Day 81: Transit to Phonsavan

We rocked up to the bus station at 7:30 a.m. already dreading our 8 hour journey. We know it’s going to be a long bus ride through mountains. We are over long bus rides through mountains. It’s just a recipe for TBS and car sickness. What do you do when all you can do is look straight ahead? It makes it difficult to talk to each other. It makes it difficult to catch up on your research for the next place to which you are going. It makes it difficult to distract yourself from your TBS. The long and short of it is that it’s really boring and kind of horrible.

However, this route is our only option. There is just one bus per day that goes to Phonsavan. We show up and ask where the bus is. Now, we have specifically purchased tickets for a bus and not a minivan. We’ve read the minivan packs way too many people into it (and we know from experience, you end up sitting with your luggage squished in all areas around your sitting area). Needless to say, we expressed serious 1^st world discontent when they pointed us towards the minibus.

This couldn’t possibly be the bus we are supposed to take? We bought tickets for a bus, not a hybrid between mini-van and bus! Oh no This was our bus. We fortunately got our two seats in front. As we sat waiting for the bus to depart, we unhappily watched them:

• Load not just one, but two scooters onto the top of the bus
• Load bags of limes onto the bus (I’ll take citrus over shallots any day) and shove them on the floor under people’s seats
• Take every row of seats that could seat 4 people and seat 5 people in them
• Pull out a plastic chair next to us and seat one person on it so he was
• Depart and travel with the door open the whole time!
• Have the person who loads the luggage sitting on a 4x6 piece of cushion in the door

Maybe we should have taken that minivan.

Thank God for catching up on podcasts, keeping our eyes closed for hours, the road not being so bad, and knowledge that Vietnam has trains.

Day 78-80: Luang Prabang

Travelling in Laos are rough, literally and figuratively. We decided to leave our beloved Luang Namtha for Luang Prabang. We had two choices: day or night bus. Normally, we opt for night bus, but somewhere in hour 4 of: bumpity, bumpity, bump, bump, hard right, hard left, hard right, hard left, shift position 1, shift position 2, shift position 3, I believe I said, I don't know if this was the best life choice. We maybe slept for an hour or two max on the night bus. However, when we spoke with two Americans who we had met in Luang Namtha and with whom we had reconnected in Luang Prabang about their day bus journey, it sounded like we had made the right choice. Basically, the road just goes around a mountain with sheer dropoffs on all sides. It sounds like something that would make me both car sick and paranoid.

Luang Prabang is a lovely Buddhist city on the Mekong River, but it's not our Luang Namtha! We honestly didn't do much except enjoy the city where we could, hang out with these Americans Nat & Mary at night, and get our Vietnam visa. There is quite a lot to do. Luang Prabang was the seat of the Laos empire when Laos finally carved itself out as a kingdom of its own. It has waterfalls, caves filled with Buddhas, cliffs filled with Buddhas, and is a UNESCO world heritage site with its 25 temples.

However. but you can feel the slow change of commercialization and tourism in this town. It's filled with families of tourists. The Laos here really are struggling with knowing they can make more money off of you versus giving you the actual real price they want to give you. You see it at accommodations where the owner goes too quickly go from 120,000 Kip to 100,000 Kip without waiting a microsecond. The arts and crafts market feels like they are professionally produced crafts - not crafts made by the villagers themselves. The homemade Lao Lao whiskey, which supposedly sometimes is bottled with a bird inside, is on display bottled with all sorts of snakes, scorpions, scorpions & snakes, etc. It just is the Laos you know Laos is probably going to transition through over the next 10 years, but hope it doesn't.

We also made the decision when we started travelling in Laos that, as we had read the roads are rough, that we would only visit only Northern Laos and work our way to Hanoi. Thankfully, Luang Prabang has a Vietnam embassy. At 11:00 a.m. I realized that the embassy closes from 11:30-1:30 for lunch. Quickly, we hightailed it the 15 minute walk to the embassy, only to walk in at 11:15 and be told that the cashier was already gone, and, could we come back at 1:30. It was probably 100 degrees Fahrenheit plus humidity outside, so we killed time around the embassy for 2 hours. Finally, when 1:30 came, we re-entered the embassy only to wait for 30 more minutes for the cashier! Then, when the cashier finally came and we went to pay him, we had to give him 2 USD worth of Kip to make up the rest of the total owed for the visa. The total amount of Kip was 17,000. He told us we owed him 120,000 Kip! We walked him through the money and he realized his error. Cal me crazy, but perhaps if he can't get his accounting correct after a 2.75 hour break, maybe he is just ill-suited for his job!

