Luang Prabang - cooking, waterfalls, elephants, massage, and shopping!

The afternoon of July 24, after the rain stopped, Cindy, Joe, and I walked around Luang Prabang, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The cool thing about the World Heritage Site designation is that traffic is very limited and the town is really laid back, unlike a lot of the cities we've been to. We visited several temples, and arrived at one just in time to hear the monks doing their evening chants. Although we'd already been to many temples, this was the first time we'd been present for the evening ceremony, and it was quite the experience. We sat in the doorway and just listened for about 30 minutes. It was like meditation.

After the monks finished their chants, we took off to climb "the mountain." Phou Si is a hill in the middle of the city that, when climbed, gives a good view of the surrounding area. We were on top of the mountain (all 100 stairs tall) for sunset, and got some good photos of Luang Prabang, the Mekong River, and the hills of the countryside. Then it was off to the night market, where we browsed the local handicrafts.

On July 25, Cindy, Joe, and I took our Lao cooking class. The class was run by the chef from Tamarind, a gourmet Lao restaurant, which is where we met to begin the day. Shortly thereafter, we were driven to the local market in a tuk-tuk. There, our instructor, Joy (spelled wrong, I'm sure), who is one of the owners of the restaurant, gave us a tour of the market, where we learned about the different ingredients we'd be using in our class. The market trip was very educational, and Joy was sure to tell us about the health benefits of various ingredients, like the ones that help your teeth, help keep you young, etc. While there, we sampled some Lao "candy" that was some kind of dried pastry, and a rare delicacy - steamed bee larvae, which were really quite tasty compared to the fried maggots we ate in Bangkok.

From the market, we were taken to Joy's house, where the class was held. We were outdoors, under bright red tents (that made all of our pictures look rosy) that were set up over the tables we used to prepare the food and next to the fires we used for cooking/steaming. At first, I was a little apprehensive about how the class would be run - whether we'd be the ones doing the dirty work or whether they'd have things cut up for us and we'd just be responsible for dumping them in a bowl - but was pleasantly surprised when we began preparing the sticky rice and Jeow (a dish that's a lot like salsa) and learned that we'd be doing EVERYTHING ourselves.

We used a mortar and pestle for nearly every dish, and Cindy, Joe, and I all bought mortars and pestles last night before leaving Luang Prabang so that we can remember how much fun we have every time we use them. I won't get into the details of everything we cooked but I'm very pleased to say that all of the dishes we cooked were excellent, and our meal was very gourmet. I think the highlight for all of us was chicken-stuffed lemongrass, which we deep-fried but can be BBQ'd. When I get back, that's probably the first thing I'll be cooking.

That night, our friend David, who we've been seeing on a pretty consistent basis since meeting him in Dalat, Cindy, Joe, and Nillefer, a British girl we met during our cooking class, went out to dinner without me since I was still sleep-deprived and wanted a good night's sleep. The next day we laid low, and this time it was Cindy's turn to stay home and sleep while I went out for dinner with David, Joe, Nillefer, and our Dutch friends Marty and Ike. We ate traditional Lao BBQ, which is really hard to explain, but is some of the best food I've eaten on this trip. I'm going to try to re-create it when I get home, but could have a hard time finding the equipment I need, so don't hold your breath on me ever being able to fix it for you. : )

On the 27th we got up at 5:30 am to participate in the alms ceremony - a daily ritual where the Lao people line up along the street to distribute sticky rice to the monks as they walk by. We had heard that monks won't accept (or eat) rice given them by Westerners, so we bought bananas to hand out to them. Not quite sure how the whole process worked, Cindy and I each gave one monk about 5 bananas, which we regretted since later on it became apparent that each monk (they walk in groups of ten) should have received his own banana. Hopefully the two we gave them to shared. : ) We planned to get up even earlier another day to correct our mistakes, but we never got around to it.

