Up River

I have been travelling up the Nam Ou, a tributary of the Mekong, and back for the past week. We travel in a very small boat with hard wooden planks to sit on. We stop at the river bank when the boat driver wants to stop for a pee. Then everyone scuttles off to squat behind some rock. We move slowly past blue dragons-back mountain ridges in the distance, beyond wooded hills. At one point we crunched onto something - rocks? the river bottom? Our driver turned round and gave us a big grin, then continued. Past Pac Ou caves we turned off the Mekong into a narrow channel, through high Karst formations. After the brown, muddy Mekong, the water of the Nam Ou is glassy green. Suddenly it was so shallow that we all had to get out and push the boat. We continued, crunching the river bed from time to time.

After seven hours we stopped at Nong Kiau, a little village beside a huge concrete bridge, the other side of which are rows of bamboo huts for tourists to stay . Spectacular high Karst formations loom either side of the river. The boat lands at the base of a dirt track, leading up to a ramshackle village of tin-roofed shacks. No-one meets us at the boat landing, offers to carry our bags or transport us by tuktuk to the nearest guesthouse. We are completely ignored! I drag my bag up the rough, stoney dirt track to the village, then all the way along the village high street - more dirt track -  to the bridge, where suddely the road turns to tarmac. On the other side of the bridge is a beautful cafe - a wooden platform under a roof with carved wooden railings all round and the whole expanse above it open, with views of the river, palm trees, bamboo sided huts, fishing boats and the steep cliffs of the Karst formations, trees clinging to their sides.

Next day I went for a walk with an American woman who is living and teaching in Seoul, Korea. We walked along a nice, flat, paved road, high peaked mountains all around us, covered in jungle, until we came to a sign indicating the way to the caves. A man in a little bamboo hut sold us tickets to see the caves. We followed a path through dense undergrowth, over a little stream then up steep steps to the cave. We saw the bamboo ladder that people used to use before the steps were built. It must have been difficult climbing that ladder with sacks of rice, barrols of water and other necessities. Incidentally a former president of Lao spent some time living in a cave during one of the many wars that afflicted Laos.

Muang Gnoi

A little boat took us up river to Muang Gnoi. The rapids are faster and more furious than down river and the boat kicks up a huge spray as we go against them.

Muang Gnoi is a dirt road with bamboo hut guesthouses on either side. It is about a thousand metres altitude, so cold at night, but very hot in the middle of the day.There are no roads to or from it, just the ever-dwindling river. Diesel-powered generators run from six til nine pm and for an hour in the morning.

At half past one it was hot and hazy. The only sounds were the cocks crowing. The river, which was distant and low was glassy, reflecting the riverside trees and feathery bamboo. Steep, peaked mountains are thickly covered in forest. Giant banana leaves wave lazily in the breeze. The woman of the house has put her baby in a basket, suspended from a beam by two ropes. She pushes it to make it swing. The baby is silent.I have a little shack at the edge of the forest to sleep in. There's a shared toilet and dip and pour cold-water washing facilities.

The trip down river back to Luang Prabang was slow and long. The river level seems to have fallen. Twice we had to get out of the boat and walk several hundred metres along the bank, while the boat (lighter wihout us in it) continued on its way, then picked us up further down stream. Frequently the boat slowed almost to a standstill as we navigated rocks. It took over seven hours.