After three nights in Luang Prabang we began the long commute to the small border town of Houay Xai (We had booked three days at the Gibbon Experience out in the Nam Ha National Park and their office is located in Houay Xai) so we booked two nights there before heading off into the wilderness again.

The journey to Houay Xai was memorable for the wrong reasons. We booked a 14 hour overnight bus to get there from Luang Prabang, with our guest house booking us on the local bus instead of the tourist bus 😬.

The sleeper bus had lay flat beds with two people squeezing into one about the size of a single bed. Matt and I had our seat on the bottom level down the back with not even enough room to sit up. To make it worse, the weird old man I spotted in the woman’s bathrooms prior to departing was lying opposite us, watching us as he played his loud Lao music through his phone. After getting past the cramped conditions we settled in to some back to back Shark Tank episodes.

At this point it was dark and the bus (seats) were all full, with us and an old French couple being the only tourists on board. We then began to stop every hour or so to deliver bags of rice to small villages along the way. Occasionally more people got on and without any spare seats, parked up in the aisle to sleep right next to Matt.

The winding roads, multiple stops and over crowding made it very difficult to get any sleep so we arrived in Houay Xai at 7am très fatigué.

After a nap we explored the main and only road and realised it was going to be a long two days before departing for our Gibbon Experience.

We did find some things enjoyable. Up the dragon steps is a cool restaurant where we had amazing fried chicken and watched the sunset over the Mekong River, with Thailand on the other side. Further up the dragon steps was a really beautiful Buddhist Temple and school for Monks with a great view.

Pakbeng

After three incredible days in the Nam Ha National Park we headed back for one last night in the ghost town of Houay Xai, ready to catch the slow boat along the Mekong River back to Luang Prabang the next day.

The slow boat took around 6 hours a day over two days to arrive in Luang Prabang with an overnight stop in another very small thoroughfare town called Pakbeng.

The boat ride was much more comfortable than the overnight bus with pretty comfortable seats and stunning views of the Mekong riverside. We met some people from the Netherlands at the Gibbon Experience and booked our slow boat tickets with them at their hostel to get good seats right up the front of the boat. The back of the boat seats were a lot less comfortable, right by the bar, engine and squat toilets – a very smelly trifecta.

We relaxed and listened to podcasts before arriving in Pakbeng. Getting off the boat onto the floating pier was hectic with people trying to claim their luggage and locals and children trying to sell all sorts of stuff. After checking in to our guest house we went and had some beer Lao’s and a great paneer butter chicken at the local Hive Bar. We ended up playing cards and drinking beers until midnight before retiring for the evening.

The following day we were on the boat two hours early to claim front seats again, armed with sandwiches and snacks. We arrived happy in Luang Prabang again at around 6pm.

We are now ready to fly to Hanoi, Vietnam on the 11th of February. Gibbon Experience photos to come!