Motoadventures2up: Around Luang Prabang

Laos, a new country for us and we are excited about that. The slowboat into Luang Prabang was a great introduction. As the boat pulled up to the shore more than a few tuktuk drivers waited to whisk us away to one of the many guesthouses. We didn't have anything booked and didn't really know where to start so we took the first one in line. To make a long story short, we found a room for the night and in the daylight the next day we found something a little more comfortable...the Sengphet Guesthouse, we would highly recommend it. We took their most expensive room, $19 for a large very clean room with t.v., internet, free tea and coffee, and all the bananas you could eat! The guesthouse also had a nice sitting area where we met a couple around our age from Canada and doing a simular trip as us, Guylaine and Greg, and Victor with his wife and kids from Hungary

We spent 8 days in Luang Prabang and as usual the time went very fast, before writing this I really had to sit down and think about what we did there. The highlight for me was the four day film festival, films from around Southeast Asia were shown at different venues around town including the town square, a tourist information centre and a FANCY resort (the most expensive in L.P...$1700 a night...the place to be seen in Laos). We took in at least one film a day, these are the films we saw and what we thought of them;

1. Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay, 2011, Philippines, 4/5*'s
2. Mindfulness and Murder, 2011, Thailand, 4.5/5*'s
3. It Gets Better, 2011, Thailand, 5/5*'s
4. With or Without Me, 2011, Vietnam, 4/5*'s
along with a few shorts the best being
1. Mom...I..., 9 minutes, Laos

All the movies we saw had English subtitles and we enjoyed the whole experience.

We rented mountian bikes, one day, and went in search of some waterfalls we had heard about but we didn't bring a map so we ended up on a wrong road that took us approximately 11 km out of town the last 5 km up into the mountians (we kept pedaling thinking the waterfalls could be just around the next corner). Instead of waterfalls we arrived at a small village where we stopped for a break and had a chance to interact with some of the locals. Everyone we saw gave us a big smile and a "Sawiadee" (hello in Laos). The ride downhill was much easier than up, Ken got a strange look and a smile as he passed a guy on a moped!

After not finding the waterfalls on the mountian bikes we decided to rent a moped the next day and try again, choosing a faster form of transportation. We found 2 waterfalls, the Tat Sae Waterfall, small but with next to no tourists, and the Kuang Si Waterfall, very busy but impressive there they had a sanctuary for 6 asian bears. The asian bears are about same size a our black bears but with big heads like a grizzly and round fuzzy ears like a teddy bear. We hiked around both waterfalls and found ourselves dripping with sweat from the humidity, the temperature was around 28 degrees and the humidity close to 90 percent. Drink lots of water!!!we told ourselves.

On other days, we did lots of walking in town, visiting the National Museum (the old royal palace) and many Wats, and enjoyed drinks and the view at a restaurant overlooking the river. We found a great restaurant called "Delilahs" where we, quite often, had the "Laos farmer breakfast"-an omlette with onion/tomato/and dill, sticky rice, steamed vegies and a dip made from eggplant and garlic, yummy! and all for under $3. I think it would be very easy to be a vegetarian here, with all the veggies and fresh fruit shakes.

For the first couple of days in L.P. we ran into many of the same people from the slowboat but as the days went by we saw fewer and fewer, it was our clue...time to move on.

Kuang Si Waterfall. Look closely Ken is standing in the middle.

The countryside around Luang Pragang, farmland mixed in with dense foliage. The diet in Laos is fairly healthy, lots of vegetables, but unfortunately a lot of the food is fried. You will not see a McDonalds anywhere though!

The view out of a window of one of the many wats. This one has a nice view of the national museum(formerly the royal palace), and the surrounding gardens.

A monk at a temple, contemplating life or ???

Froggies on a stick.

Luang Prabang and the Khan River as seen fromThat Chomsi on Phousi Hill, located in the middle of the old town area..

Apprentice Monks say a prayer for the people on Luang Prabang. Alms is given each morning from around six a.m. The Monks walk the streets collecting food from the people and in return they pray for them.