Next stop: Phosavan

Day 77: Luang Namtha Black Tie Tribes

There are so many hill tribes just within a 10 kilometer radius of Luang Namtha. The one that is most prevalent is one called the Black Tie tribe. We figured today would be a great day to rent our trusted automatic scooter for a few hours and go and explore them. The route looked easy according to our not-to-scale map: 

1. Ride 6-8 kms south
2. Go through the next town, turn at the 2nd left
3. Drive 2 kms to the first Black Tie village and turn left
4. Drive 1 km to the next village
5. Keep going straight for a few kms and a few villages until you hit the highway
6. Turn left on the main road and voila, back home

Pallavi got ready to drive. I got ready to direct. Off we went. We drove happily down the highway, looking for our turn. I realized we had gone a bit too far, so we pulled over at this absolutely gorgeous rice field with cloud-covered mountain to ask some workers for directions to the Black Tie town (and take some pictures while we were at it). 

We had passed it. New directions in hand, we turned around and looked for what the worker had told us: turn right at the 1st intersection. Wait! What does the 1st intersection look like? These all look like side roads, not main proper road. We don't see stop signs. We don't see side roads with pavements. We took a gander and turned onto what turned out to be a dirt road. Crap! Not only was it dirt, but as it also had been raining during our highway drive, it was also complicated with muddy potholes. This couldn't possibly be our road! We asked a local. He tragically pointed straight ahead. Damn! This is our road. Double damn! Pallavi was none too thrilled. In fairness, the map did indicate that the road condition could change. We just didn't think it'd be quite this bad. 

It got worse! 

We made it to the first Black Tie village and asked directions to the next one. The directions matched our map, so Pallavi continued her excellent driving on our not nice road. We found more beautiful vistas and took more pictures.

We made it to the next village and ask for directions. Somehow, it sounded like we still haven't reached our intended village. In fact, we are supposed to be going straight. However, contrary to the map, the road splits and a villager tells us to go left. Alright, left it is. The road suddenly got more narrow. As Pallavi drove and drove and drove, the road got worse and worse and worse! Then the crops started to grow higher than our heads and closed in on the road. Where the heck are we? Driving through a corn field? This can't possibly be the route we were suppose to go. 

Again, we asked a villager, who directed us to continue on straight. This drive is officially crazier than when we rented a Hyundai Getz to drive through the outback. Here we are, two foreigners, on this little low powered automatic scooter, with our ill-fitting helmets, driving through some random road in the middle of nowhere! We look quite the sight. 

Pallavi does a great job driving, as we now are basically driving only through puddles and rocks. However, finally I say, "this is ridiculous. We must be on the wrong road. Let's turn around." So we turn around the scooter. Then Pallavi says, "no, this has to be the right road." So we turn back around the scooter and continue a few more meters. Then I say, "no, really, let's turn back." So we turn around the scooter. Then Pallavi says, after two minutes of looking at the map," no, it'll take longer if we go back now. Let's keep going." So we turn back around the scooter. Then we drive a few tens of more meters. Pallavi then caves and says, "alright, let's go back." Back to turning around the scooter. Then Pallavi hears something! "It must be the village. We're close!" Back around the scooter goes. Our scooter turned 360 degrees 3 times! 

We got to the village and ask directions and they tell us to go straight and left. Forward we go for 500 more meters and what do we hit? The highway! This isn't where we were suppose to be. Wait, if this isn't where we were suppose to be, then where the hell were we!! 

Farm. That's right. Once we looked at the map, we could see that we had clearly NOT gone on our intended road and had, indeed, driving on a "road" that went through an area on the map that was clearly labeled "Farm." 

To top the day off, when we made it back for Pallavi's well-deserved beer at the Night Market, we met some Akha tribeswomen who Pallavi had purchased several things from a few days prior. The women sat and chilled with us. Through Pallavi's gift of reading body language, we learned all about their headgear, their names, how many children they had, where they lived, their daily schedule, and more. They offered us opium. We refused. Another Akha woman who had been absent the day Pallavi made her purchases kept trying to get Pallavi to buy something. She even made up a whole song for Pallavi that went something like "Pallavi, so pretty, 10,000 kip, buy." It even had its own chorus! Now that's a hard sell (didn't work though, but she gets an A for effort). 

