Jungle Trek: Lions, tigers and bears – Oh my!
Anthony and I set out for our trek the morning after we arrived in Luang Prabang and found that were in a great group with two Americans who are teaching English in China in the Hunan province and on holiday and a British editor who is on the last leg of her half year of travel. For more details and photos
Toui (pronounced two-ee), our guide for our 2-day jungle trek is 19-years old and moved to Luang Prabang from a village up in Northern Laos to go to school. He goes to class during the week and on the side, he leads treks thru the jungle for Tiger Trail tours, the company that sponsored our trek. He makes USD50 /month, which amounts to USC600/year. Half of his salary pays for his tuition which is USD300 per year. He pays USD10/month for rent for a house that he shares with 4 other guys. That leaves him USD15/month for food and other living expenses. He goes to school so that he can “graduate smart” and believes strongly in the importance of education. He’s an easy-going Laoation with a great sense of humor and a heart of gold. He speaks great English and was the best tour guide that we could have had. Without him, our trek would not have been nearly as enjoyable.
Our first day had us hiking thru the teak forests, tropical farmland and through some of the most breath-taking mountain scenery we’ve ever scene. We also hiked thru a few villages inhabited by two of the areas tribes, the Hmong, probably the most well-known Laotian tribe, and the Khmu, one of the largest indigenous tribes. Both tribes are settled farmers that practice slash-and-burn farming and depend on agriculture for the main source of food and livelihood. There is an organized leadership within all these tribes as a tribe head is elected annually whos responsibility is to maintain communication with the other tribes and be the “go-to” person for all internal and external tribe related matters. We were greeted with polite friendliness and wonder in each village that we hiked through. It seems as though the villagers do not get much tourist traffic and are still open to foreign visitors, which apparently isn’t the case in areas like Northern Thailand where tourist treks are so plentiful that the locals are accustomed to visitors.
We stayed overnight in a Khmu village and enjoyed the awesome dinner that Toui whipped up for us. For much of the night, the villagers would wander by our hut and peer over the fence to watch us during the night – much like visitors would observe animals at the zoo. We also had no shortage of visits from the local livestock and animals who continually managed to sneak thru the fence to keep company (and try to mooch some of our dinner, of course). Interestingly enough, though the villagers all live very simply with in basic bamboo huts, no running water, limited electricity from gasoline-run generators, and live off of what they produce, raise and hunt food – there was one household that had a big screen TV and DVD player. That night we were invited to a movie showing at this house for USD0.05/person and though we all decided to pass as the movie was in Thai, we were fortunate enough to witness the event. Pretty much the entire village gathered in the living room of this family’s bamboo hut and watched the movie, enjoying the entertainment as a community. The money that was collected from each of the viewers is used to purchase new movies from town and for gas for the generator. Our group spent the remainder of the night chatting, playing cards and drinking Lao-Lao (Laotian whisky that smells and some would vouch tastes like paint thinner).
The next morning, we woke up early and hiked to the elephant camp where we hopped on our elephants and rode them thru the jungle which was great fun – you feel like the king/queen of the jungle. The driver even let me sit right on the elephants head for a good half hour to get the real experience. To add to the fun, we happened to get the most delinquent and rebellious elephant in the caravan, Saam, who would often take it upon himself to snack on ANY type of vegetation next to the path or just go off-road on a whim when he got bored with the normal route. At one point Saam, decided to take a little detour walk into the brush and refused to move for a good 5 minutes. After halting and rest of the caravan and not responding to any of the coaxing coming from all the caravan drivers, the gates opened and low and behold Saam opened up the flood gates and let out out an impressive number 1 and 2 along with an incredible display of elephant flatulence…..WOW, wouldn’t reccomend it to my worst enemy. We crusied down to the Tad Sae waterfall where we had a refreshing cold swim and lunch, hiked to the river to get our kayaks. We spent the rest of the day kayaking down the river, observing the river life and making our way back to Luang Prabang.
Best Eats: Toasted baguette, an egg omlette, and Nescafe instant coffee (chock full of sugar and non-dairy creamer) – sounds nuts, but hands-down one of the best breakfasts we have had yet.
Most Memorable Eats: Durian-flavored cookie sandwiches. If you love yourself you will avoid them like the plague. For those of you who don’t know what durian is, its a funny fruit that “smells like hell and tastes like heaven” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian. ) It smells so bad that it has been banned in the subways of Singapore. Too bad the cookie company made cookies that smelled AND tasted like hell (more like rotten mango with a touch of poo for extra flavoring) for our consuming pleasure.
Best Moment: Stopping to take a break during our trek at a little bamboo hut (basically just a platform with a thatch roof) up in the mounatains which provided incredible shade and shelter from the beating sun. Our whole group sat down and like dominoes, we each laid down and took the most incredible power nap I’ve ever had. We’re all still talking about it.
Funniest Moment: Turning around and unexpectedly finding a naked little stowaway sitting on the back of our kayak. Apparently he had silently hitched a ride while we were cruising down the river 🙂
Best Quote: “I got drunk in Thailand and woke up in Laos.” – said by Katie McGelligotti to a friend she was supposed to meet in Thailand that week, but couldn’t because she ended up in Laos for the week.
– Shan
Tags: Laos, Laos, SE Asia, Travel
Shan