249. | Five days, 500 km on the roads of Laos

On my third day in Luang Prabang, one of my new companions asked me if I wanted to rent a motorbike and go on a big motorbike trip together for the next 5 days.

I’m not here on holiday. I still treat weekdays as work days. Of course, there’s room for a little detour. But in the last few weeks, I’ve spent 3 days in the jungle and 2 on the Mekong, so I said no.

I jokingly remarked that if there was a way for me to work while traveling, it would be different. To which he replied that he had to work every day too.

So the next day we set off on the long journey.

My long way

Last year I was in “Wales”, to be exact in Abertillery. There my hosts showed me Ewan McGregor’s series Long Way. It’s a very nice series for me. The famous actor appears in a completely different role than we are used to from him.

He and a good friend got on a motorbike and motored across the country, and they made four excellent film series from their travel experiences. A living, breathing show that faithfully documents the highs and lows of a long journey. Naturally experienced with sufficient naturalness and spiced with brilliant humor.

I started watching the series in Chiang Mai this February. A few times I felt like getting on a motorbike and driving through countries.

Back then I would not have thought that two months later I would start my own motorbike journey. My own long way. Which is now a small way in the eyes of the world, but a giant step in mine. LOL.

The night the idea came to me, we rented a motorbike and set off the next day – Wednesday morning. I took my laptop backpack and a small backpack with a few T-shirts, underwear and my toothbrush.

I left my large backpack with most of my gear at Sasa Lao for safekeeping with a friend.

On the way to Nong Khiaw

Our first day’s performance was 140 km. 4.5 hours of motorbike riding.

Anyone who has ridden a motorbike before can guess from these two numbers what the roads were like. They might think that the roads were not of good quality.

This formulation is close to the truth, the only thing that needs to be refined is that instead of the adjective “not of good quality”, we are looking for another adjective that is roughly degrading. I leave it to the reader to say the right expression.

In my opinion, the road was not that bad, you just need to assign the right purpose to it. Normal motorbike riding is not one of these. But if we had wanted to prepare for a rally, for example, the terrain would have been excellent. In the first few hours, I formulated that we were driving on a third-class rally track.

Sometimes the road reminded me of the experiences I had when I walked on forest roads. A nostalgic memory, but here I was driving on a main road, not in the forest.

The road alternated between normal bitumen, bitumen crap, gravel and really crappy gravel sections. Sometimes it felt like the road surface changed every 50-100 meters.

This of course meant that we accelerated the engine (you don’t have to think about a crazy pace, say 40 km/h), then slowed it down to almost zero. We did this for about 3.5 hours, so our average speed was around 30 km/h, but this was only possible because – this is also part of the truth – there were sections where we could drive at 90 km/h. On average road sections, the speed felt close to zero.

Another characteristic of the road was the dust. During these 100 km, I swallowed an industrial amount of dust and dug it out of my eyes. I would like to ride a motorbike in a desert someday, and I feel like I got a good warm-up here for this future adventure.

On a 100 km stretch, everything was covered in dust. The “everything” here can be interpreted literally. I’m not just talking about the fact that our white skin shone from the dust-covered rest of our bodies when we took off our sunglasses. That our bags turned an unrecognizable brown.

The dust covered the trees. The villages we passed through. The people. The animals. The goods and fruits on the streets. It was horrible to think that people were living their daily lives in this dust. Their dusty daily lives.

The main road we were on was a busy stretch of road. With motorbikes, cars, SUVs and my favorite, the trucks.

The trucks were dragging behind them clouds of dust the size of a nuclear explosion. My favorite types made it even more colorful with the thick black smoke of diesel. So we overtook everything as best we could. Sometimes, however, we got stuck behind a truck. On such occasions, we found ourselves in a sandstorm where – literally! – nothing could be seen. These moments added an exciting spice to the motorcycle trip.

Due to the condition of the roads, I began to imagine myself in an exciting game. I was the ball in a roulette wheel and the road was the spinning wheel. It constantly gave us exercises with tasks to be solved second by second.

