Luang Prabang, the UNESCO World Heritage City (Day 10 – Day 12)
Mar 03
Let us continue the adventure…
So I have arrived at Luang Prabang alive. But the problem right now is how the hell am I going to find a place to sleep at 4am? Practically the whole town was sleeping. Together with Antoine, Pierre, Remi and Guillaume, we lunged our backpacks that feel heavier than usual into every corners along the dimly lit empty streets and then knocking on every doors that looks like a guest house only to be ignored or greeted with the standard excuse, “we are full”. Dogs were barking at our presence, breaking the silence of the night. I do feel guilty for every doors I knocked. As the clock ticks away, we were getting wearied and desperate. We even tried one of the many temples in town and to our amusement, we received the same standard excuse, “we are full” from the temple’s caretaker. WTF? How can a temple be full?
We almost gave up until we came to Merry Guest House 2. After a few knocks on the door, we were greeted by the owner. Instead of giving us the same standard excuse, he told us we can check-in in the morning but we were allowed to spend the remaining few hours on the floor of the living room free of charge. We accepted his offer immediately without any hesitation. His mother was kind enough to provide a sleeping mat and a blanket for each of us. We stayed in the guest house until we left Luang Prabang. It only cost me 64,000 kips or RM27.
The reason I made Luang Prabang one of my check point is because it is an UNESCO World Heritage City. Other UNESCO World Heritage sites I have visited are…
- Melaka and George Town, Historic Cities of the Straits of Malacca
- Kinabalu Park
- Halong Bay
- Historic Centre of Macao
- Angkor
The town was small enough to walk around. However I was too lazy to walk, so I rented a bicycle at 20,000 kip (RM8.50) a day. These are the photos I took on the first day.
My brunch
Street in Luang Prabang
My rented bicycle
Banana fritters
Choose your flavor of tuk tuk
Wat Ho Prabang, located in the Royal Palace Museum’s compound
Staircase going up pussy Phu Si hill. Entrance fee is 20,000 kips.
Over looking Luang Prabang town and Mekong River on top of Phu Si.
View of the town from the other side.
Chatting with Su In and Hwang Ju from Korea while waiting for the sunset on top of Phu Si.
Sunset…
Tourists taking photo of the sunset on Phu Si.
Hmong Night Market. You can find Lao textiles, handicrafts, jewelery, traditional medicine and other souvenirs there.
Stove for our barbecue dinner
Barbecue dinner, Lao style.
From left: Me, Guillaume, Pierre, Remi and Antoine.
Beerlao. National pride of Laos. You can see them everywhere in Laos.
On the second day, we visited Pak Ou cave and Kuang Si waterfall. Since they are located quite far from town, we had to rent a van to bring us there. Each of us paid 120,000 kips (RM51) for the one day tour. Our first destination was Pak Ou cave.
View of Pak Ou cave from across the river.
Cute little girl
Have to cross to Mekong river by boat to reach the cave
Cam whoring on the boat
Pak Ou cave. Entrance fee is 20,000 kips.
Go to the cave early so that you won’t have to cramp with hordes of tourists that arrive later by boat.
The cave is stuff with all kinds of Buddha’s statues and images
Termite infested carving. Anyone?
Antoine doing his stuff in the background
More statues
Checking out the upper cave. That is right, Pak Ou has two caves. One lower cave and one upper cave.
At upper cave
There are plenty of souvenirs you can buy on the way up such as…
Key chains
Bananas
Some ugly, furry things
Poor little birds
We have to paddle our way back to the shore because the boat’s engine died half way across Mekong river
Motifs on pillar of a temple
Young monk in the village
Along the way, we stopped at one of the village to sample Lao Lao (Lao Whiskey). Shown here are wines with “special” ingredients in it.
More wine with special ingredients. Please note that it is not for decoration. It is for consumption.
Satay Lao style. Taste awful.
One of the stall selling Lao Lao.
Our last destination was Tat Kuang Si or Kuang Si waterfall which is 32km away from town. The entrance fee was 20,000 kips. It was the most beautiful waterfall I have ever seen. It features a wide, multi-tiered waterfall tumbling over limestone formations into a series of cool, turquoise-green pools. See it yourself…
A perfect combination; turquoise-green pool with bikini clad women.
Look at the color of the water. Don’t you feel like swimming in it?
Am I in heaven?
We celebrated our last night in Luang Prabang with cocktails before we part ways on the next morning. Thank you guys. Luang Prabang wouldn’t be as fun if without you guys. As a token of appreciation, here is a little promo for you guys…
Guillaume, Antoine, Pierre and Remi are 4 friends from France who decided to embark on 7 months expedition across the world. They have visited South America, India, Nepal, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and South East Asia. In fact, they are still on the road now. You can follow their wacky adventure in their blog; Tour du Monde. However, the blog is written in French.
Next stop: Vang Vieng…
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Hey Ben ! So nice to read our adventure in Luang Prabang. It is a really good memory for us too… Pictures are so beautiful !
See U
Cheers
Remi, Guillaume, Antoine, Pierre
hey..nice place.
thinking of going there next year.
anyway, how much did u spend in laos??
is a week enough?
I think no more than RM1k for one week. You can fit in Luang Phrabang, Vang Vieng and Vientiane in a week.