We continued our cycling tour in Laos by riding north from Luang Prabang. In this photo Kristina is crossing the Nam Ou River.
Here are Claire and Simon. Their smiles show how much fun it is to ride in Laos.
We crossed over the Nam Ou River a few times during the day. We saw fishermen casting their nets from boats as we rode.
Day 10: Pak Mong to Oudomxay, 82 Km
Today we climbed up 1,800 meters, the second biggest climbing day on the tour. Kristina is riding with Steve (our friend from the Burma cycling trip) and Claire (who is English but lives in Perth, Australia).
Here's our cycling group of 14 riders. Our Laotian guide Khen is on the left.
We choose to go on cycle tours with Red Spokes because we like their ethical tourism model that includes giving back to the less affluent countries where they lead tours. We visited this school in the Ban Faen village that was funded by Red Spokes.
It was interesting to learn that the school was a controversial project in the Ban Faen village, in part because not all of the elders believe that education, especially educating girls, is a priority.
The students seemed enthusiastic and we think about half the students are girls.
Red Spokes has been offering this Laos tour for 13 years, so the crew that supported us are very experienced. This is Mrs M, one of the cooks on the crew. She is preparing vegetables for lunch.
This is Khen, the bus driver. To distinguish him from our overall tour leader, he was known as Handsome Khen. He also helps out with the cooking prep work.
And here's a typical lunch we had while cycling: tasty stir fried vegetables with chicken served with rice.
After we ate, Mrs. M washed the dishes.
These cute little piglets were keeping their eyes on us as they rooted around by the side of the road.
Who says dogs and cats don't get along? We spotted these two buddies at a small roadside shop just outside Oudomxay.
Laos is a very hilly country, which makes for great views. It also makes for some strenuous cycling. After a while, we started to understand when our guide told us we were headed for a flat stretch, he meant "Lao flat", or what we'd call "hilly".
Kristina is in between Richard (left) and Greg, American brothers who love to cycle and travel together. Richard lives in Perth, Australia with his wife Natasha, while Greg lives just north of Chicago.
On the right is our guide leader Khen, and on the left is Bounsene, a new cycling guide on the trip. Bounsene had been a monk for eight years, and he is the first person in his village to graduate from high school and college.
Day 11: Oudomxay to Ban Nalay, 57 Km
As we rode out of Oudomxay, we got to ride in a bike lane, which is pretty rare in Laos.
The terraced rice fields are so pretty, even when they have been harvested.
A group of us stopped for a closer look at the rice irrigation system. Lo and behold, someone had a camera to capture the moment!
Lao PDR is a beautiful country!
Behind Pete are Richard and Natasha (who live in Perth), followed by a bunch of folks from the UK.
We didn't always get homemade stir fry for lunch, but the tuna sandwiches and hard boiled eggs were pretty good, too.
These kids were so curious and friendly. Pete showed them how to make eye glasses with their fingers, so they are posing with monocles or spectacles.
We liked seeing how the clothes and the chilies are all drying in the sun.
Here the rice hasn't yet been harvested, but it looked like it would be soon.
Nick took this photo of us. If it looks like we were hot and dusty, it's because we were.
We rode into the village of Ban Yar in the early afternoon, and changed out of our cycling clothes.
We visited the school and were received like royalty.
The kids with the blue caps are the best students. They had the honor of giving each cyclist a bouquet of flowers.
Nick, Claire and John (from Canada) are waiting for the dance performance to begin.
These girls danced several traditional dances for us, which was a treat.
Then six men from the cycling group played soccer with about 20 boys from the school. It was a sweaty, hard fought game that ended when the boys scored.
We went back to the village of Ban Yar where we took part in a traditional Thailue ceremony. There were three medical doctors on the trip: Tommy (left), Claire and Rhona.
