Slip-sliding and dust-eating, i.e. road travel in Lao

October 28th, 2002 at 12:00am

Whoa. Tired. 8 hours on the back of a pick-up today. I’m still in Lao, but I can see Thailand just across the Mekong River. I arrived too late to cross the border today; will be heading out first thing in the morning.

I have no idea how many kilometers we rode today but I can tell you how much dirt was on my face, up my nose, and all over my body when we arrived. A LOT. The first 2 hours of the drive out of Luang Nam Tha were mud – wet, slippery, and full of puddles. We were slip-sliding all over the place, often times at the edge of a 5000-foot drop. I’m not a smoker, never was, but during those first 2 near-fatal hours I kept thinking man, I need a cigarette. At one stage we were trying to get up a muddy incline and well, we just completely slipped back down. Then on the next attempt, everyone had to move to the very back of the pick-up and jump up and down to try to force the car up. Now that’s the type of cultural bonding experience that you just won’t get on a package tour. Ha.

In the pick-up there was a German girl, me, and 5 local Lao guys. Which was pretty roomy considering I’ve been in pick-ups with well over 30 people before. Anyway we finally got through the mud (after crossing through several streams even) in the pouring rain which I forgot to mention (covering ourselves with plastic tarp) and then the road seemed to dry out and oh joy, it became dust-eating time. Actually I’ll take dust eating to near-death cliff dives anyday.

8 hours of dirt road in the back of a pick-up builds character. Yeah. Part of the Lao experience.

I can’t tell you how happy I was to finally get to Huay Xai and get OUT of the pick-up. Thailand today? No, tomorrow, 8am. Of course. Driver gets a kick-back from the guesthouses for bringing tourists in just late enough that they’re forced to spend another night in Lao. Doesn’t really matter anyway. I found a guesthouse, rinsed off the dust tan with a hot shower, and prompty went out for a Beer Lao and vegetable fried rice (or, in Thai-Lao-English,’flied rye’).

Tomorrow is my birthday (!) so it will be kind-of cool actually to get 2 stamps in the passport with my birthday on them. I’m anticipating a much smoother first-world type of aircon bus ride to Chiang Mai from the Thai side. That’s my birthday present.

Entry Filed under: Huay Xai,Laos