The Chiang Khong / Huay Xie crossing between Thailand and Laos is a simple ferry ride across the Mekong river. From there, your choices to get to Luang Prabang are: 2 days on a standard boat, 10 hours on a bus, or 6 hours in a speed boat. I once heard that the worst thing about travelling is arriving. I agree in principle with this philosophy, but when you have three choices of how to get somewhere and they range in duration from 6 hours to 2 days, I think it's pretty obvious which one is worth going for. As it turned out, 6 hours in a speed boat was about 5.5 hours too long. There was nothing wrong with the ride itself, but the floor space appointed to each person was about 4ft squared. I say floor space as there was no seats. Sitting with your kness pressed under your chin for 6 hours tends to make you a little uncomfortable. The saving factors were the speed at which we travelled, the fact our driver wasn't drunk (as we'd heard is often the case), and the beautiful sceneray which provided just enough distraction from the discomfort to make the journey bearable.
SE Asia seems to have a laid back attitude in general but with Laos, you're so laid back, you're lying down. I'm blaming this infectious state of mind for our complete failure to research the country and find out that there are no ATMs. Believeing that we would draw out local currency as soon as we arrived at the first town, we were now in a situation where we had just arrived in a new country, with no currency, either local or the all-accepted US dollars. Thankfully, two blokes from England felt enough satisfaction in meeting two people who were less organised than themslves and lent us some money - thanks Andy & Dave! They heading north to go fishing to a sleep little village in the middle of nowhere, so we trusted fate and joined them.
The journey started with a 3 hour bus ride to Nong Kiaw and then a 1.5 hr boat trip to our destination, Muang Ngoi Neua. It is a beautiful little village which is only accessible by boat, has it's power supplied by a generators, and has an untouched earthly feel to it which is enhanced by a dusty sprinkling of mud to every building. We stayed in small huts, built on stilts and located a stone's throw away from the river. Stretching out from the huts was a small communal balcony area with hammocks supplied to soak up the atmosphere in an appropriate fashion.
Our search for a guide for the fishing was completed the moment we walked into the first restaurant. The owner, Kan, said he could take us on a day trip upstream and teach us some local fishing techniqies - lunch would be provided by us. The next day, we split into two 15ft boats and paddled our way up stream. The first stop was a small island which he suggested would be a good base to conduct some net fishing. First we used a circular net with chains spanning the circumference. This was thrown out into from the water's edge in hope that it trap any fish swimming past that spot when the chains sank. You'd then pull on a blue cord at the centre of the net which effectively pulls the chains running the border together and traps anything in the middle. That's the theory, anyway.
Further upstream, we used traditional rods from the shoreline, and worms which were collected from the river mud, as bait. This resulted in an absolute feast....for the fish, and a complete lack of lunch supplied by the rods. However, the grasp of technological innovation was on our side, and we proved our superiority with the application of a net big enough to trap everything swimming down river within a 20 yard area - our catch was served with spicy spinach, sticky rice and pumpkin jelly. We then washed down this veritable concoction of palatable delite with a shot of Lao Lao, and made our way back to the village.
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