Well we flew to Luang Prabang Airport in Laos on a small propelled plane, "
it looks like something out of Tintin", remarked Harry and the three intrepid young travellers embarked on their next adventure, excited although obviously minus 'snowy' (Max, our ageing Jack Russell) the dog! Once gain I had the pleasure of siting next to Freddie , my 9 year old, who in his usual way was very excited, especially at being able to see the propellers outside his window.
"Wow, look at the propellers, they are going round so fast you can't see them ................. I wouldn't like to be Harry, (sitting behind us) because if they come off he's dead ...... it will slice right through the plane and chop him up!......... I think I'll be ok"
Fred has this amazing ability of making all the passengers on the plane feel totally at ease on any flight!! ............. Needless to say, Harry decided to move to the spare seat in front of us, just in case, leaving the man sitting next to him all alone! ........................ I half expected Freddie to turn round to him and say in a slow deep voice: ..............
"be afraid ....... be VERY afraid!" !!
Fortunately the propellers stayed on, Harry lived and the man sitting behind us survived with only minor emotional scarring.
Airports, they always seem the most stressful part of our journey as the children are always hugely 'hyper' after the excitement of the plane - the seriousness of getting your Visa at the Airport in front of all those straight faced Officials with guns, just doesn't wash with the children! I am sure they think they are some kind of 'FUN' police and their guns are really water pistols, ready to squirt at any moment, and as for trollies and Baggage Reclaim ............ well, that's just a free ticket for the Luang Prabang Airport F1 qualifying circuit and if that isn't bad enough, they even have their own 'moving fun slide'..........what us normal human beings tend to call 'the baggage conveyor belt' ......... why don't the Officials just deport them?!! .............. I'm actually surprised we ever get into any country!! ..............
"Was I really this bad when I was their age!!?" ........ 'I need a drink!!' ....... but, you know what they say, if you can't beat em! join em! ......................... next Airport, it might be less stressful signing up with Team Baggage McLaren!!
Luang Prabang is quaint, calm and appeared extremely chilled compared to Hanoi, with a general millay of bicycles, tuk-tuks and scooters passing by and after a medicinal Gin & Tonic and a Beer to get over the trauma of our Airport ritual!, life started to calm down and we all meandered through the midnight market that was alive every evening with local crafts, silks, art and jewellery and other general bric-a-brac ranging from ancient knives to Tigers teeth! We ate a a recommended restaurant Dao Fa Bistro, which boasted good home made pasta! and wonderful ice cream! and they weren't wrong ............................. However, for some unknown reason I decided to have the Crocodile Red Curry with Rice!!
Next Morning, 04.00am - I was having a serious conversation with God on the Big White Telephone, in several languages ..................... and boy did we have a lot to talk about!! ...................... things could only get better!
Next day ............................. very quiet! ....... I certainly wasn't up for dinner but managed a cautious trip on bicycles to JoMa Cafe and the Market where Jo bartered a good supply of fresh yellow mango, mangostines and watermelon which the children thought were delicious and urged Jo to buy MORE next time!
The children were pleased to here about a charity in Luang Prabang called Big Brother Mouse - www.bigbrothermouse.com - where you can attend and read locally written books to children. The Charity also aims to get books to some of the distant villages and set out on sometimes difficult trips by boat and truck to reach them. We bought a pack to take with us as we were visiting one of the jungle Villages next week with Plan UK, where we sponsor a little girl called Pa Va, who lives some 2 1/2 hours away by truck in the jungle. She is 11, same age as Harry (below) and it will be great for the children to experience first hand how other people, of similar ages to themselves live in these remote areas.
Next day. - Feeling better, we all ventured back into town on typical Laos bicycles, provided by our accommodating Hotel manager. Although 39 degrees and humid heat (even hot by Laoos standards), the bikes seemed to almost freewheel into town and create a cooling breeze which made it quite pleasant and the children loved it, ringing their bells every few seconds along the way. It was a nice 10 minute ride into town, stopping at JoMa Bakery & Cafe for great french cakes and coffee, this becoming the local school house for us to sit for a couple of hours and go through spelling, maths and a geography quiz, followed by a wander round the market and a cycle to the Mekong River. Tonight we decided to have 'street food!!' ......... a recommendation from a couple of young teachers we met in JoMa. Pork noodle soup and chicken fried rice for a tenth of the price we had paid the night before ...............an open kitchen actually on the street! ...... and clearly I had nothing to lose! ................ it was great and the children loved it! ................................. We then cycled home in the dark with our 'dynamo's' providing light and had a good nights sleep ................... until an almighty storm broke out in the early hours of the morning ................. never heard thunder, or rain,so loud before, but the children, in their room down the corridor slept through it!! ................ It certainly cleared the air in the morning and felt unusually refreshing.