What a day! Tomorrow we'll take it easy, say our goodbyes, and make our way to Luang Prabang. 

Day 76: Luang Namtha to Muang Sing By Scooter

Pallavi has been looking for a chance to rent a scooter or motorcycle since we started this trip. We've never quite found the perfect spot or occasion for it. This town is perfect. There is a 58 km road that goes through the mountains and the Nam Ha National Protected Area up to the Laos/China border town of Muang Sing.

Muang Sing is at the epicenter of what was known as the Golden Triangle where Laos, Myanmar, and China meet. It also was the heart of the opium trade. I'd read that the Laos government has tried to stamp out opium, but hill tribe women will often try to just give it to you on the side of the road. So, it seemed like a really fascinating place to make a day trip.

After a few practice runs on the scooter (proving that riding a scooter is like riding a bike - you never forget), Pallavi was ready to take me on board as her passenger, and gave me all of the instructions I'd need for my first proper scooter passenger experience.

We set off. Now, throughout this trip, I've frequently cursed the journey, not the destination. Not today. We drove through one of the most beautiful, breathtaking landscapes I think I've seen. Freshly planted rice paddies in green plateaus, dotted with wood huts. Workers tilling the rice paddies with traditional plows. Tons of hill tribes folk walking along the road, often carrying woven baskets on their back filled with something. Tons of hill tribes folk walking off into the mountain to cut down some vegetable to eat and put into their woven basket. Green mountains with steam coming off of the road and clouds enveloping the mountain tops. Breathtaking.

We drove through the Nam Ha National Protected Area. This area is suppose to have tigers, elephants, clouded leopards, jaguars, and more. Supposedly, they are incredibly shy and almost impossible to spot as they have been heavily hunted in the past. However, nothing is stopping Eagle Eyes Pallavi from looking. If anybody can spot an animal or bird or worm in the jungle, it's her. In fact, as we were driving Pallavi mentions that she had read there are tons of beautiful insects everywhere you look in Laos and hadn't I noticed them everywhere. No! Of course I haven't noticed the insects on the side of the road. We're on a scooter. The only way I'll see an insect is if it unfortunately makes a bad life choice and eats up either inside of the car or on its windshield.

Then, there are the villagers and hill tribes folk! It's not just the people we passed en route. It's the people we saw in the villages. We stopped in one village and passed an older woman who was sitting on her porch, spinning cotton into thread using two spindles, smoking a pipe, with her breasts uncovered! National Geographic here we are! We stopped in Muang Sing, and a woman was grilling up some sort of rice-based naan covered in chili-bean marinara. We didn't see much in Muang Sing. We also didn't get offered opium off of the street (at this town, anyway!). but it was worth the adventure.

There were only 2 negatives to the day.

1) Jungle mystery food #2. We stopped at some popular side of the road place just shy of Muang Sing for lunch. It didn't have any menus, but it had lots of people and some French tourists we had met a few times along the way, so it seemed safe enough. We pointed at some dish on another table that looked tasty and waited. When the food came, we couldn't figure out what the heck it was! It was some sort of scaly round super bony meat. Definitely not fish - the shape wasn't right. Definitely not snake - snakes don't have a vertebrae. We went back and forth on what the heck it could be, and tragically, ended up leaving it. NOT because the flavour wasn't good and NOT because we are jungle food pansies. There were just too many bones for our eating pleasure. On our way out, Pallavi asked a basic English-speaking local what the heck the food was. The best Pallavi could understand was that it was like a snake with hands with a long neck that eats insects. We've narrowed it down to anteater or gecko. I think gecko. This experience combined with yesterday's day market experience leads me to believe that people in Laos eat anything. Waste not want not; however, no more mystery jungle food for us that isn't clearly vegetarian. We're still paranoid about accidentally eating a rat, and really hope they don't eat dog here! We also were still hungry, which is how Pallavi ended up eating that yummy grilled rice naan with chili marinara.

2) TBS (tired butt syndrome). It was suppose to take us 2 hours to get to Muang Sing. It took us 2.5 hours. However, I feel a bit thwarted. The reason why I dread riding a bicycle is because I don't want TBS. Every year in college, the first week back at school riding my bike to band practice all day resulted in TBS. There isn't anyway to avoid it. It's just the reality of breaking in your butt for riding a bike. I had no idea you could get it while riding a scooter! The 2.5 hour ride there was alright. Just a few TBS issues. The 2.5 hour ride back took FOREVER! The light was fading. We were running against the clock to get the scooter back. It took 5 minutes to get 1 km due to bad roads and mountainous conditions. It took 5 minutes from taking a butt break to reliving the TBS. By the time we made it all safely back to Luang Namtha, we could barely get off of the bike!

