Our special slideshow-Laos 2

Having arrived in the north, we chose to go on a two-day trek to visit the Akha hilltribe people an enjoy the unspoilt beauty of Laos. Unfortunately, 3 hours into our trek, the rain et in and our trail was transformed into huge mudslides. I don’t mean a bit of mud on our shoes, I mean, no sight of shoes, no mention of ‘walking’, it was rather like having a bunch of 80-year-olds holding on to their sticks and anything they could find in order to maintain some kind of stability and move forward a little. A few hours of this, an a few sore falls later, however, ou realize that basically it’s just like skiing and if you apply the same kind of fules, you’ll get down. Somehow. After this slideshow, we were all relieved that after the strainuous trek, the only thing we would have to do is sit on a bus to Luang Probang for 8 hours. If there had been a bus that is. If there had been seats that is… We arrived at the bus satation and the minibus was full, but we had tickets. Not a problem in Asia, you can sit on ricebags… so here we were again, on the rice bags, unable to move, on our journey down something called road, rather reminding us of a golf course given the amount of holes, only that these ones were rather large and filled with water. Luang Probang is a fabulous city, full of temples and old colonial buildings, with a very relaxing atmosphere and a fantastic market. It’s nice that the French left the cafes and the croissants, a shame they took the suspensions for the buses with them when they left…