Luang Prabang

laos

All for me

Two days on a boat and excited for a bed!

Just a rose I CARVED OUT OF A TOMATO

At the intersection of the Mekong and Nam Khan rivers, Luang Prabang's peninsula is an Unesco-protected district of centuries old wats, colonial French architecture, and streetside noodle soup and coffee vendors.  While the outer peninsula welcomes its upscale guests in style, the city retains much of its affordability, authenticity, and charm (the outdoor riverside cafes are the perfect way to burn an afternoon).

We celebrated New Year's Eve in Luang Prabang, and for this the LPDR relaxed its very real nightlife curfew of 11:30pm!  Like any New Year's Eve worth its hangover, we ended up at a bowling alley.  We arrived back at our guesthouse just before sunrise, only to hear a roaring percussion ensemble from the wat next door celebrating the holiday.  We rushed outside and were the sole spectators for this performance.  As our band concluded we heard similar ensembles performing in the distance, at the other wats scattered about the city.  And with the drums, of course, countless howling dogs!

We eventually hired bicycles to escape our bubble, and an easy five km ride lucked us into an attractive waterfall where we met a kind newly-wed couple from New Zealand, and I cooled off with a swim.  Neither of us had manned a bike in years, but we did well weaving through the afternoon traffic of motorbikes and construction trucks.  It was the closest I've felt to not being an oafish falang.  We got slightly lost, but that meant seeing an area of the city we would have never otherwise encountered.