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We arrived in the small village of Nong Khiaw from Luang Prabang at around midday.
We strolled into town (actually we staggered into town under the weight of our immense backpacks) trying to find accommodation.
Nong Khiaw immediately impressed us. It is surrounded by huge limestone karsts and the village sits alongside the pretty Nam Ou river. We crossed the river by foot into the adjoining village of Ban Sop Houn. After much haggling and to-ing and fro-ing we found some cheap digs for the night.
Both Nong Khiaw and Ban Sop Houn are relaxed and friendly villages. A nice place to stroll around and enjoy the beautiful Lao scenery, or sit and enjoy a Lao coffee (strong syrup-like coffee, best served with condensed milk).
We ate at a simple family run restaurant and had the most delicious South East Asian food we've yet tasted. I had a dish called Orlarm, which is a kind of lemongrass and beef stew with chillies, aubergine, mushrooms and aromatic wood bark for flavouring. Amazing!
Nong Khiaw is a trekkers mecca, so the next day we headed out on a two day trek to visit one of the remote mountain villages. Our guide, Tong, first took us to a village where we could see locals weaving fabrics. He then led us out of the village through lovely countryside and numerous rice paddies climbing higher into the mountains up a long series of jungle covered waterfalls, the water cooling our feet.
Lunch was a delicious mix of sticky rice, vegetables and Lao sausage, which Tong had brought along wrapped up in banana leaves.
We carried on up through the jungle, eventually reaching the mountain village in mid afternoon.
We learnt that the village, Viang Hen, was created relatively recently by the Lao government. In order to provide electricity and road access, the Lao government had relocated two other villages and created Viang Hen. The two relocated villages were of different ethnic minorities in Laos, Hmong and Khmu. We wondered how this relocation had been met with by the villagers and how the two communities had integrated. Tong, himself a Khmu, could see both the good and bad things about the relocation.
Next we were taken to the school to meet the school children and teachers. We had brought some Lao books and footballs with us as presents for the kids. The children were really funny and were clearly enjoying seeing these curious, sweaty white people with the long noses bearing gifts. I played penalties with the kids whilst Steph spoke to the teachers.
After we left the school, Tong led us to a large cave nearby. We climbed deep into the cave which contained bats and rats. The air became fetid, moist and warm and quite hard to breath. We learnt that during the secret war, when thousands of bombs were dropped on Laos, the local people lived in the cave to escape the bombardment.
As the evening cooled and the light faded we sat outside our wooden hut and more children came to see us. Tong and I played a great game of kick about with some of the village boys. Steph watched as the village girls (some carrying their younger siblings) played simple games similar to jacks and hopscotch. I took some video footage of the kids and they really loved seeing themselves being played back. They crowded round me to watch themselves. At the same time a few of them couldn't resist touching my leg hair out of curiosity. I guess hairy legs are a bit of an oddity in Laos.
We sat and ate with Tong and talked about Laos, his religion (animism), and village life. We were saddened to hear how tough their lives are but very glad to have experienced their warmth and friendliness.
The next day, we left the village and began a long trek which took us up and over a mountain pass, through small farms and villages.
As we sat waiting at one of the lower villages, a father appeared, holding his son by the arm. The son had gashed his finger with a machete and his hand was covered in blood; a wound inflicted whilst fashioning a wooden spinning top. The father signalled for help and Tong, together with another villager, sterilised the wound with iodine and bandaged him up. We were interested to see that the father had chewed up one of the local plants and applied it to the wound to prevent it bleeding. The village had no hospital or medical clinic and Tong explained how plant medicine still played an important role in Laos.
We continued on and eventually reached the banks of the Nam Ou river. From there we caught our long-tailed boat back to Nong Khiaw enjoying the spectacular mountain scenery.
No rest for the wicked. The next morning we began a 3 day kayak trip down the Nam Ou river back to Luang Prabang. There were five tourists in our group, an English couple and a Dutch guy.
We packed our things into dry bags and loaded up our inflatable kayak. The early morning cloud shrouded the jungle covered mountains as we paddled down the peaceful river. The only sound was the sound of us bickering about our asynchronous paddling.
We paddled and bickered and bickered and paddled. The sun burnt off the cloud cover by midday and we paddled on with the bright sunlight in our faces. At various times splash attacks took place between the various kayakers, and there was even a mutinous splash attack from my own crew member to contend with.
We reached a village just before sunset where we stayed the night. The English couple had a ukulele and harmonica with them which had immediately put them in my good books. We all tried to entertain the villagers with rather sketchy covers of western songs. A particular lowlight was our rendition of Buffalo (or Buffa-Lao) Soldier by Bob Marley. The village kids enjoyed playing the harmonica and looking at Jupiter through my binoculars.
The next day involved another 7 hours of paddling and now that we had found our rhythm, rather less bickering. The river was in the main very calm and slow moving. One oddity however was the large number of whirlpools and upwellings created by the river currents. These were easily strong enough to lift and turn the kayak, frequently sending us off course. The last hour of weary paddling was over a series of fairly challenging rapids, where we almost capsized. Fortunately we kept the boat upright and were very relieved to make it to our camp site. Whilst the guides went to pick up our tents we unsuccessfully tried our hand at net-fishing.
After pitching our tents and building a fire, the guides brought us some very tasty fish and rice and importantly, some cold Lao Beer.
The Dutch guy was former special forces and had some amazing stories of missions in Iraq and hostage situations on oil-rigs. The beautiful stars, ukelele music and war stories made for excellent campfire entertainment.
The next day, we got up early and after a quick breakfast pulled on our wet clothes and set off again. After four hours, we stopped for lunch near the confluence of the Nam Ou and Mekong rivers. Shortly after lunch we reached our destination and were driven back to Luang Prabang. We were sad to leave the river behind, but also relieved that we had made it back on dry land with all our cameras and phones and passports in one piece.
~Chris
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