internet...) that was very good with Luang Prabang Stew with green beans, eggplant, lots of pepper bark, greens and chili. Bill had BeerLao with buffalo chili.
Bill went to work on his CMA requirements and to get some money while I went to the Luang Prabang Beauty and Spa. It was pretty good. The treatments were good, but the place was not the cleanest. The pillow, table and towels were oily. I paid $35 for 3 hours for a body scrub, sauna, massage and facial, so I guess you get what you pay for!
Bill did not have such a relaxing time. He was having computer issues and had to try a couple of places. He tried to get money out of the ATM and it did not work (the money is out of his account, but did not get the cash, same thing happened in Luang Nam Tha, hopefully BMO can sort it out for us), and it was too late to take a cash advance on his VISA (is a better deal because you actually get the money and are not charged bank fees by 2 banks).
I was not feeling the greatest, so we just walked around the night market for a bit. One place would custom make a stamp for you, but they wanted $35. There were some food stalls down an alley, so we had a BBQ chicken breast (have not seen many of those) and a pork kebab for 5,000 kip ($2.50). I bought an apple for 3000 kip ($.50) and a fried veggie rice wrapper spring roll.
We went to the Internet cafe for 1 1/2 hour it is 6000 kip/hour here. It was after 10 when we went back to our room.