Trip to Luang Prabang

Trip to Luang Prabang Lao

As I have mentioned already in my last blogg we took a minivan to the border. Our pick up was around 9 pm and we arrived there at 3 am. Fortunately our ticket included a bed in a creepy guesthouse to sleep for a couple of hours. Boys and girls were not allowed to stay in the same room (a Thai lady indicated that quite strictly) so I shared with an Argentinien girl.
We had to get up a 7 to get some breakfast and cross the Thai-Lao border. To do so you have to cross first the river by water taxi, so far was everything still under Thai controll which means there is still some organization. The moment we arrived at the visa application in Lao with turned crazy. Even though people tried to queue this has obviously no value for the Lao border officers. To finally get a stamp and a visa you would need to fill out the application, put it in your passport, include a foto and pass it via other applicants through the window of visa application office. Than wait!!! Once in a while a door would open and a passport would be given to any person waiting there for their own passport. This person checks the name and starts calling for the owner of the passport. Then payment issues are handled. 36 USD for 30 days.

After we got our visa, we went to the pier to board our boat as we would continue by slowboat to Luang Prabang. The slowboat takes 2 days but is supposed to be really nice. Lao is famous for it „Lao-Time“ which means basically everything is not that efficient and rather slow and people just take it easy. Maybe it can be said that Lao is the Greece of Asia :-) Before we left a nice gentlemen gave us a introduction about how to find accommodation in Pat Beng (the village we would stay overnight). According to him, there is not enough accommodation for 200 people and therefore it will be difficult to find something and unfortunately it is not too safe BUT we need not worry because FORTUNATELY he has a guesthouse with a couple of free rooms for ONLY 500 THB (12 euros, that doesn t sound much but actually it is). Of course this had to be a scam and we did not go for it but some others of course did!!
When we arrived in Pat Beng many many people were standing there with there signs offering rooms! We got a really nice one (fan, hot shower and very clean) for 250 THB – half of the price!
This village exists mainly because the slowboat stops there. As a result you ll just find guesthouses, sandwich shops, restaurants, marihuana vendors and ONE bar. The bar is called „The HiVE – the best and only bar in town“ and it has a cerfew at 11.30 pm!!!! PARTTYYYYYYYYY :-)

The next day – again a boat day. We arrived around 5 pm in Luang Prabang. I had imagined it to be much bigger but it is rather a small town. Program: find a guesthouse and food. Mission accomplished for today!!!!

regards from Luang Prabang (Lao)
Astrid and Fabian