Had to make our 7am cruise ship this morning for our two day trip down the Mekong River ............ everyone looking forward to it. Slight problem - our very accommodating hotelier told the Tuktuk driver to take us to the wrong pier - we should have been wary of him when he agreed so wholeheartedly with Jo that his room rates were expensive!. ....................... He hadn't got a clue what she was going on about! ...... "
just smile and wave boys!" ......... Having discovered that none of the 20 boats lined up were ours, we finally found someone who knew that the Auberge Cacao pier was half a mile away, longer once the one way system was negotiated - you can guess the next bit, yes we had missed our very expensive boat to Huay Xai! . Luckily, following a few frantic phone calls, our Tuktuk driver could take us 10km up the road to the first village, where we could walk to the river bank and get a small boat to the other side, to the Bhuddhist caves, to meet up with our boat which would be making a stop here - we hoped. ............ This children thought the tuktuk was great fun!! .................. funny but a very similar thing happened 18 years ago whilst trying to get to an airport in Vietnam!! second time we have had to tell a tuk tuk driver to "step on it!!"
The boat trip down the Mekong is now underway and we are heading into deep jungle. The temperature is getting up to 106 degrees in the shade and all we needed to hear now was the low whooping sound of an American AH-1 Cobra Helicopter and the dulcet tones of Mick Jagger singing "
I can't get no ....... satisfaction" to re-create a scene out of the Vietnam war where Laos was also heavily bombed. It gives a small snapshot insight as to what it must have been like during those days. In fact the landscape has probably not changed at all! The US lost 4,869 helicopters between 1962 and 1973, 2,000 of which were lost in 1968 and 1969. An estimated 260 million submunition 'bombies' were dropped on Laos between 1964 and 1973. 78 million of them failed to explode and since the end of the war over 12,000 people, many of them cildren, have fallen prey to them. Our 5 passengers (plus our family of 5) includes an American couple, the husband, 'Bud', of whom served in the Vietnam war and in the name of education, as the children had been learning about the war, we thought it would be a good idea if the chidren carried out an interview with him, to give them a better understanding as too what it must have been like. The questions were discussed between the children and written down (vetted by us just in case) and the interview went well. .............Q. "
What music did you listen to?" ........ A. "The Monkeys and Mick Jagger"
The boat was a wonderful way to experience Laos as there was plenty of space to spread out with the children as it could take 30 guests and there were only ten of us. The chairs are comfortable, the food is good and there is a welcome cool breeze flowing through the boat. We had a large table to work from which doubled up as a great class room!, lessons being interrupted every now and again by kingfishers, water buffalo, local people panning for gold and the odd stop at a local village where Harry and Freddie take the opportunity to swim in the Mekong with the local kids, while we walk up to the village.
We had an overnight stop in a jungle lodge set back from the Mekong River which was very pleasant, sharing a couple of wooden lodges next door to each oher, the children snug in their mosquito nets and sharing our rooms with some very noisey lizards! - Later that night was THE loudest thunder storm and THE heaviest rain I had ever heard!! ......... can't believe the children slept through it!
Later on the next day we arived at the Town of Huay Xai, on the Thai/Laos border, a fairly small town with very little going on, appart from Milk Shakes and Fruit Smoothies', but this was our stop for 'The Gibbon Experience' - Livivng in a Tree House for 3 days, 2 nights, 120' up, with the only way in or out, via 'zip wires'!; the longest of which was some 500/600 metres long, several hundred feet up over the jungle canopy! ....................................... Jo (my wife) and Fred (my 9 year old) - not being great with heights were feeling a little more than apprehensive!! ..............................
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