Christmas and the road to Luang Prabang

I returned from my 3 day trek on Dec. 24 and decided just to take it easy the next day. I slept in and had a big breakfast. I spent some time online and then had delicious indian food for lunch. I went for a relaxing massage for an hour. The massage place was a raised bamboo hut with 2 small rooms for herbal sauna. They started to get the sauna cooking when I arrived so it would be hot for after the massage. The sauna room was tiny with small foggy window. It was really cooking and after 20 minutes I had to take a break. I came out of the sauna drenched in sweat from every pore on my body. The only thing I wanted was a cool drink of water. What do they give me? Hot tea! I drank it and when back in and out a few more times. Now I was fully relaxed. I met Jenny, from our trek, for dinner. It was a quiet christmas night but enjoyable.

The next day I took a minivan to Luang Prabang. In a huge contrast with Myanmar, Laos has a variety of transport options between towns, where Myanmar had mainly the local bus and that was it. I opted for the more comfortable, slightly more expensive but faster minivan option, since it was a minimum 9 hour drive to Luang Prabang. Aaron and Laura, an American/Brazilian couple I met Christmas eve, where also on the minivan. Aaron and I shared the front bench seat. The road slithered its way through the mountains, hugging the cliffs. It was a very windy road with hardly any straight stretches but the scenery was nice to look at the whole journey. Once we arrived in Luang Prabang, Aaron, Laura and I shared a tuk tuk to the center of town. We searched for a while for a guesthouse. All of them were either full or asking $30US for a room! It was getting frustrating walking around carrying all my gear looking for a place. The first place we checked had a room, it was cheap but not very nice and we thought we would see what else was out there. That was a mistake! I ended up getting a room for an okay price but it wasn't worth the price. It will for one night though. Aaron, Laura and I ate a restaurant along the banks of the Mekong. There are many, many foreigners here. A lot of expensive, classy French restaurants. It doesn't even seem like Laos here.