Totally worth it though. This place is absolutely breathtaking. 

Day 75: Luang Namtha

We got off to a later start today, but this town has such a great vibe that we don't feel any need to rush. We've been wanting small town Southeast Asian life and this certainly is a small town.

• It has a whopping 10,000 people.
• It recently got it's very first traffic light.
• It has one main street & a few side streets to make it a proper grid. 
• It has 3 markets (a morning market, a day market, and a night market - obviously).

Armed with our not-to-scale map, we set off to find the day market. We've read that it is quite the experience. Markets are abundant throughout Southeast Asia and they all have a similar structure. There is a dry area that is just for fruits & grains, a wet area that is for meats, and a few random stalls just to make it interesting. 

We came into the Luang Namtha day market ready for anything. First, the dry market. Pretty standard stuff. Lots of fruits I don't recognize. Lots of vegetables I don't recognize (sidenote: did you know that they have eggplant here that is the size of a golf ball?). Lots of interesting tribal people in traditional clothes. So far. So good. So Southeast Asia normal. 

Second, the wet market. It wasn't the pools filled with live fish that grossed me out. It wasn't the cages of poultry that grossed me out. It wasn't the bag of dead chicks that grossed me out. It wasn't the frogs that grossed me out. It wasn't the big ass insects that grossed me out. Oh no. It was the grilled RATS on skewers that grossed me out. Little grilled rats with their little incisors showing! Eew! My having to eat rats on the Amazing Race would be the thing that would make me yell, "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here." I have met my food nemesis. Who eats rats?? They are carriers of the plague for Pete's sake!

Now Pallavi & I are a little concerned as to what exactly was the mystery jungle food we had eaten at the night market the previous night. It was some sort of green vegetable (we think ratten) and it had some sort of meat? One should never be guessing if a substance is mushroom or liver or lamb. The only questionable food in life should be baby food vegetable & meat blends. Nothing else! God we hope that mystery meat wasn't rat!

After the day market, we thought we'd go for a walk and see if we could get to the village that was marked out as within walking distance from the day market on the map. As we walked, almost immediately after we left town, we entered in a hill tribe village. Paved roads gave way to dirt ones. Stone houses gave way to wooden ones. Little boys rolled tires down the street using sticks. Fields freshly planted with rice all around. Who would have thought that after searching all over northern Thailand for villages and hill tribes that we could reach them just within a 10 minute walk from our hotel! 

That night - clearly identified chicken skewers for dinner! 

Day 74: Transit to Luang Namtha, Laos

We are already getting great vibes from Laos, and we just got here! We decided to just spend the extra money to get a bus that would take us directly from Chiang Rai to our next stop Luang Namtha in Laos. It just makes it easier to have the bus take you through the border crossing than having to do it yourself (which involves taking a bus from Chiang Rai to near the border, then a tuk tuk to the border, another bus between no-mans land in between borders, then a tuk tuk from the immigration crossing Laos to the closest bus station, then another bus from Laos to Luang Namtha). No thank you.

The border crossing was so much more relaxed than our previous ones. It felt like there were only 2 buses of people crossing into Laos on that day. Already, the transition between busy Thailand and Laos had begun.

Unlike between Thailand and Malaysia, where you couldn't really see much of a difference between one side of the border vs the other, you see the difference between Thailand and Laos almost immediately.

1. Welcome to driving back on the right side of the road! 
2. Hello, road lined with villages made of wooden huts
3. Look, there are lots of naked children bathing and swimming in that river
4. Oh my gosh, so much greenery. Tree covered mountains followed by rice-filled plateaus with small little wooden huts on top of them
5. Ooh, look a hill tribe person carrying wood on her back
6. Ooh, ooh, look, another hill tribe person wearing a turban and tending to the cattle
7. This is what we always imagined Southeast Asia to look like

Seriously - it's pretty breath-taking. As soon as we got to the town, we got a good vibe. Some Kiwis living here gave us the low-down on Laos. They are honest; albeit a bit lazy. You can leave your wallet in the middle of the road and nobody will take it. They are very friendly. They are content with life, i.e. they are poor, but happy to just have enough food for today.