Drive on the right side, slow down, avoid the pothole, speed up. Change to the left side of the road, speed up to avoid the gap, slow down to avoid falling on the gravel. Neither the left side is good, nor the right, drive in the middle. Brake on the good section of the road so that the oncoming car doesn’t hit you. Accelerate to overtake the truck, but immediately slow down because a tank trap has appeared on the road. The road is good, accelerate, but then slow down because there is a 50 cm deep hole in the middle of the road and nothing indicates it in advance, because it is better fun that way.

There was no question of enjoying the landscape. The split-second lapse in attention was immediately signaled by hitting a hole. I manage to catch one hole so that my phone flies out of the phone holder. It was an unpleasant experience to watch the more capable half slide 5 meters on the asphalt. Of course, a motorbiker came right in front of me, almost ran over him. (My phone fell on the road on the Gili Islands too, and a cyclist immediately ran over it.) When I bought this phone, the fact that it was shockproof played a role in my decision. Now it turns out for the umpteenth time that it really is. The only problem was that the glass covering the cameras shattered, but luckily this didn’t affect the pictures I took.

Gasoline

Well, yes. There is a gasoline situation here too. The normal price of gasoline is around 20,000 LAK (320 HUF, 0.8 EUR). In recent weeks, this price has gone up to 40,000 LAK. When renting the motorbike, they asked us if we wanted to buy gasoline, and they could give us one liter each for 65,000 LAK. We happily accepted, and after some persuasion, we got another 2 liters.

This purchase was a good decision, despite the triple price. After all, we knew that it was not very easy to buy gasoline in Luang Prabang. According to our information, the situation is easier further away from the city.

In practice, this meant that we saw a lot of closed gas stations on our way. And several that were open, but did not have gasoline.

We were able to refuel 60 km from the city.

Despite the dust, potholes, potholes, constant slowing down and speeding up, we enjoyed the trip. The two of us, free on the road. We covered the kilometers dustily, but happily. This trip gave us a dimension of freedom that I would like to have everyone write down with their family doctor, as a must.

We arrived tired near the town of Nong Khiaw. Three kilometers from the city center, outside the residential area, we saw a very nice campsite, and we immediately reached for the brakes and turned around.

They were able to offer us an excellent wooden bungalow and a tree house. We decided which of us would live where using rock-paper-scissors. I lost and stayed in the bungalow for two nights. Of course, I don’t seriously think I lost. I could have given this accommodation to my friend even if I had won. After all – to say the least – not so long ago I spent two wonderful nights 32 meters above the ground.

Nong Khiaw is a medium-sized town. It is a colorful and bustling little town, but only for those who are not looking for unbridled entertainment. There are lots of small shops, many accommodation providers, a few restaurants and bars, and maybe 2-3 places where you can have fun in the evenings. But everything(!) closes at 11:30 PM.

An interesting thing happened to me. I was looking for a hairdresser because I had not had a chance to get my hair cut in the past few days. I found a hairdresser in the two-street town. There was a barber’s chair in front of a shop on the street, which indicated that the seller probably also deals with hair cutting.

As I looked at the chair exposed to the street and still there at night, I was unsure. Do I have the courage to get my hair cut in this chair? After a little thought, I decided that I would probably have more interesting experiences than this, where I would think about how simple my life was in Nong Khiaw. So I sat in the chair and got rid of unnecessary things. My hair and my little doubt.

The hairdresser was very nice, he even wanted to teach me a few words. His work left something to be desired, but I can’t be picky. Now he’s on my way. The next master will surely fix what he just did wrong.

Due to the opportunities offered by the small town, the day spent here was spent working and chatting in the evening.

And forming a team.

The formation of Hells Angel

In the city we met a Spanish guy and a Dutch girl, whom we met during the boat trip. They came here by bus. We had already done the return trip to Luang Prabang together on a motorbike.

Plus a French/Dutch girl joined us.

She was a bit of a cuckoo in the group. She had never ridden a motorbike before. She was a bit afraid to take part in the trip or not. She asked me what I thought. Since she is only a year older than my older daughter, I told her the following. You have to decide. But if you were my daughter, I would tell you not to worry, try it. If you don’t like the motorbike and the trip, turn around and finish it without hesitation. If you were my daughter, I would say go for it, but I would be so excited for you.

She did. I showed him how to operate the vehicle. I warned him that it was a 125cc engine, and it was powerful. Despite this, she pulled the throttle so hard on his first ride that she almost took down the building. That was all she did. She did the trip incredibly skillfully. We asked her several times if she had really never ridden a motorbike before? Because she didn’t seem like an amateur at all.

