78: Red Cross Indulgence
08-Feb-2006
Today was the first full day in Luang Prabang after I arrived here by boat the evening before.
I checked into a different guest house and spend the best part of the afternoon at the Red Cross for some pampering…
I woke up around 7am as usual (strangely enough I do wake up around that time every day even without setting an alarm clock). Just as well though or I would have been woken up by the building work that started around 8am right next to my room. (You don’t notice the building sites when you check into a new hotel in the evening when it’s dark already 😉
So first thing I had to do was walk around town and find a better guest house. I was planning to do this anyway but the building site gave me an extra incentive to go out and find that quiet! place 🙂
I looked at a few places. Typically the places recommended in the guide books are overprices and pretty run-down. They take advantage of the “recommendation” I guess.
There are plenty of guest houses around and prices are typically between 5-15 US Dollars depending on what comes with it (Fan/Air-Con, Private/Shared Bathroom, Windows)a dn what state they are in though the price does by no means reflect the condition of the room!
I found a nice, clean 10 Dollar Fan room with private bathroom inc hot shower. The house is colonial style with dark wood interior and wooden shutters. The room as well as bathroom is large (the owner kindly offered me the big room with 2 double beds for the normal 1-bed price:-) and more importantly clean! I’, not tip-toeing around the room for a change;-) Oh and no Ants in sight like at the White House in Chiang Mai so I can leave my stuff unpacked ok 😀
The Guesthouse is located in the old, historic part of the Town which is good since this is the only part that’s worth exploring (I think). Not too far from the Boat Pier (5-10 mins walk) and just around the corner from the road running parallel to the river. There are convenient restaurants around the corner overlooking the river to have breakfast and walking up the road for 2 minutes leads to the main road with many small shops and restaurants. It’s also a perfect location for exploring the city as it’s the area of most Temples..
Once I moved my gear to the new place I was free to explore the town.
Actually I had breakfast first in one of the places overlooking the Mekong River.
I walked around town for a while going to the Royal Palace. There is no Royal Family and the Palace was turned into a Museum about Lao History, Tribes etc. I was keen to go there but whilst the grounds were open the Museum was closed.
Next I walked up Phu Si Mountain (about 190 steps) which is a little hill in the middle of the city. On the way up are women selling flowers for the temple and also little birds in bamboo cages to be released at the top for good luck. I did not buy any and hope it doesn’t mean bad luck 😉 On top of Phi Si is a tiny Buddhist Temple and a golden Pagoda.I took a few pictures up there but not the the pagoda since it was way to bright to get a good shot (plus it was very cramped due to the lack of walking space, the pagoda and temple basically use up the available space up there) Good views over Luang Prabang, though there was a lot of haze as usual. It was up here here that I realised that the sun in LP is blasting down considerably more than in Chiang Mai or at least it seemed like it.
I noticed already at the temple that Sunglasses are absolutely necessary as the sun is extremely bright here from 11am onwards. This plus the combination of white building walls makes it painfull to walk around unless you wear sunglasses but it also seems to get hotter than in Chiang Mai (less polution though which is a nice change).
Once I was down the hill I continued walking away from teh center, visited a few temples and the local market. You would thing I was used to Asian Markets by now but not so since I was rather put off eating meat here having seen piles of cut meat in semi-shadowed tables. This itself was not off-putting but the swarms of flies that covered the meat were… Two days later and I have not touched any meat yet..
I left this market soon and decided it was time for the planned recovery after the long boat trip. I read that the Red Cross are doing some excellent Lao Massages so I was off to pay them a visit.
Red Cross
The Red Cross is a little bit away from the busy area of LP but not too far and I managed to find it ok using the map in the LonelyPlanet Book.
The Red Cross has two things of interest on offer:
Lao Massage $3 (1 hour)
Herbal Steam Bath $1 (any duration)
I was keen for the massage as 2 days of hard wooden bench on the boat to Luang Prabang took its toll;-) Red Cross has about 15 people giving masssages, both women and men from 20-50 years maybe. I had a guy around mid twenty who was quite good but it din’t quite match the Wat Po Massage in bangkok which up until now was the best massage I had. Lao Massage is more like a Swedish Massage. It’s a whole body massage but with a lot of focus on Back/Neck/Shoulder and working the muscles by kneading plus some pressure massage whereas Thai Massage is much more based of pressure points, stretching and twisting your whole body (in a good way;-). Unlike Thai Massage the Lao massage is not given through your clothes but directly. This is surprising as it shows the difference in Traditions between Thai and Lao people. Thai would never massage you directly as it’s considered impropriate..
An hour later I felt better but didn’t feel like leaving just yet. I enquired about the steam bath but it would not open for another 30 mintes (4pm.. late) To gap the time I went to see a Temple opposite the Red Cross for a bit and then came back to the Red Cross where I had a fabulous Herbal Steam Bath. I was expecteing some large roman type bath house but it was not. Instead there were two small Sauna type rooms for up to 8 people, divided by male/female. Never mind it was VERY good and I spent about 1.5 hours there. You have little breaks between steam room sessions to have showers and drink some of the free tea…
Dare I admit after I was done with the steam bath I had another 1 hour massage! This time I asked for an older person to give the massage since skills might be better.
I was not disappointed! A woman called “On” in her late fourties maybe was amazing. I recognised the massage technique/moves from the previous massage but she was much more precise, skilled and applied the right strength compared to the younger guy. I would go as far as sawing that she gave a better massage than the one I got at Wat Po!
If I had a choice between Thai and Lao Massage I would opt for Lao as long as it was an older person giving the massage since I reckon the skills wil be better. The Wat Po Massage was given by a youngerguy as well (late twenty) but he was extremely good (probably because it is the top Massage School in Bangkok where I went and training takes about 7 years..)
I finally left the Red Cross after that second massage as it was after 7pm and dark already. I kinda felt quilty for spending a whole afternoon there but hey, on a second though.. I don’t. It was one of the best things I have done for a while and I was desperate for some pampering 😉
Tags: Laos, Luang Prabang
saschas
[…] 78: Red Cross Indulgence […]