When you read about what to do in Southeast Asia, "trekking" seems to be high on every list. We considered going trekking from Chiang Mai but decided to first give it a try in Laos for a few reasons. One, because there was so much else to do in Chiang Mai and two, because I had read many reviews where other travelers mentioned that they went trekking in both Northern Thailand and Laos and they thought that it was much better in Laos. Given our unexpectedly short stay in Chiang Mai - I'd say that our decision worked out well!
So what is trekking and how long do you go for? Trekking can be a combination of many different activities such as hiking and/or kayaking and mountain biking. All of the treks I read about offered a local english speaking guide and you can go for a day or several days and nights. We decided to get our feet wet with an all-day trek that included 8km of hiking and 11km of kayaking. We went yesterday, and it was ok. I wouldn't say awesome, but we had a fun day being outside, learning a bit about Laos culture, being active, and talking with other interesting travelers.
We started with a short ride out of the small downtown area of Luang Prabang in the back of a covered pick-up truck. Along with me, Jake, and our two tour guides, we were about to do the trek with three other travelers.
- Cecilia from Denmark, who had just finished three weeks of traveling in Vietnam before coming to Laos for two weeks. When she returns to Copenhagen she'll begin her masters degree in event design.
- Ben from Belgium who was enjoying five of his yearly nine weeks vacation traveling throughout Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. A fellow diver!
- Phil from Germany who was in the midst of traveling for six months while he decides if he moves back to NYC where he recently spent time working for a German bank (including three months living right near where we used to live in Brooklyn), or moves back to Germany. Like us, his stuff is also sitting in storage waiting to see where it gets unpacked.
It was great chatting with them throughout the day about how wonderful traveling is, and what it's like living in the U.S. and in their countries. We continue to meet people in all stages of life traveling the world - long journeys are so much more common in other countries. As a matter of fact, Ben shared with us that he works for the Belgian government and one of his benefits is that after working there for four years you receive a year off. When your year off is over - you are guaranteed your position when you come back. My reaction, "What?! Are you serious?!". Yep, he was serious. Unreal.
Anyway, back to trekking. I said it was ok and that is probably because it felt like a short walk in the woods, not a challenging hike. We could have handled something a bit more strenuous. During the trek we stopped briefly at the Hoify village. We saw some local children running around enjoying the day off of school to celebrate a national holiday - Laos Independence Day. Other than that the village felt empty. Our guide said that 83 families live there, just over 400 people. Most of people were out in the fields working to harvest and care for various crops: rice, hops, pumpkin, etc. Some of the crops they sell (all of the hops for instance), but most is for the consumption of the village. The village has very little electricity and the little it has is from solar panels. On our way out, we saw several girls bringing wood back into the village.
On our way out, we saw several girls bringing wood back into the village.
It would have been nice to interact with people in the village more, but that opportunity didn't really present itself. Maybe next time. Our next stop was at the Tad Sae waterfall where we did a brief swim in the freezing water! I've never seen that color water before and it was really beautiful. The waterfall was much more inviting than the thunderous ones we saw in Scotland and Norway. We hiked down to it and it had two levels. The first level was completely natural and there were only a few people swimming in it. The lower level, where our guides brought us for our swimming break was also beautiful but appeared to have some artificial aspects to it also to make it easier for people to get in and out of.
Tad Sae Upper Falls
The lower level had an “Elephant Camp” where you could pay to bathe, feed and/or ride elephants. It is nice to see these creatures, they really are fascinating...but it’s awful to see them chained up.
We ended the day with about two hours of kayaking in a double kayak. To get from the waterfalls to the area where our kayaks were, we took this long boat.
You feel as though you are only an inch from the water. While kayaking we saw two buffalo that were swimming, well maybe just standing in the water. You could only see their eyes and horns but that was pretty cool.
As far as trekking goes, our next one will be for 4 nights and three days in Sapa, Vietnam. This one will include a one-night homestay so hopefully it will be a bit better than our homestay in Italy.
~Jesslyn