Luang Prabang

Actually, Luang Prabang is not our first choice for the late summer holiday. When we couldn’t book the cheap flight to Siem Reap, we decidedly quickly to give it a try to Laos, which is well-known for the laid-back being. And we’re right to make a trip to Luang Prabang, the World Heritage old town in northern Laos. We have felt in love with every little thing that we bumped into in that small town and wanna come back some time in winter, to indulge ourselves in the early morning mist and peaceful alleys and mouth watering cuisines of LP.

Part 1: Falling into LP

We took the 9am flight from Hanoi and just 55 minutes after that we were in LP airport, the ever small one if you can imagine with just a few dozens of holidaymakers/backpackers . There’s only 1 airplane on the air port each time we arrived and departed. this is LP seen from the airplane:

We were welcomed and picked by Khone’s brother (I cannot remember his so-long and difficult to remember name) who are very gentle and a bit shy every time he tried to communicate with us in English.

We took a ride on his old Jeep on the windy and dusty roads to Khoun&Khone Guesthouse, which is around 3km to the LP centre.

Old Jeep:

Lying just 3 km from the town, but Khoun&Khone GH is quite isolated, backed by a mountain and surrounded by trees that Khoun has grown years by years. We are so touched by the greenness of the place which is built by Khoun himself with some help from his friends and family. All the bungalows are made by Khoun, from the wooden beds, clothes hangers, stoned bathrooms to the chairs on the shaded balcony. Everything seems to be peaceful and guests who’re mostly westerners seem to be completely contented.

Our hired motocross (white one):

This is our favorite place where we can lazily lye there for a nap, or for a book, or just simply indulge in the heavenly green garden. Our neighbors also love this place. A bold man, my father's age always sat there with his favorite book all the time we met him.

Khoun&Khone are very helpful and hospitable. Khone cooked the early lunch for us with some of Laos delicacies like laap, fried river weeds, sticky rice, Luang Prabang salads… She’s such a good cook that we ate out all the foods.

Hubby went out with Khoun to hire a motocross so that we could go around the town and away. I lay lazily as a cat on the wooden chair on the balcony, looking out the green spaces surrounding me, feeling relief and peace as if I had never felt those before.

After 20 mins, I heard the engine echo from afar and quickly grabbed my bag ready for a ride. We took the country road off to Tat Kuang Si – Kuang Si waterfall. We were caught in a light shower on our way and had to stop by an abandoned house on the roadside near the paddy fields and a pond of water lilies. It rained for a while, shortly enough to cool the air and we were on the road again. The road runs parallel with the Mekong and we can feel the breeze coming up from the river.

with our hired motocross:

Tat Kuang Si waterfall is a beautiful waterfall around 26km from LP center. People (mostly westerners) love this place very much where they can swim and play some fun things like this:

or they can take a look at the bears that are rescued and kept in the Bear rescue center placed in the jungle near the waterfall: