too old for dreads

Of course PDR actually means People’s Democratic Republic, but this place is better known by westerners for it’s relaxed and laid back atmosphere. 

That’s not quite the vibe you get when you arrive at Luang Prabang airport and are met by a wall of officials all there to process your visa. 

No smiles. No pleasantries. All dressed in communist party green. It’s the first – and typically only – reminder that this is a Marxist single party state which has only really been truly open for the past 10 years or so. 

I tried to open up conversation with our guide yesterday about government here. All I managed to get from him is that very few people in Laos have passports, therefore foreign travel is very rare and that the single party government is ‘very strong’. As soon as I started to probe a little deeper and asked him more subjective questions about life, politics and government here, he quickly clammed up and said he couldn’t understand me. I realised I was straying in to difficult territory and we changed the subject. All very interesting and a real reminder that Laos remains a very different country. 

We’ve been in Laos during the run up and eventual election of Donald Trump as President of the US – a strangely bizarre place to be. From talking to some Laotians, they are clearly aware that the election is going on but none of them would be drawn on an opinion. We reckon it’s because they’re just not used to (or not able to) express opinions on politics. So today the relaxed PDR of Laos has continued as normal and nothing feels very different here. The same can’t be said for the rest of the world I’m sure. 

We’ve spent the day dyeing, spinning and weaving at a fantastic place called Ock Pop Tok. And we’ve come away with a bit of a silk masterpiece that we weaved ourselves. Amazing and very surprising! 

Boy has it rained today. Clearly it’s not just the political landscape that’s changing across the world; climatically this place should be well and truly in the dry season but it’s very much not. Something is definitely changing. 

Luang Prabang was listed by UNESCO in 1995 as a World Heritage site and it’s a lovely place. Very quiet, with lots of beautiful French colonial architecture interspersed with amazing temples and highly gilded Buddhas. We’ve cycled our way around the place and got a real feel for it. We met an English guy who moved here a couple of years ago after quitting his job in the City. He’s opened a great little bar here called 525 after falling for LP’s charms. Think I can understand why. There is something about the place. 

It’s been exciting finally to see the mighty Mekong. 

We were inspired by the great documentary on BBC with Sue Perkins working her way from the source of the Mekong to where it meets the sea in Vietnam. 

Here in Luang Prabang, the Nam Khan river meets the Mekong in a boiling brown confluence with little whirl pools and timber that’s been washed down from the mountains eddying round, right in the way of the river longboats. 

We went off piste this week and headed in to the Laos jungle to learn more about the country, native tribes and all the wildlife that lives outside the towns.

We walked miles (back in our ‘technical’ Tasmanian ponchos) and went to a Hmong village and a Khmu village; they were side by side and numbered Laos Laos 1 and 2. However the houses were differently designed, the peoples’ faces were different shapes and they spoke radically different languages (both of which were very different to Laos). It was a great experience – in spite of the rain, leeches on our legs and ants in my hair. 

It’s been markedly quieter and less polluted here than elsewhere in South East Asia. There’s been no shortage of people here though. We’ve realised just how busy South East Asia is as a tourist destination and that you’ve got to work hard to get off the main track. 

Here we are absolutely on the main track having the obligatory pic at the very busy and beautiful Kuang Si waterfalls just outside Luang Prabang. 

We’re heading to Siem Reap in Cambodia tomorrow to spend a few days at Angkor Wat and we’re excited about that. Everything we hear about the place tells us we’re going to be blown away by it.