At the end of the day, we arrived in the next town, where she said that he was a little unsure here because he didn’t know the signs very well. I was suspicious, so I asked herif that was why she had a licence, right? It turned out that not only did she have no driving experience, but she didn’t have a licence either.

It was a brave decision for her to set off. You could call it irresponsible, but I think we measure signs differently in Asia.

Five people on four motorbikes. The adventure had entered another dimension.

On the way to Muang Xai

Our newly formed team set off on the road.

We expected the worst, but we were pleasantly disappointed. Good roads awaited us. Not the best, but let’s just say I could have been in Hungary.

There were no potholes, or at least not many, and we didn’t swallow too much dust today. It was a dream trip.

At least for us.

We crossed a mountain, in an incredible environment. Trees, trees, trees everywhere. An endless series of curves. Roads winding past huge cliffs and over ravines. It was a real motorcyclist’s dream.

But life also showed its true form.

We drove through many small settlements, where we could see what poverty really is. The streets and yards without grass, the red earth everywhere. The people, how they do and buy around their poor houses. The children playing and living their daily lives along the roads.

The joy of playing with a bucket of water, the sadness that appeared in the eyes of the old man collecting wood along the road. The hopelessness of life that the streets showed and the smile that appeared from time to time despite the bad conditions placed a very serious lump in my throat for two days.

Life begins here, and I think for many it ends here too. I am grateful that I am one of the few who can decide, travel and live without worries.

My gloomy thoughts were driven away from time to time by the children. The enthusiasm with which they greeted us, waved, watched us, and the joy with which they received our waves.

After a few hours of travel, the five of us arrived in the city of Muang Xai. I saw two more Westerners on the street, so I would venture that there were seven of us in the city.

Our task after dinner was to choose our accommodation. We rolled into the courtyard of a guesthouse with four motorbikes and greeted the woman who was there. She didn’t greet us back, she just called out to a young girl to handle the situation. Our situation.

The girl didn’t greet us either, she simply walked towards where we thought there were rooms. There was nothing to do, we followed the speechless girl. She simply opened a room. It had a double bed, which seemed small for 5 people, so we used Google Translate to make her understand that we needed 3 rooms in total.

Then all that was left was the question. She wrote an amount on her phone, we wrote another to apply the bulk discount. She pedaled away and soon came back and nodded. So we moved in. And she didn’t say a word during all that. It was strange.

Fast forward a bit: The next day I got up early and started working, but I only managed to enjoy my work for fifteen minutes when the electricity went out. Using Google Translate, I asked him when the electricity would be back on. He smiled and… nothing else happened. I told him “no electricity”. He shook his head with a smile, which I thought was the answer “are you kidding me, buddy?” And he didn’t say a word.

I’ve been thinking ever since that maybe he took a vow of silence…

After we got into the room, it turned out that we had to pay extra for the air conditioning. Life always throws up something interesting.

After we got ourselves cleaned up, we went into town for a second dinner. At the chosen place, they laughed at us a lot, even when we sat down among the locals. I think they laughed with us, not at us.

Then we went to a high-tech disco. This was an experience that transported us to the other side of the world. I have to say that when we arrived at this location, everyone laughed at us here too. In vain, Muang Xai seems like a cheerful city.

Upon entering the building, a curtain had to be pulled back to reveal the stargate. We immediately found ourselves in an air-conditioned world, where we had to enter the nightclub through a long corridor. The corridor was made of mirrors on both sides and the top, and neon lights followed our path all the way. I felt like I was boarding a spaceship.

The room where the space corridor led was a huge nightclub. People were dancing everywhere, standing next to tables. A manager who spoke perfect English immediately offered us a table, only to have to buy 6 bottles of beer to get this last free table.

We immediately started drinking and dancing. There were a lot of Chinese people in the room, we suspected that this building was built for their money and not for the locals. Less than a minute passed and one of the Chinese guys turned to me to join them at their table. Which was bigger and surrounded by sofas. When he invited us for the third time, we accepted the invitation. From then on, our glasses were never empty.

We had an unforgettable time, I left the venue with the young biker girl before the other three members of our gang.

I was the first to get up in the morning. I must have a better routine.

