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Well our first day on the slow boat completed! We left the Green Tulip House on Friday morning and set off in a full mini van to the border town of Chiang Khong. The drive was fine although the driver was a Lewis Hamilton wannabe. Crazy arse driving especially up hills and round blind bends. But we made it safe and sound. We were lucky as the halfway stop to grab some lunch and toilet break was at Chiang Rai at the White Temple which I wanted to visit so bonus! We eventually arrived at Chiang Khong, our accommodation wasn't the best but thankfully it was for only one night. I can't complain though as the deal we got through our guest house was really good, transport to the border, accommodation with dinner and breakfast and the slow boat for two days was 1550baht (£30). We paid a man to sort our visa for Laos and get the exit stamp for Thailand he took our passports and said we would get them back at breakfast. We had breakfast and no sign of our passports then magically they appeared as we were just finishing. We all piled into the back of a pick up truck with our bags, 6/7 of us in total, driver had to go back to pick more up. He then dropped us at the border, piled into a little boat which took us onto the Laos side and then had to go through the visa business and paid our dollars. $35 lighter we had a stamp and could wait for the slow boat. A little man took us to a shop where we booked accommodation in Pak Beng grabbed a nice baguette for the boat trip and drove us to the river to get in the boat. We were lucky and managed to grab a nice comfy seat (old car seat) and eventually set off at 11.30am. I expected the journey to be uncomfortable from what I'd read, however it was actually quite amazing. We sailed down the Mekong through thick wild jungle with little villages dotted along the way. There was a varied range of nationalities and personalities on the boat, which made for an entertaining ride. In contrast to Thailand, which was flat for the most part, Laos is the opposite, very hilly and mountainous. Very untouched and natural terrain.
We arrived in Pak Beng at 5.15pm. We all climbed into another pick up and balanced ourselves in the back amongst the bags all 12 of us, no health and safety in Laos, arrived up the hill at our accommodation for the night! Slightly worse than last nights! I will definitely go with my gut instinct next time and chance it and find my own accommodation, thankfully just one night! I wonder what tomorrow will bring?????
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