luang nam tha adventures
day one - blog
frog
Glenda and I are staying at the Boat House, a quaint ecotourism (they actually mean it, with solar hot water and electricity!) lodge on the river here. We awaken to find little frogs all over the bathroom, and one is clinging to my backpack despite my hauling it around trying to find a bathing suit.
bog
The mist over the jungle here is intense, a white cloud hovers over the green hills everywhere. The river is still high, and chocolate-brown from mud. We are pulling our kayaks - let's just call it like it is, big red dinghies - into the river and our shoes get stuck in the mud. As we make our stops at the local villages, our flipflops collect more hay and goop. Eventually they look like platform shoes, the bottom made from sludge!
grog
We stop in one village for lunch, after some pretty good rapids (glenda steered like a star, and got many paddle-high-fives). They served green pumpkin stew, beef stew, and spicy eggplant mash - with sticky rice, of course. We are watching village life, all the women pounding rice husks and the puppies trying to sleep on top of each other for warmth. It is raining most of the day.
dog
Once we got off the river, our guide decided we needed to try Lao Lao (the ultimate creative term for rice whisky). I think he liked Glenda - his comments about the older women appeal were strong hints... Regardless, one of the villages nearby had a policemans meeting coming to a close. Meetings are one of many excuses for drinking. Beer laos is passed around in communal (and communicable) glasses. Then they want us to share the meal. Turns out they cooked a dog special for the occasion. So much for the cute puppies we watched that morning. They too will be ceremonial dishes soon - and we just couldn't stomach the thought, nor the dog sausage. THe worst was when they fed the dogs under the table some bones...
wait for it...
you know I have to do it...
I guess it must be a dog-eat-dog village...
We also drew the line at "jug whisky", a huge urn filled with rye and rice and silty water that you use a huge straw to suck up the bottom booze. Also glad, and surprised, to see our driver did not partake!
day two - Princess Buttercup of the Jungle
Now we are into the wild. We are trekking up a mountain of sticky rice fields and rubber plantations (thanks, CHina, for raping the Laos jungle...). It is 34 degrees in the shade. We are amazed by how many things can be created with bamboo - hiking poles, baskets, bowls, boats, and even entire homes. Water buffalo share the trail, and have turned it into sludgy mudtraps that grab at our feet like suction cups. Each time we fall, we owe our guide a beer. By the end of the day, we are indebted 8 Beer Laos - and there are only two of us.
Our guide is a local Khmu man, who grew up in a village that survived on subsistance farming. The villages we go to for this trek are only accessible by walking or boat, so they learn to tough it out (when Glenda asks about medical care, they say waiting six days to see if the symptoms subside and if the local medicinal herbs might help is the rule). These villages have organic, free-range chickens, pigs, ducks, goats, and (yes, just when you had forgotten) dogs. Glenda and I have decided that you could not be a princess and trek out here. Too many ants. And we smell like bog.
day three - InsectAside
Leeches.
No one warned us about the leeches.
They wave their spindly little pin-like bodies in the air until they grab onto a moving object, and crawl up it until they find skin to feast on. We find at least twenty each - the highest managed to reach my knee.
The bugs are thick in this part of the jungle. We are trekking along the Nam Ha today, until we hit our next mountain range. The path is not well-trod, even the hardy villagers take an easier route out.
We are irritable when we finally reach our next village, but almost weep under their cool water tap where we can rinse off layers of caked-on mud, bugspray, suntan lotion and sweat (glow?).
Soon, the local children have spread the word about the falang who have arrived. They gather in their dusty, torn clothes to remind us that even at our most grim - we have something to change into. They gawk at us as if we are the attraction.
Once we settle into the bamboo hut, and our guide kills a duck for dinner, the show begins. First, we must exchange songs - campsongs like The Other Day and Kukabura are big hits, but we think they liked You Are My Sunshine best, since they insist on clapping along with everything. Their songs are mingled with giggling fits and feats of acrobatics on the patio (which is missing much of the floor). This leads to yoga maneuvers - these kids have skillz. Finally they settle in to watch what us chill out, and touch our toes or arms to ensure we, too, feel just like them.
These kids are gorgeous, with huge brown eyes and sparkling smiles (it continues to astonish how such a poor country is full of such incredibly gorgeous white teeth). The girls can climb trees in their long folded skirts, and the boys can hang off the roof from their toes.
Tonight, we have learned how to tie our mosquito net better to avoid the ants. Small mercies.
day four - not-so-wildlife
Our last day is a gentle paddle down the Nam Tha. We pass through some of the protected area again, and look into the trees for monkeys.
Insects bleat out like car alarms (honest!), and skinny fishermen gather nets in their underwear. The only monkey on the river is me!
Our guide tells us he wants to start up his own trekking company. This one has been arranged by the Green Discovery outfitters, so is pretty legit (and organized, not the most Laos trait). He is thinking of names, and picking our brain for some english lessons. He is so sweet, we decide it must be a cultural phenomenon to alert us of our route once we have passed it and must paddle upstream (our first day guide did the same).
We are glad to reach the Boat Landing guesthouse to partake of as Laos a Thanksgiving as we can manage - pot roast duck in lemongrass, and a curry for gravy. Lime mint slurpies are gulped with wild abandon. The shower is like heaven.
Thanks for your attention, if you made it this far.
Hope you enjoy hearing about our time here.
For us, it has been a great reminder as we start to work in the hospitals - that the vast majority of the nation lives in mud and bamboo huts, has one change of clothing, and sweats the day in a rice field...
Now we fly off to Vientiane, where there is french cuisine and a workout facility. Soon, we will make our way to the provincial hospital, and contend with congealed blood soup and dusty small town life again.
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