Luang Nam Tha and back to Thailand

This post features pictures that Beth took during our three day trek. Another big thank you to Craig and Beth. Craig is finally pictured below, simultaneously sucking down some home brewed rice whiskey with Andrew. Tasty! Actually, it was pretty smooth. At the bottom of the shot you can see the mug used to refill the whisky with water. We were told to suck until the guy had to refill two cups of water which, when being pulled through long bamboo straws takes a lot of sucking. See Andrew suck. Makes it look easy.

Other than a beautiful shot of the river and surrounding scenery I'd also like to point out that you can see the back of the kayak partially submerged while Nicole rides a good foot above the water line. It's, uh, supposed to be like that and in no way motivates me to start shaving off some elbees.

The lady below cooked our meals and hauled water up from the river for cooking. Small fire pits are used by the villagers for cooking. Corn is hanging from the ceiling to dry and, eventually, to be used to feed their pigs. While we were there the woman had a huge vat of simmering corn slop bubbling away over some coals.
On Saturday(the 21rst) morning we left Laung Prabang on a bus for Luang Nam Tha, further north in Lao. Having a previous bad experience with the "VIP" bus, we agreed to take the local buses whenever possible (that way if we had a bad experience, at least we wouldn't have paid extra). The bus was just fine, although all buses here are maddeningly slow because of poorly constructed mountain roads. Unlike the states, driving through the mountains isn't just a matter crossing a pass. Instead, the roads repeatedly climb up and then descend through the karst landscape. In this case, eight hours worth of up, down, and side to side. Not to mention that much of the road is unpaved - providing the additional joy of bouncing and shaking. Just as with riding the school bus, the back seats get more bounce for the buck - kind of fun for us, but I think the vomiting villagers disagree. The problem with motion sickness is apparently not isolated to a few Lao villagers. It is routine for the bus conductors to hand out much-needed plastic bags.

We had planned on trekking in Luang Nam Tha, but ended up deciding against upon recommendation from Jasper and Roline, a Dutch couple we met during the bus ride. They mentioned that they were heading for The Gibbon Experience and suggested that instead. We couldn't get reservations, but are seriously considering heading back to Lao to check it out. Jasper and Roline were staying in the area for a couple days and we went "scooting" along with Jasper around the surrounding countryside in full body, chain mail reinforced leather jump suites (air bag capable), enormous helmets, and never exceeded 5 km/hr . It was incredibly beautiful there - several rice fields were being planted despite being the dry season. For the first time we saw a sea of green rice fields, all with huts for sheltering the tenders, and all being planted by hand. It is quite a thing to see. On an unfortunate note, I am not used to riding on the back of a motor bike. . . and was not aware of the danger of the hot tailpipe. So along with photos, I might have a nice scar to remember my trip by.

Getting back to Thailand was a relief to both of us for reasons we could not quite put our fingers on. Lao makes Thailand seem like a picture of order, modernity, and development. For example, the bus station we were at this morning used a computerized ticketing system, assigned seats, and tagged our luggage! Amazing.

In any case, we are in Chiang Mai now, and (due to the nicer Thai roads) no one was sick on our bus, so Andrew's fears were assuaged for the time being. We purchased another camera today, so we will be back to publishing recent and relevant pictures. Wish us luck - we're hoping this one survives longer than the last!