We'll see how much we like Laos once we get to interacting with it a bit more, but we are loving what we've seen so far. 

Day 71-73: Chiang Rai

Being an ethical tourist really puts the kabosh on activities in Thailand. Well, actually Pallavi is the real ethical tourist. I totally would have done it if she hadn't told me better.

We went further north to the small town of Chiang Rai. It's surrounded by wildlife reserves, elephant conservation centres, tigers, and hill tribes. It's also two hours to the nearest border crossing with Laos. We thought it'd be the perfect last stop in Thailand. We'll go see some hill tribes and wildlife, get a Thai massage, and say our goodbyes.

The elephant conservation centers, which only allow tourists to act as temporary caretakers (feed, bathe, clean up crap) for semi-wild elephants, were booked out. Every other wildlife tour always involved some sort of 'circus' element.

Exhibit A: Take care of an elephant and then have an elephant ride/trek out to the wild. Uhh... doesn't sound like rehabilitation to me. I mean, I get it. It's a ride on an elephant. Pretty cool. However, that's not conservation. No elephants for us.

Exhibit B: Go and have your pic taken next to a tiger. I have friends who have done this activity, but I know what happened to Sigfield & Roy. We don't believe sitting next to a wild tiger is safe, and we don't believe in drugging the tiger to make sitting next to it safe. So no tigers for us.

Then there are the hill tribes. We started looking up where we could go to visit the 'long neck' tribe. We could not believe the number of articles that advised us not only to not visit the long neck, but also not to visit any of the hill tribes whatsoever. The hill tribes no longer really dress in traditional clothes unless it's for a special festival. The hill tribes you can go on tours to visit have 'signed up,' and put on the traditional clothes as part of the 'show.' Participants include the 'long neck' tribe, whose traditional clothes actually cause physical pain to its women. Not only that, but most of these tribes only get a fraction of the proceeds from the tour. There are NPOs trying to change that, having tribe people 'sign up,' but getting all of the proceeds from tourists who come to their village. However, it is still just a 'show.'

Let's say you decide to forget the tour agents and the NPO villages and then just try to find these hill tribes on your own. You might find a hill tribe living in a traditional way; however, most people would not be dressed traditionally. Not only that, but you've basically rocked up to their village without invitation as a spectator and the people don't profit from it. I know we use people for tourism all of the time - look at the Amish. However, Amish villages are usually near a town and has a store - which indicates the village is open to people visiting it. Plus, most people who visit the Amish at least go and buy some yummy baked good from their store, so the people get some income from it. Not the case with hill tribes. So no hill tribes for us.

Instead, we took it easy.One thing we love about Thailand is that it feels like no matter where you go or the size of the town, the culture is always on display. For example, in Krabi town, our hotel was right across from a night market with a stage that had hours of cultural performances (including one that we can't get out of our head). Even Chiang Rai's baby night market had 2 stages with multiple performers who performed every night!

We also went to Chiang Rai's White Temple. Going to Chiang Rai and not seeing this temple would be like going to Barcelona and not seeing anything by Gaudi. This temple is like Frozen meets Dante's Inferno meets Gaudi meets Buddhism. Seriously. The temple itself looks like it is dripping in icicles covered in frosting. It's much more modern than Gaudi, but has his same over-the-top architectural style. Only these artists really takes the demonification of consumerism and personal possession to a level I have not seen in Buddhism. You pass something that looks like the bad scene in Little Mermaid when Arial is going to see Ursula and she has to pass that whole bed of just hands reaching up in torment (in my head that's how I think it is) in order to cross the entrance bridge. Outside of the temple, there are hanging carved heads of movie characters like Gollum, Wolverine, Malificent, etc. Once you get into the temple, there is a beautiful scene that wraps the entire interior. You start at the back of the temple with images of Hollywood characters, 9/11, bombs, etc. all wrapped in flames going into the mouth of a Devil-like creature, except a few souls on various boat-like vessels who are floating towards the Buddha at the front of the temple. Heavy stuff, but super cool.

Finally, I got a Thai massage. It was like 4 months of stress got the crap massaged out of it. It made me wonder if I shouldn't just take a massage class sometime. I already give (might I say) decent back rubs. Why not make some money out of it? I'll contemplate a bit more. However, Thai massages are a full work out for the masseuse, what with using their feet and legs in addition to their hands. I loved it. I've gotta go find another country known for massages as we travel along so I can know when to look forward to my next one.

Tomorrow, Laos!