As we understand it, the ceremony was something of a cleansing process and was intended to protect us from the bad spirits. Interestingly, an integral part of the ceremony included imbibing shots of hard spirits, Laotian rice whiskey known as "Lao Lao." It was pretty smooth.
Each villager said a prayer as they tied a string around our wrist.
By the end we each had about 20 strings around each wrist. We were instructed to keep them on for three days. Claire took hers off as soon as she could, warning us that the strings would be swarming with bacteria after three days.
We shared a meal with the village that included a lot of beer.
The village teenagers danced for us. After some encouragement and probably too many beers, we danced for them. Luckily for us, we have no pictures or video of this event, and we don't want to go into too much detail; Let's just say that if you visit a small northern Laotian village, don't be surprised if they ask you what "YMCA" means.
That night we stayed with a family from the village. They set up mattresses with mosquito nets so we were quite comfortable.
The next morning we spent some time with the family. Kristina is at the front of the house, and the daughter is peaking at us from the doorway.
We didn't have a shared language, but we could communicate through gestures.
The two year old daughter sang and danced briefly for us. But she kept very close to her mom and dad, as she wasn't sure what to make of us foreigners.
After breakfast, our group made a donation to the school that we had visited. John, as our eldest rider, had the honor of giving the money to the school principal.
Day 12: Ban Nalay to Pakbeng, 87 Km
After saying good bye to the kind villagers, we rode off, enjoying the cool, misty morning temperatures.
Pete got this shot of Kristina in front of a village temple.
We stopped at our guide leader Khen's house.
In addition to leading cycling tours, Khen also farms tilapia and catfish. In this photo he has just given the fish some food, and they are up at the surface eating.
Of course a fish farm needs a lot of fish food.
As we rode through the small villages, we became quite fond of hearing greetings of "Sa bai dee!" from the kids.
These huts are used for storing rice and other grains.
Kristina looks happy to be eating stir fried noodles for lunch.
Isn't this a beautifully colored bug?
We were riding along a river where we spotted this rustic bridge.
It's currently the dry season, so the lower bridge is the one that people use. We saw these two little boys who were running back and forth across it very comfortably.
It's been a wonderful two week cycling trip, and we've ridden just about 800 kilometers! Kristina is on the left with Nick and Claire.
The cycling group traveled from Pakbeng to Luang Prabang on the Mekong River on this boat.
It was a comfortable six-hour cruise.
We enjoyed the beautiful scenery.
This is our boat captain.
Nick is savoring the cooling breezes as we motored down the Mekong.
The cycling group had a few more tasty meals together in Luang Prabang, and then we had to say, "Good-bye for now but we hope to ride with you again!" to our new friends.
By happenstance we met Michael and Lue in Luang Prabang. Michael is an American who moved to Luang Prabang in 2010 to teach English and life skills to impoverished kids. With Michael's help, Lue has earned a scholarship and will be going to college in Kuala Lumpur starting in January! Michael's non-profit is the SMILE project, and after learning about all they do, we were happy to support them with a donation. If you're feeling in the giving spirit, check out SMILE's Amazon wish list of English-learning games they need for their classes, or make a tax-deductible donation to this wonderful school through PayPal.
We told some of our cycling friends who were still in Luang Prabang about the SMILE project. Our friend Steve had the privilege of visiting Michael's school where he met six students and spoke with them in English. We feel so fortunate to have met Michael and we wish his program and students continued success!
In 2013 we had spent six days in Luang Prabang with Kristina's cousin and our dear friend Cynthia, so we were looking forward to revisiting this beautiful place. This photo was taken from Mt Phousey, the highest point in Luang Prabang.
At the top of Mt Phousey is a Buddhist temple.
Nagas, or mythical serpents, are prevalent in Laotian and Thai architecture, especially at Buddhist temples.
The seven-headed naga is sometimes depicted sheltering the Buddha.
Here the nagas look like they are being swallowed by a makara, a mythical sea dragon. Actually the stories about makaras usually have them disgorging animals like nagas.
