Sleepy and Beautiful Luang Phabeng

We arrived in Luang Phabeng late in the afternoon on our second day in Laos. We were greeted by the standard hordes of guesthouse toutes at the dock but headed out to find our own place. It was relatively easy to stumble upon decent accomodation. For the equivalent of $2.50 USD we stayed in a spacious twin room with a shared bathroom fully equipped with a hot shower. Three of the guys we met on the boat, Paul, Ben and David, were also staying at our guesthouse. We all took our turn enjoying the steamy bathroom while the rest of us relaxed on the veranda drinking Beer Lao. We shared the usual crazy travel stories and discussed musical tastes.

Dinner was on the banks of the Mekong river under plastic patio lanterns. The whole day was filled with "I can't believe where I am" moments. I was feeling very grateful to have the opportunity to experience all of these adventures.

I spent my first full day in Luang Phabeng just wandering the streets. Kirsten was feeling unwell, possibly due to the malaria meds so I was alone and enjoying the solitude. Loung Phabeng is less of a city than a sleepy little town on the banks of two rivers. The buildings are French colonial and made me feel like I had landed in a European town stuck in a time warp.

As I walked past one of the many wats a young monk called out "saybadee". His name was Bounthong and I talked to him about his role as a monk, his plans to study computers and his dreams of one day visiting Canada

The next morning I was awaken at 4:00am by roosters and didn't really get back to sleep. The group of us were hoping to rent scooters to visit the nearby countryside. But this particular week the police had decided it was illegal to rent scooters to foreigners. Instead we hired a tuk-tuk driver to take us to Koung Xi falls with its eleven spectacular tiers. We hiked a trail to about halfway up the falls and then actually climbed the falls themselves to get to a deep swimming pool. We took turns swinging on a vine into the pool and jumping off the rocks.

The trip to the falls was filled with picturesque hills, rice fields and villages. All the children would wave hello as we passed. The smiles and warmth in this country have been overwhelming.

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