The Slow Boat - Day One

After about an hour at the holding pen, we set off for the pier. There were even more people there, divided between two long boats. Despite being among the last to board, the seven of us managed to find seats near one another. Near to us, we found another two Americans - Heather and Mark from California, who had been on the bus with me that morning. They were both single travelers who hooked up along the way, and there was tension brewing between them.

The boat set off more or less on time. It was crowded (no maximum occupancy notice was visible; I’m sure the number of people on board far exceeded most western safety standards), there were no life jackets in sight, and we sat on used minibus seats that were not bolted to the floor. This thing was a floating death trap.

The Mekong’s waters were murky, but the scenery all around was gorgeous. Just lots of shades of green. I spent the time chatting and getting to know my new friends, reading, snoozing, and admiring the scenery. The Spaniards at the front of the boat were having a very drunken salsa party. One of them wore a distinctive pair of black athletic shorts that quickly became a running joke among us. I observed them in amusement, as well as a Laotian guy who knocked down three beers in very quick succession and then stumbled all over the boat. He eventually joined the Spaniards. The next day, I heard that the other boat also had some partiers and they got quite out of hand, including daring one another to dunk their heads in the water.

Late in the afternoon, five of us started a drinking game. We were barely into it when we pulled in to Pak Beng, a full two hours earlier than we had been told to expect. I was a little ticked off that the lady at the bar sold me that beer so close to the end of the trip. I chugged the beer down, belched, collected my bag, stumbled off the boat, and followed a guy from my guesthouse to a sawngthaew, which deposited me at the guesthouse up the hill. As expected, the pictures I was shown earlier that day were too good to be true; they must have been for a more expensive room. No matter, it was only for one night and it was adequate. Not surprisingly, Pak Beng turned out to be a dusty one street town whose main purpose was to accommodate and feed travelers on the slow boats.

That evening, the nine of us met for dinner at an Indian/Lao restaurant. After dinner, I went to sleep serenaded by distant strains from Happy Bar. They played some of the most cliched backpacker music imaginable (think Bob Marley).

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