Luang Nam Tha (February 13-14)

One month is over now. Every day I enjoy it more. I like the cultural diversity in Asia and that the people are incredibly friendly. I have also met a lot of interesting people from Western countries who are either on holiday or live here permanently. In very few occasions I felt lonely or bored, so I can say that my first month was a success, although the beginning was not very smooth.

The border crossing to Laos was really straightforward. Actually I thought there was a bridge between Chiang Khong on the Thai side of the Mekong and Huay Xai on the Lao side but after passing Thai emigration we were brought to the other side by long-tail boat. The visa on-arrival procedure and immigration in Laos worked really well. I had to pay 30 USD for the visa and that’s it. Huay Xai is not really exciting so I decided to continue to Luang Nam Tha in North-eastern direction. In Huay Xai I met Mario from Zaragoza. He travelled all the way by land and started in his hometown last March. He crossed Europe, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, China (including Tibet), Nepal, India, Thailand and finally Laos. I guess he was over 60 years old, really impressive! He only had to take one flight from Kolkata to Bangkok, because you cannot cross Myanmar by land.

I forgot to mention that I am a millionaire now. I changed 70 USD and 3400 Baht (85 EUR) and got 1.440.000 Kip in change. You can easily get confused with all the decimals when 1 EUR corresponds to more than 10.000 Kip, crazy!

The trip from Huay Xai to Luang Nam Tha was really nice. We were only 5 people on the minibus and had a lot of space. I was really surprised because in developing countries they normally wait until the bus is full in order to save gasoline. The landscape was very nice with great views from above the mountains. I really noticed a difference to Thailand because the villages we passed were quite poor. The houses were exclusively built with bamboo and other material from nature, no concrete or stones. Children were running along the street naked, something you wouldn’t see in Thailand. The road was in pretty good shape because China is investing heavily in Laos. You could see the signs indicating that construction is funded by China. Obviously they do that not because of charity reasons but rather to be able to better exploit the country’s resources. Laos still has a vast jungle area compared to other Southeast Asian countries but it seems as if these days are now counted. Deforestation is clearly visible along the road. Once more you can see how human greed destroys this planet.

Yesterday evening I was about to book a trekking tour but I was so tired that I decided to take one day off. It’s funny to say “one day off” but travelling is really a full time job. At the end I wasn’t able to do nothing so I rented a motor scooter to discover Luang Nam Tha and surroundings. It’s nice but the landscape is more less the same as in Northern Thailand. It’s interesting to drive through all the villages (on the right side, not on the left!). The people were really nice and started to smile when they saw me and all the children were waving to me when I passed with the motor bike. Suddenly a group of teenagers walking along the street indicated to me that I should stop. I first didn’t know what they wanted but then I realised that they ran out of gasoline and wanted some of mine. I had no problem with that because I thought I had enough so one of the guys started with the tank-to-tank fuel transfer with the help of a tube and his mouth. I have no idea how much fuel was transferred but when they finished my tank was almost empty. I had another 20 km to the next gas station! At the end fortunately I made it! This was my contribution to development aid in Laos!

Tomorrow I will go on a 2-days trekking (if the group size is big enough), otherwise I will continue to Luang Prabang.