Thanksgibboning

We took a picturesque boat ride from Chang Kong, Thailand across a river into Huay Xai, Laos as we took our next step in our Asian adventure. Immediately after crossing over the river, I felt like I was in a different place. We could still see the Thailand to the west from our guesthouse as the sun set over it, but we were definitely in Laos. In the border town of Huay Xai, very few people spoke English, compared to Thailand where most guesthouses have at least one English speaker on staff. While this should feel normal, I was actually very surprised when I realized that people drive on the right side of the road! Coming from Kenya, Australia, and New Zealand where people drive on the left, I hadn’t had oncoming traffic on my right for six months. The currency is also slightly different. In Thailand, the currency is the baht, which trades at about 30 baht to 1 USD. In Laos, the Kip is used, and it takes about 8000 Kip to make a dollar. That required a bit of mental math adjustment. On the upside, I got to be a millionaire (in Kip) for a minute!

We wandered off the boat and explored Huay Xai, which unlike its booming Thai counterpart, Chang Kong, consisted of pretty much one street. Glad to have made it across the river before the border closed, we asked around where a nice affordable place to stay was and wandered in to what one of the street vendors had recommended. At first it looked fine and was reasonably priced so we went for it. Bad move. We quickly learned that the bathrooms had no real plumbing; all of the water just emptied on to the slanted floor and into a drain. It was a “shared bathroom” which really meant go downstairs to use the owner’s personal bathroom which consisted of her hanging underpants and a standing pool of water that looked like it came straight out of the horror movie Saw. Of course the electricity didn’t work and the owner didn’t speak a word of English. Without a doubt, our favorite part of the town was “the sandwich lady,” whose name we later found out was Gang Gong. She is the most outspoken, intense, street vendor I have ever met. Because her English wasn’t amazing and she knew what brought travelers to Huay Xai, she prepared signs to grab the attention, along with her voice, of passing voyagers. She sold us food, water, and flashlights we needed for the next two days and let us play with her daughter, endearingly named “Money.” We laughed about our time with Gang Gong and made the most of our accommodation as we eagerly awaited the Gibbon Experience.

The next morning we happily escaped from our worst accommodation of the trip and headed out into the jungles of Laos to set off on our two-day adventure. The Gibbon Experience is an adventurer’s tour of the jungle home of the gibbon monkeys, involving hiking, ziplining, and exploring with a local Laotian guide. We met up with a British couple and a pair of German girls and with that, we were off. Tam, our guide led us through the twisted pathways of the jungle until we reached a dead end in the trail. At first thinking we had made a wrong turn, I looked out into an opening in the trees and saw not only a beautiful mountain landscape, but also a 400m zipline crossing from our current ridge to the one of the mountains in the distance. Harnessed up, we flew across the canopy, looking out to the beautiful mountain landscape and down to the gigantic trees and ground floor more than 100m below. After getting over that adrenalin rush, we walked another minute or two and got on yet another line, this one 600m long! After a few hours of walking and many more zip lines with spectacular views, we made it to our lodging for the night: the treehouse.

The night before we had been wondering how we were going to get up to the house. We had guessed a giant ladder or stairs cut into the trunk. But when we finally reached our lodging, we found that the only way in or out was by a zipline.

Excuse the tilt, I was on a zipline!

The treehouse was absolutely amazing. The bottom floor was the “entrance” with the zip line and a bathroom with running water, a shower, and quite a view. Heading upstairs we reached the main floor with a 360 panorama of the jungle, a table, and sleeping mattresses under bed nets. And on the top floor was the “luxury suite” as we like to call it; an open area with three mattresses where Jimmy, Charlie, and I slept. We were welcomed into our temporary home with fresh fruit and Laotian wine, took a quick nap, and headed back out into the jungle for more trekking and many more ziplines. The lines became more and more comfortable and the views more stunning as the sun started to set on the mountaintops. We made it back to the treehouse just before sunset and when we arrived we had a hot, delicious Laotian meal prepared. I could get used to living like that. After a late night of card games, jokes, riddles, and travel stories, we awoke with the sunlight, ready to explore even more of the jungle for a few hours before breakfast. After eating yet another great meal, we packed up and zipped our way back to the town of Huay Xai. Over the two days we covered a good amount of ground, zipping for a total of about 15km!

When we got back to town, we went straight to the bus stop to get tickets for the overnight bus to Luang Prabang. The merchant confirmed that there was room for five people and confirmed the price, but just pulling out my wallet he decided to tell me that there were no more seats. This was pretty unfortunate because we have pretty tight travel plans but we made the most of our extra night in Huay Xai. After vowing never to step foot in the Saw house from two nights previous, we found new accommodation that was infinitely better. It was about 30,000 kip more, which works out to about a dollar per person, and it was worth every kip. We had clean sheets, working electricity, and running water, and a spectacular view of the river and Thailand. That night we celebrated Sibel’s birthday by going to Huay Xai’s finest restaurant in town, which sure beat turning 20 on an overnight bus. We ran into the British couple from the Gibbon Experience, Pete and Lisa, and we ended up hanging out with them, sharing stories and having a good time, until it was finally time to go to bed.

Huay Xai wasn’t exactly our favorite town in Asia, but overall the three nights we spent there were a lot of fun. The zip lines were amazing, the views were breathtaking, and the people we met (can’t forget Gang Gong!) were very friendly. Although it wasn’t quite a turkey dinner in America, it was definitively a Thanksgibboning I won’t forget.