Muang Sing

We got up one morning at six to see the morning market. It's a typical Lao market where you can buy anything and everything, from vegetables to clothes to illegally made LaoLao (some sort of brandy that will leave you blind and with no throat left, you should try it sometimes...). The thing that stood out was a small butchershop. I felt like I was on the set of some horror movie with blood everywhere. Just before I took this picture a dog was licking this bowl of bloody livers. Yummy! Right across the street there was a nice little restaurant. It was very relaxing to sit there and watch all the things happening around you.

One day I could see the lady from the guesthouse wash our clothes and hang them to dry on the roof of the building while pigs and waterbufalloes where walking aimlessly through the streets. These ugly little fellas wandered on the road to China.

Between 6 o'clock and half past eight in the evening the town has electricity. After that the lights in Muang Sing go out with a single flick of the switch it seems. People put candles on the table and in the toilets so you can go on fraternizing with the other backpackers. A couple of people we saw in Luang Prabang and travelled with on some parts also made it to Muang Sing. We especially had a great time with a Scottish girl called Niamh (procounced as Neve). We hooked up with her on our way to Thailand. After 3 nights in Muang Sing we took a truck to Xieng Kok. The Lonely Planet guidebook warned us for this trip. Xieng Kok is "roughly 75km from Muang Sing via a tortuous road. It takes all day - up to a day and a half under certain road conditions." So we prepaired for the worse.

We were surprised that after three hours we drove into Xieng Kok. We were lucky because it was the end of the rainy season. From there we had to take a speedboat downstream on the Mekong to the bordercrossing with Thailand.

So, get in the boat, squat down on half a square foot of space and brace yourselve. Imagine sitting like this for four hours, slalomming around rockformations, doing 70km an hour. Myanmar (Birma) on the right hand and laos to the left. Yeah baby! On this picture we took a brake on a sandbank, hence the smiling faces!