Fresh off our slow boat through Lao to Luang Prabang, its been a great trip.

When we last blogged we were in the town of Chiang Khong, we weren't really all that impressed with it when we first arrived but it really grew on us. The middle part of the main street was actually quite pretty and the whole town itself was pretty quiet and steady. We had a meh tea of fried rice that was included with our hotel and decided to go buy supplies for our boat trip tomorrow. Walking back to the hotel we passed a bar which had Oli a chap we knew from our hostel in Chiang Mai. He was a with a pretty big group of English, American, French and Chilean backpackers. We ended up having a drink with them, a few a too many actually.

The next day started off pretty fuzzy with a bit of a hangover. It was also pretty cold and raining so it was a complete waste of cash upgrading to the AC room! After breakfast, loaded down with supplies for the slow boat we got a lift to the "Border". Some chap in a shack took our ticket and gave us a sticker and told us to head down to the river crossing. We had our passports stamped out of Thailand and got in a pretty rough looking boat for our trip (less than 5 mins) across the Mekong and into Laos. The otherside was teeming with backpackers all waiting for the visa on arrival to be processed and we waited patiently as the guy in the office waved processed passports through his hole in the glass for people to collect and part with their $35.

Following successfully entering Laos we wandered further away from the river and found a guide who recognised our sticker. A group of six of us had this sticker and were shepperded to a tourist office, then down the road to a cafe. Here we were told we would wait for another group. After an hour or so and a few more groups arrived the guide had us all together. He then proceeded to "warn" us about the dangers of the slow boat. Horror stories about mosquitoes, river floods, unexpected stops for the night in the jungle and crooks in Pak Beng. He then said for no extra cost we could take the much safer bus and be in Luang Prabang tonight. We were actually pretty convinced by his speil and almost took the bus, but we had come here to sail down the Mekong! 80% of the group took the bus and presumably the guide made a handsome profit on the difference between the cost of the bus and the boat ticket that was already paid for! The remaining six of us were rudely shown where the waterfront was and left us to figure out which of the 10 or so boats was our slow boat.

Here we found Oli from the night before and one other girl called elora, the entire rest of the group had played it safe and taken the bus! We made ourselves comfortable in the long boat and settled in for a long journey. The boat was filled with old bus seats that were not fixed to the ground, leg room was fairly limited and the engine noise filled the cabin. The Mekong is an impressive river, very brown and its surface covered with eddies, whirlpools and bubbling areas. As we passed we saw plenty of rocks and rapids as well, every now and then you would hear the sound of rock on metal and the boat would rock slightly as the boat grazed the river bed. Charlie had read that there were large, deep holes in the river bed where giant catfish live, presumably they were the cause of the boils and eddies very visible on the surface.

The entire day was overcast and we didn't really see the sun at all but the temperature was very pleasant which made a nice change. We arrived in Pak Beng around 6PM and the entire town came down to tell us what nice guest houses they all had. We skipped this and walked up the hill into town. We found a nice Indian chap that had a guest house perched over the river. It was stunning, by far the best finished room we have stayed in with an immaculate bathroom. The best part was we had our own balcony looking out over the Mekong. Of course it had a price to match..but after some very relaxed haggling he dropped from $30 to $10, presumably realiing that we were the last of the boat load and his last chance for a sale that day. We dropped our bags and went to explore our new town.

To say Pak Beng is small would be an understatement, the place lives and dies by the river boat. All other business relies on this, we wandered the town and met lots of people from the river boat. This included a dutch couple from our hotel who we crossed the border with, and Oli and Elora from the bar the night before. We had a nice dinner of traditional Lao Lab and curry. Lab is meat cooked with lots of herbs but most noticably corriander! The most special part was the restaurant overlooked the moonlight Mekong with tree covered mountains either side very special sight that the camera just couldn't seem to capture. We ended the evening on our balcony with few Beer Laos, most special moments of the trip so far on that balcony in the moonlight. (the large snake right outside our room...not so special!)

In the morning we had to rush to get our boat, much smaller this time with less leg room and an even noisier engine. It was a warmer day but with the occasional rain shower. The Mekong seemed wider and more placid but there were still areas with rapids and plenty of rocks around. Charlie also learnt a valuable "Golden rule", don't fall asleep on a boat without suncream on, even if it does look cloudy.... or you'll end up with lopsided burn.

We arrived in Luang Prabang around 5PM and headed into town. Got a nice hotel with AC, again not convinced we needed it! Luang Prabang is far smaller then we expected and definately has a french influence. We took a wonder around the night market lots of rugs and crafty stuff. Fruit shakes are 5000kip here or about 30p maybe. So slurped one of these and ran into a few people from the night in Chiang Khong, not sure they were that pleased that they took the bus, arrived here at 4AM!!

We found a gorgeous restaurant for tea, it was the busiest one by far on the main road and we soon found out why. Massive portions of tasty food, we had an Or Larm (a light Chicken broth), Tom Khem Mou (Pork and Tofu stew with a sweet caramel sauce), amazing bamboo spring rolls and some dark sticky rice that you roll up and dip in the stew and broth. AMAZING and all washed down with a few beer Laos. Great night but after stuffing ourselves we were shattered off to bed!