Cruising in a slow boat along the Mekong River was one of Ron’s very first things on his wish list for our travel itinerary way back in the early planning stages. So it was with great expectations we climbed aboard in Luang Prabang heading for Huay Xai with an overnight stop in Pak Beng. Of course Ron being research guy had figured out the skinny on how to make sure we got on the best boat with the best seats possible. Every boat is different, some with comfortable seats and some with small wooden benches. Every boat is a traditional style river boat made of wood. Each day is 9 hours long on the boat so you can imagine the importance of making sure we were going to be comfortable. Ron chatted up the guys at the dock and found someone willing to reserve our seats and Ron made sure he was down there one hour early to secure the seats.
Nine hours on a slow boat on the river. Lots of time to read, listen to the iPods, do some math and gaze at the scenery going by. We were all a bit underwhelmed at the scenery. I think we were expecting to see more life along the river but there was only the occasional village and not much in between. It was very pretty…but 9 hours is 9 hours. The river is constantly changing levels, making the captain’s job difficult as he dodged around the exposed and unexposed rocks. A safe route one week is not necessarily a safe route the next. Which is why we chose not to take the fast boat. Option number two for the Mekong is to take a fast boat for about 6 six hours for the same distance we covered in 18 hours. Tempting, except for the rumors of high accident and fatality rates. A fast boat sped past our slow boat at one point. It was an oversized sea flea, low to the water with a loud engine on the back crammed with about 8 tourists leaning forward into the wind (and away from the screaming engine) wearing huge fluorescent orange bubble helmets. Five minutes like that would be too long let alone 6 hours…if you made it. We are glad we did the slow boat trip and would recommend it to others. There are just a few realities that come with it which are good to know about.
Overnight was in Pak Beng which is also accessible by car (meaning you can jump ship if you can’t handle the pace) and about ½ way between Prabang and Huay Xai. The town is nothing special and it is a bit of a race up the hill running into the various guest houses to find a bed. Boats converge here from both directions so the beds fill up quickly. The boat that drops you at Pak Beng, turns around and returns to where it came from. This means you have to get on a new boat for the 2nd half of the journey, and go through the process of securing seats all over again. Sadie and I took this early shift to get seats and it was a good thing as our boat only had about 16 comfortable seats, the rest were small wooden benches. But people always find a way to get comfortable sprawling all over on the floor and across the benches.
We arrived in Huay Xai at about 5:30 hoping to get across the river and into Thailand by the time the border office closed at 6pm. It was a total scramble to get all the forms filled (every country seems to require more than one departure and arrival card…health form…customs cards etc.) The girls are really good now at filling out their own and we have all finally memorized our passport numbers. We didn’t have a place to stay in Chiang Kong so we ended up trudging up and down the road in the dark trying to find a place. Turns out Chiang Kong didn’t quite have the charm we thought it had (and the Lonely Planet is badly out of date for this town) but we eventually found a good bed, dinner and internet. Breakfast was stellar at the Bamboo Café with the first whole grain bread, home-made jam and the best coffee we’d had in a long time.
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