We arrived at the vehicle ferry for Don Khong, one of the largest Mekong river islands, after an unusually acceptable bus journey. The"ferry was not the most technologically advanced we have ever seen, however it managed to get our minibus accross to the island without incident. We then drove a short distance towards the one and only village on the island, looking forward to our tranquil island retreat. Unfortunately, we were deposited into the middle of what can only be described as a karaoke and litter-strewn hell.......yes, we had managed to arrive during yet ANOTHER festival. This time is was for Laos National Day, a 3 day holiday which was already 2 days underway. We grabbed our packs in a huff and starting walking purposefully in the other direction, in the hope we could find a guesthouse away from the mayhem. Thankfully we found a very cheap, quiet hotel and the festivities actually finished around 9pm so we got a good night's sleep despite the odds!
The next day a huge clearup operation began....well, until the workers needed a lie-down after about an hour obviously. Unfortunately Laos, and Asia generally, has very much embraced the plastic throw-away society and where they used to use natural packaging like banana leaves, now everything goes into as many plastic bags as possible. There was a ridiculous amount of rubbish (photos to prove it) on the village green, which was swept into small piles and then set fire to. So unfortunately our first day on the island was somewhat marred by the black smoke and pungent plastic fumes. Thankfully things improved and we had some lovely meals over the next couple of days in the restaurants. We also hired bikes to explore the island as it was a bit too big to explore on foot. All was going well on the first trip as we passed pretty villages and water buffalo, little Laos children shouting hello (sometimes taking us by surprise with their bellowing!) and we were planning to cycle round the whole island. Next thing we know, John's back tyre was completely flat! Sarah began cycling back to the village to get help. Virtually as soon as she had left, a local came up to John as he was pushing the bike back towards the village and offered to fix the puncture. Ten minutes later the bike was repaired, and following much gesticulation and unknown discussions with the village children regarding the Manchester United football shirts they were wearing, he was back on the road. Eventually we were reunited and headed off back across the island in a different direction. Away from the festival carnage, the island really was very pretty and it was lovely cycling past numerous water buffalo, villagers going about their daily business and glimpses of Cambodia the other side of the Mekong river.
The following day, whilst Sarah was doing some serious relaxing, John decided to head off on a bike again to see the other bits of the island that we had missed the previous day. Feeling somewhat elated to actually have gears (though you required an engineering degree and backwards pedalling at the gear-change moment) he set off once again......only to get another puncture at the furthest point on the island. After pushing the bike a significant distance, and having the tyres pumped up twice, a tractor stopped and offered a lift. The bike was chucked ontop of the trailer full of wood in disgust with John sitting on top of it. This sight was clearly very amusing as several locals pointed and laughed on the trip back to the village.
After a few days we decided to head to another smaller island on the Cambodian border. Here we took our relaxing to another more serious level, with much lazing in the hammocks and watching river life go by (our research showed that every Mekong boat requires at least one person to be bailing out at all times). We hiked and cycled the small paths which criss-cross the island through the paddy fields and jungle. We saw a spectacular waterfall in the Mekong where tons of water crash through on the way to Cambodia. This island truly was the peaceful retreat we were searching for and also had the best food we had had in all of Laos (the fact that Sarah's trousers will no longer do up properly is testament to this).
On our last day we cycled down to the southern most tip of the island and chatered a boat to see the rare Irrawaddy dolphins which live in this area of the Mekong. We were fortunate enough to see several dolphins, although at first they were quite a long way away. We had been told that we could cross into Cambodian waters.....not surprisingly that's where the dolphins were. As a foretaste of Cambodia's entrepreneurial approach to border control we had to pay $4 to cross this unseen line. However, it was worth it to see the dolphins up close...although they are pretty ugly creatures with bulbous noses and puny dorsal fins, but are very graceful in the water.
After a week on the islands, we were fully relaxed but ready to move on to a new country. We got a boat back to the mainland and then the usual Laos confusion as to who was going where and getting on which bus ensued. We got ferried to the Laos-Cambodian border where the fun began......in order for the Laos officials to stamp you out of Laos (takes around 5 seconds, with two hand stamps) we had to pay a "processing fee"(aka bribe) of $2 each. We walked across no-man's-land with our rucksacks to Cambodia. We were first directed to "Health Screening" where we filled in a form saying we did not feel ill and had the pleasure of paying a $1 bribe each to have our foreheads zapped with a remote temperature gun (we are 100% sure this would not diagnose bird flu....if however, we are mistaken then what is the western world thinking, keeping this modern and valuable technology from us??!). Then followed a convoluted visa application process, involving several huts and bribes. In the end we paid $23 offical dollars for each visa and $5 each in bribes to get through to the other side.
A few hours later we were dropped off in the Cambodian town of Kratie. Whilst not overly impressed with the Cambodian officials, our first impression of the Cambodian people is that they are both friendly and helpful and noticeably more personable than many of the Laos people we have met (Laos has been a bit of a mixed bag.....the scenery has been beautiful and we have had a great time but found some of the people unfriendly and beligerant. Whilst Laos was terribly treated by the US as part of the secret war, we are not sure if it was this which encouraged resentment towards western tourists or the influence of both the French and Chinese on the Laos people!).
Tomorrow we plan to head to Siem Reap and the famous Angkor Wat. We shall report on Cambodian bus journeys next time!
