Slow boat on Mekong to Luang Phabang, Laos

Tuesday and Wednesday, 21 & 22 November 2006

The first thing we want to do in Laos is to take a 2-day slowboat along the Mekong River from Houayxai to Luang Phabang. To get to Houayxai, we needed to make the border crossing at Chiang Kong in Thailand. This involves a 10-hour overnight minibus journey - the less said about that the better!

We had imagined the slowboat to be a converted cargo boat, shared with a few hardy souls like ourselves and a bit of room on the upper deck to laze about on. No such luck. Instead, it is a highly evolved form of tourist sardine-can. After all of the miniscule wooden chairs, fixed and loose, are occupied, the late arrivals are put sitting on the floor at the back of the boat (us) or, worse, are put in the engine room. The poor folk in the engine room have the anxious, half-startled look of refugees who have just been discovered by border police. They endure worse when the engine doesn't start and some cowboy mechanic tries to recussitate it by banging it in random places with a rusty mallet. It splutters into life to the cheers of the 150 or so passengers on board.

There is a party atmosphere on the boat: we are sitting with a group of Americans (Alaskans!), Australians, Belgians, Chileans and English, who drink the boat dry within the first hour (the lady at the food stand had to arrange an early emergency docking to replenish the stock of Beer Lao). One of the Belgians has brought a trumpet and plays a few bugle calls. There is a mad-eyed chef from Milan, dressed in a Huckleberry Finn outfit complete with straw hat, who spends the two days smoking dope, enthusiastically supplied by the crew. We also chat to Trevor, native of Hull, who is a great character and, stranded in Houayxai for a couple of days, has read up on Mekong trivia. Apparently, the biggest fish caught in the river was a 600 lb catfish. The river is also home to pink dolphins and huge water snakes. None of these decide to eat the eejit who fell out of the boat on Day 1. There were no lifebuoys on board but at least the captain had the decency to turn around and pick up the man overboard.

After the first day of boating, we stay overnight in Pakbeng village. It's a bit chaotic when we hit land. There are no lights by the river and locals, eager to make a bit of money, commandeer the luggage that is being tossed from the boat to the bank and offer to take it to a guesthouse. Silhouettes flitter about the place offering accommodation or marijuana. Eventually we manage to find our bags and head for Bunny Guesthouse. The accomodation there is standard enough but the restaurant seems to be working on the "one wok" system so it takes an age to get any grub. We find out the next day that the Indian restaurant in the village is pretty good.

Apart from the fun on the boat, the scenery is spectacular. The river banks sweep up into verdant jungle. We pass by fishermen casting nets, children playing in the river and other boats. When we see them, we feel sorry for the tourists who stumped up for the 6 hour speedboat to Luang Phabang. The engines on the speedboats are deafening. All of the tourists are wearing Dr. No helmets. As they whizz by, they look as if their eyeballs are going to pop out from the g-forces! Even if it was a bit slow, it was two days well spent and we really enjoyed it.

For more photos click here.