After going back to bed for a few hours, we woke up, met up with Joe for breakfast, and hired a tuk-tuk to take us to see Kuang Si waterfall, a famous waterfall just outside Luang Prabang. Just before leaving, we met Yev (from New York) and Isaac (from San Diego), who joined us on our trip to Kuang Si. When there, we hiked the trail to the mid-falls area. Here I experienced my fist "Lao massage." We stood in the middle of the trail, under the falls, and let them pound down on us. The water was falling so hard that my quads started to fatigue because it took a constant effort to stay upright and it felt like I had been doing a wall-sit for 30 minutes. The pressure was AWESOME. From the mid-falls viewpoint, we then climbed the rest of the way to the top of the waterfall, where from our vantage point we could see straight down the falls. We of course stopped again on our way back down for our second Lao massage, before getting back in our tuk-tuk and returning to Luang Prabang, where Cindy, Joe, and I got a real Lao massage (much like Thai massage, but better in my opinion) before heading to the Lao BBQ place for another dinner since Cindy hadn't experienced it the first night and we all loved it so much that we wanted to eat it again. Yev and Isaac joined us.

On July 28, Cindy, and I woke up just in time to catch our bus to the All Lao Elephant Camp, where Cindy, Joe, and I rode elephants - Cindy and I for the second time on our trip. We were bummed not to be riding together (I got stuck between a French couple), but got some good pictures of each other this time, which was a benefit. I was on the biggest elephant, which I loved (except for the having to duck under spider webs and tree branches part), and I was really happy because the elephants were treated so much better than the ones we had ridden north of Bangkok. We trekked on elephants for about 1 1/2 hours - through jungle and down a river - before being dropped off at a lodge for lunch. Then, at about 2:30 we each boarded our own elephant, not sitting on a seat, but on the elephant's neck with a guide sitting behind us, and we got to bathe the elephants! My elephant (once again the biggest) was the first in the water, and the last out so I was really happy to have the extra time to be in the river with him. He sprayed me with his trunk a bunch of times, which I don't think we got on film, but it was one of the coolest experiences I've ever had. I'm hoping to ride some elephants in Africa because they're so much bigger, but I'm not sure that experience could top this one!

We arrived back into town around 5pm and headed straight to the massage place to test out traditional Khmu massage, which is like Lao massage, but with oil. I didn't like it quite as much as the Lao massage, but it was still good. Then, we headed out to the night market to buy yet more souvenirs and gifts. We once again ate an amazing dinner of street food, and went to bed pretty early since all of us were wiped out. Riding elephants is really tough work. : )

On July 29, we woke up early and were picked up and taken by boat to Pak Ou Caves, the famous "Buddha caves" outside Luang Prabang. One of the caves has over 4,000 Buddhas displayed, and the other was too dark for us to see much (we forgot flashlights and headlamps), but I believe it had far fewer Buddhas inside. From there, we went to "whiskey village" and sampled Lao Lao, which is rice whiskey that can be shot straight, or mixed with various fruit juices (pomelo, honey and lemon, etc.) before coming back to Luang Prabang and hitting up the night market one last time.

We got nearly all the souvenirs and presents we wanted to pick up before grabbing take-out from street vendors to eat on our bus ride to Vientiane, which is where Cindy and I are now. We arrived this morning at 6:45, drank "all you can drink" coffee for a few hours, wrote postcards, and have spent most of the day walking around Vientiane and catching up online. We board a bus for Bangkok in about 45 minutes, then will spend 2 1/2 days tying up loose ends - buying warm clothes, shipping our souvenirs, and uploading photos - before leaving for Delhi on August 2.

In India: We plan to spend 3 days in Delhi and Agra (home of the Taj Mahal) before escaping north to Leh, which is the hub of the Ladakh area of India, in the Himalayas. As sad as I am to leave SE Asia, I'm looking forward to leaving the heat and humidity behind and getting to Ladakh, which gets about the same amount of rainfall as the Sahara Desert. There, we hope to do some really good trekking and do a yoga/meditation retreat. If we have time, we'll travel south to Dar es Salaam, home of the exiled Dalai Lama, and possibly to Varanasi, of which Wiki Travel has to say, "The scene of pilgrims doing their devotions in the River Ganges at sunrise set against the back drop of the centuries old temples is probably one of the most impressive sights in the world - definitely a must see destination on any trip to northern India. " But it also says that it's excruciatingly hot there, so you should time your trip in October. Maybe we won't be going there after all . . . time will tell.

That's all for now. Happy belated birthday to Travis Greenwood on July 29 and to Nik Bergman on August 1. And in case I don't get online for a few more days, happy birthday to Gunn and Matt on August 6th!