While walking around Luang Prabang we were happy to come upon this huge naga lantern.
There are so many beautiful Buddhist temples in Luang Prabang. This is Wat Sene.
At Wat Xieng Thong we saw this large Buddha with offerings in front.
Wat Xieng Thong uses mirrors for their bright decorations. We especially liked this elephant sculpture.
While in Luang Prabang we continued to enjoy the Mekong River from the shore. Pete settled in at this riverside restaurant for lunch.
We ate spring rolls, pork larb and mixed vegetables, as we felt the soft breezes from the river.
We especially liked the food at Tamarind restaurant.
On the left grilled pork patties wrapped in lemon grass and served with a ginger-tamarind dipping sauce, and on the right is green papaya salad.
We strolled through the market, admiring all the exotic fruits and vegetables.
We could have stayed longer in lovely Luang Prabang, but it was time for us to go to Chiang Mai, Thailand.
This was our third visit to Chiang Mai, so we stayed outside of the center in a new Airbnb townhouse.
We liked their gym and pool in the complex, and went swimming in this huge pool almost every morning.
Our Airbnb townhouse came with bikes, so we had fun cruising around.
We are impressed that Chiang Mai now has some bike lanes and signs like this one.
Of course we wanted to eat lots of Thai food. One of our favorite Thai desserts is mango sticky rice.
We found an awesome restaurant named Krua Phech Dai Ngam that was just a few minutes by bike from our Airbnb place, so we rode there many times.
We had read about restaurant Krua Phech Dai Ngam in an article about Andy Ricker, the chef of PokPok and other restaurants. We had eaten at PokPok in Portland and knew they served authentic northern Thai food, so we expected Andy's recommendation to be great. Here's Pete at the front of the restaurant.
One of the first things the waiter brings to the table is a basket of greens that are to be eaten with the Thai food. The red beverage is rosella juice, which reminded Kristina of hibiscus flower tea.
Kristina is smiling because she gets to eat yum sa mun prai, white turmeric and thai herb salad on the left and gang hung lay, braised pork belly in yellow curry with ginger.
In this close up of yum sa mun prai, white turmeric and thai herb chili salad, you can see that it's served on a betel leaf. We used that leaf and other leaves from the salad basket to make yum sa mun prai tacos!
This is yum ta lay ruam, spicy seafood salad. And it was really spicy, but with wonderful herbaceous and citrus flavors.
We also tried yum hua pee, banana blossom with shrimp in chili dressing. Are you noticing the chilies in all the dishes? Yes, it is spicy food!
Another favorite was yum neam, spicy fermented sour pork salad. We aren't sure how they make the pork, but it has a wonderful texture and a delightful sour flavor. The dried chilies on top of the dish are extremely hot, so we learned to avoid them (but we did eat some at first and the burning in our mouths lasted for what felt like an eternity).
Nam prik tha deang is a spicy chili and tomato paste dip that is served with steamed veggies. Nam prik is also used as a seasoning in soups and dressings. It has a wonderful fishy, salty, pungent flavor.
Khaep moo is crispy pork skin and they are so tasty!
Kristina is dishing up tom yum pla, spicy and sour snake fish filet soup. This was another dish that had a winning combination of sour flavors with plenty of spiciness. By the time we got to the bottom of the pot, it had become so spicy that Pete was sweating profusely with each bite, but he didn't stop eating it.
We ate at Krua Phech Dai Ngam SEVEN times and each visit we would order four savory dishes and practically lick the plates clean! We tried 24 different dishes and four desserts, and there wasn't a bad dish on the menu.
This is the entrance to restaurant Krua Phech Dai Ngam at night. What a treat it's been to have so many wonderful meals in Chiang Mai!
Next we are heading back to Yangon, Burma and we'll stay at the Shwe Oo Minh monastery for a month.
We wish you a wonderful holiday season and a very happy new year!
