Only a week since I last wrote; miracles do happen. I am in the most atmospheric, most charming city (small town, really) that I've visited here in South-East Asia. It was a long, hard slog to get here, but well worth it.
I left Vientiane with my newly-issued Chinese visa and my huge conical peasant's hat (great against the sun) and rolled through really dull, flat rice country to the town of Thalat. I made a big mistake there; it was late in the day, and rather than press on to the lake I wanted to get to, I stayed in "The Guest House" in Thalat. It should have been called "The Brothel". It was hideous, someone stole my Lao phrasebook and the end of my radio antenna (senseless vandalism, really), the beds were unspeakable, there was noise until 3 am, the hookers kept knocking on my door to offer their services, and I was very, very happy to get out early the next morning.
The ride to Vang Vieng saw the plains end suddenly in a serious set of hills. It was a shock to the system to have to climb in lowest gear at 5 km/h for a four or five hours on end, but then I was over the hills and amidst the lovely limestone towers of Vang Vieng. It was a great place to relax in a bamboo hut hotel, eat well, drink cheap draft Beer Lao and drift down the river in inner tubes. It was a very dramatic setting, with forested vertical walls of limestone soaring far over my head. It was hard to tear myself away after only one rest day.
It took three days to ride the 232 km to Luang Prabang. The valley of Vang Vieng came to an abruptly vertical halt and I climbed for hours and hours over a big pass to get to Kasi, in another valley. The road went against the grain of the land, connecting villages that, as in Nepal, sit on top of ridges rather than down in the valley bottoms. It really was the beginning of the Himalayan foothills; from here to Pakistan, there are continuous mountains, and the vegetation, birds and even the people of the hill tribes are all oddly reminiscent of Nepal.
From Kasi, the climbing got serious. At one point, I climbed for 35 of 37 kilometres, liquefying in the heat, wondering if the hill would ever end. The pass I eventually crossed was well over 1500 metres above Kasi, and I stopped for a long, tired lunch at the top. I met my first overland motorcycle tourists, a group of 4 English and 2 South African bikers who had ridden from London to Kathmandu, flown to Bangkok and were zipping around South-East Asia before heading down to Australia and New Zealand. An hour later, I met 3 Swiss motorbikers coming the other way. I camped that night hidden behind a schoolhouse, high on a mountain ridge with spectacular views and a breathtaking sunset. It was welcomely cool at that altitude and I actually got to use my sleeping bag, which has been excess weight for most of the trip so far.
Yesterday was even tougher: 110 kilometres of alternating descents and ascents. Luckily there were more downhills, since otherwise I wouldn't have made it here before dark. The scenery, if possible, got even more spectacular and reminiscent of Nepal, and I realized how much I had been craving mountain scenery while in the flatlands of Thailand. The villages that I passed through were from several different ethnic groups, and I could see the differences in the faces and the elaborately woven skirts that the women wore. The villages were monetarily poor, and the young kids were half-naked or clad in ragged Western mass-produced clothes, but they seemed to be pretty content with their lot in life. They seem to have enough to eat, and the women weave in the shade under the houses while the men hunt with home-made rifles and the the kids fetch water or firewood. Immensely pregnant sows and turkeys scuttle across the roads, while the fields, carved out of the primeval forests by slash-and-burn methods, bristle with corn and sugar cane, with a bit of dry-land rice as well. There are no Buddhist temples; the tribes are animist, worshipping ancestral spirits. These are really the first people I've seen on this trip that are almost completely disconnected from the rat race of the cash economy. As long as harvests are good and there are no wars, it's a decent lifestyle if you've grown up with it. The hordes of kids in the villages bodes ill, though; the hills are already fairly deforested, and there's a limit to how much more new land can be brought under cultivation.
Anyway, I made it here yesterday afternoon, sped along by a 23-kilometre downhill and a 12-km one. Luang Prabang is the old royal capital and is full of delightful temples decorated in an exuberant yet tasteful style. As well, the downtown is a neighbourhood of French colonial buildings that have faded and peeled to an agreeably picturesque degree. There are wonderful photo opportunities around every corner, the people are laid-back and friendly and seem truly happy with their slow-paced lifestyle, and you can see why under the French Luang Prabang was the most highly-sought-after posting in the Indochinese Civil Service. I will rest up here and sightsee for a few days and then head for the Chinese border, maybe 4 days' riding from here.
Until next time, sabaidee from lovely Luang Prabang.