The Nam Ou from Muang Khua to Muang Ngoi

No Luxury Boats Up Here

 Typing this with a headlamp on the keyboard in Muang Ngoi, a sleepy little town inaccessible except by boat.  The only electricity here is generated by generators or small individual water-driven power plants.  Of course, there's no a/c here, but there isn't even enough juice to run ceiling fans.  Stifling hot during the day, but pleasant at night.  Headlamps a must since they only deliver power from about dusk (5:45) to 9:30, or whenever the batteries run out.  Gotta charge all the electronics in a small window.  The boat ride down the Nam Ou from Muang Khua was breathtakingly beautiful and I shared the boat with nine others from Holland, Switzerland, France and Laos.  We navigated some class two rapids and the driver was a master.  Settled in a nice little guesthouse for 100,000 ($12.50) which was much better value than Muang Khua, but still not nearly what you would get for the money in Luang Nam Tha or Oudemxai.  When I arrived, the manager was arguing with a tour group advance man who was disappointed that there wasn't 24 hour power and a/c.  Seems like the fault was the group organizer, since most everyone knows this is a rustic place and lack of amenities is part of the charm.  Wound up drinking with some guys from Korea, Germany, the Yukon and an Aussie I'd befriended on the ferry into Laos from Thailand.  The place was run by a Swedish guy and his Lao wife and family.  Decent veggie buffet for only $3, but lack of real power meant the beer could have been a lot colder.  They bring in a few blocks of ice on the one hour ferry from the next town South, so it's a little better than awful.  Glad I brought the smart phone since there's a cell tower in town and having the laptop means I can catch up on some videos from home as I sit here in the quiet darkness.  In the morning, I'll trek a few hours to a tribal village and enjoy the karst formations along the river.  Sublime place.

Just Outside Muang Khua

The Driver Was a Master

Muang Ngoi Looking North

Trekking Muang Ngoi

Some Trekking Photos of the Muang Ngoi Area

 Spent six hours trekking to a nice little village E of town, marred only by the large tour group.  Still a bit baffled why a large tour group would head to the antithesis of organized tourism, especially since it involved a 12 RT hour boat ride from Luang Prabang for what amounted to one short day in town and one trekking day, then a 5AM wakeup and back on the boat to Luang Prabang; these poor folks probably are paying $100+ per day each and staying in a $10 hotel with a serious lack of amenities.  I trekked for awhile with Felix, who just graduated high school in Bremen; nice kid finding his way around the world and also was able to chat with a Lao guide who bemoaned the cultural losses brought about by Lao's rapid movement into the 21st century.  He felt the sense of community was being replaced by greed.  I can only imagine what's happening to the culture with even tiny villages sporting satellite dishes; I'm afraid the real Lao is rapidly disappearing and only the elderly cling to any kind of historical cultural values. I spoke with another Lao, a schoolteacher way up North and her feeling was that the government was selling everything they could to the Chinese, who are logging, mining and farming everything square meter they can get their hands on.  The good part is that kids are getting educations here, apparently paid for by the State (though I did see some private schools around Muang Sing, as well).  Meanwhile, I'm still out in the boonies, with no real feeling yet how this change has impacted larger places like Luang Prabang and Vientiane, though the reports from others indicate huge growth in both places over tha past decade.  Get here soon, folks.

Souvenirs of the American War Outside of Guesthouse