One bumpy minibus ride later and I arrived in Nong Kiau. I walked across the bridge to the tourist side of town and gazed up at the towering mountains all around. I chose the first set of cabanas on my left and got my own little bungalow with a wicked view of the river and mountains. Sitting on minibuses all day is hard work, so I spent the rest of the day lounging in the hammock and napping, resetting my stupid fan that only remained on for a maximum of one hour due to a mandatory timer. I got up around sunset and walked along the bridge, taking awesome photos of the yellow light being cast on the town and mountains. You can see my place in the picture with the golden glow on the cabanas (it is the last one from the end of huts being bathed in light and heat).
The next morning I slept in as late as I could (9) and made my way to breakfast. There I met two awesome American girls, Elizabeth from Iowa and Christina from Arizona. They invited me on a fishing and tubing adventure that they had just decided to do. After food we walked down to the river and took turns getting ferried up the river to a small beach (the skinny boat was too small for us 3 and 2 locals to go at once). At the beach, the guys tried to teach us how to fish with a weighted circular net. You need to pick it up systematically and grab the proper area of the net with the correct hand so that when you throw it, it spins and forms a circular area. The weights around the net pull the sides down quickly and fish become trapped. We only managed to catch a few tiny fish using this technique, so we got in the boat and they taught us how the big boys fish. A long wall-like net is cast in an area and a bamboo pole is used to slap the water and scare fish into the net. The first time yielded a few larger (but still small) fish and the second time resulted in about 15 fish a few inches in length. We pushed the boat back to the beach using the pole and a fire was started. While we waited we took turns taking shots of lao lao (rice whisky) that had been soaked with limes and herbs for 2 weeks. It was the best lao lao i had tasted and we all got slightly buzzed off it. The fish were cooked and set down on leaves, as well as eggs, sticky rice and some sauces and spices. We tossed the crunchy fish into our mouths whole or in 2 or 3 bites, dipped our sticky rice into spicy chili paste and salted up the eggs.
After the food had digested we got in our tubes and slowly made our way back down the nam au river to nong kiau. The boat ride up was only 15 minutes but it took us 2 hours to tube back down the gentle river. We kept meaning to shower but we never got around to it and spent the night drinking beerlao and playing cards at the Indian restaurant. The next few days were spent similarly, drinking beerlao, playing cards and eating at the Indian restaurant. We gave the Indian owner so much business but for some reason he hated us. He rolled his eyes everytime we ordered beerlao and grumpily took our food orders. This didn't hold us back though. The food was so good and we kept coming back. One day I ate way too much (two full meals in a few hours as well as several beerlao) and exploded when I got back to my room. One of the days we were active enough to rent bikes and check out the cave just out of town. We tried to go on a rock climbing tour but the guide wasn't available for another week. So most of our time in nong kiau was spent chilling and being lazy... It was nice.
We headed an hour up the river to muang ngoi and spent two nights there. We planned to go trekking but the day after we got there it poured rain all day. We were invited into a home just after a late breakfast and shared Lao Lao with a family and their friends, as well as with frank and Claudia, a german and a French who we met that day. The locals kept saying that it was raining and the only thing to do was drink Lao Lao. We happily agreed at first, then reluctantly agreed after a few hours of this. The girls managed to escape and nap, but frank and I stayed there the whole day getting plastered. After some time one of the guys busted out buffalo skin, and we all tried chewing on that. I didn't like it but everyone else did. We stumbled back to our rooms and napped until dinner. The town only has electricity from 7 to 1030, and we ended up having dinner by candlelight.
The next day we headed back to nong kiau for a day of Indian food, cards and beer. A few people (Elizabeth and Christina included) got soaked on the boat ride back to nong kiau. The boat was overfilled with heavy white people and water kept splashing up over the sides.
The day after that (yesterday from the time of writing this) Christina left on her way to Bangkok while Elizabeth and I headed north to luang namtha. Our minibus got stuck on a slippery dirt road and dozens of locals pushed our minibus up the slope for a small fee. 8 hours later and we had made it to luang namtha with only 2 plums in our stomachs since breakfast.
Today we lounged in our room and around town, and tomorrow we are going on a 2 day jungle trek with 7 other people!
After that I am going to head into Thailand and make my way to chiang mai or chiang rai while Elizabeth will head to Vientiane to get her Thai visa sorted out.