And I have more energy. LOL.

Pak Mong

The slightly hungover gang set off on their penultimate day.

The experiences on the road were similar to yesterday.

We changed things up a bit, in that we arrived more prepared than we had been yesterday. We put on our helmets. Although they didn’t object to us not wearing them yesterday, we didn’t want to take any risks today. This was the first time since we left that I had put the device on my head.

We had another really nice experience before we arrived at our last stop on our trip. Yesterday we passed by a lot of melon vendors, and during the evening it turned out that everyone had been thinking a lot about melons, but no one had said anything.

So this morning we decided to stop at the first melon vendor and eat ourselves to death. We kept our promise!

When the woman realized that we were not just buying a melon, but also wanting to eat it, she cut it open for us and made little chairs for us.

And we really ate ourselves to death.

Half of the melon was left. I suggested to the others that we give it back to the woman as a gift, because there were a beautiful little girl there, I think they were her little girls. The others didn’t understand what the point of that would be, since they could probably eat as much melon as they wanted. I said that I wasn’t sure at all. And if that was really the truth, then they could sell that half, and that would support them.

We agreed on that and left the other half. I was happy to experience that the next day, when we played the same scene in another place, the gift was no longer mentioned, it was simply done by one of the team members. I was filled with joy to see this.

Shortly after the first melon, we arrived in the city of Pak Kong.

This is also a dusty little village, where there is not much in the strictest sense of the word.

We spent our dinner in the best restaurant in the village. The building was actually an open shed, I would say it was more like a stable than a restaurant. There were three types of soup on the menu and a man dressed as a woman ran the shop.

It was a surreal experience to eat there, where any other living creature could easily be a guest, not just a human. The concept of cleanliness and the whole place were in an antagonistic relationship with each other. The soup, however, was delicious and this more than justified the statement that we were in the best restaurant in the village.

Since there was no program available, we made it for ourselves. We bought chips and sweets and had a movie night.

It was a great experience, how the five of us fit on a single bed and watched a movie in Spanish with English subtitles on a laptop on a chair in front of the bed.

We didn’t finish the movie, but the experience was still perfect.

Return to Luang Prabang

Our last day started well. The seat of one of the motorbikes couldn’t be opened. This was a problem because the fuel cap is under the seat, and there was hardly any petrol in the motorbike.

After a quarter of an hour of mishap, we set off to look for a mechanic. For some reason, there are a lot of motorbike repair shops in every village. So after walking 20 meters, we found a mechanic who was able to open the seat after another 10 minutes of work. The petrol station, where there was petrol, was 100 meters away. After the lucky refuelling, we covered the remaining 110 km.

100 of these were on the same road as the day before. Everything was the same, only on the way back, and the number of team members was greater.

On the road, we also met a huge elephant! It was comfortably pacing along the road with its owner on its back. It was an experience to see you overtake me twice and walk past me.

We tried to get home as soon as possible, so we quickly pushed on, except for a couple of short stops and not forgetting the second melon party.

Getting home.

On the way, I realized that for me now – or from now on – my home is where my big backpack is. It was interesting how this definition of home was born.

When we arrived at Sasa Lao in Luang Prabang, the keeper of my bag welcomed me with open arms and said only this: Welcome home!

Do you need any stronger proof of the truth of my definition? LOL

The last party

When we arrived at Sasa Lao, there was only one family room available. So we ended the trip with all five of us sleeping in one room.

I had the role of father during the trip anyway, so I took the kids to bathe and relax.

On this last day, I told them that I had an interesting fact for them. I showed them the scarf that I usually wear on my head, but today I wore on my face. “Guys, I bought this scarf 25 years ago, and I’m afraid there’s not a single one of you who was alive then.” This remained just a fact, no one could refute it.

In the evening, we headed off for our last dinner. While we were eating, I came across an interesting little book, which will be discussed in the next post.

After dinner, the idea came up to go bowling. By then there were six of us, because my friend who was guarding the backpacks had also joined us. And we had two motorbikes with us.

After some deliberation, we decided not to spend money on a tuk-tuk, since here in Asia it is completely natural for three people to sit on a motorbike. So two three-wheelers set off for the bowling alley. Which, by the way, was still in the jungle eight years ago, which gave it its charm. Today there is no trace of the jungle.

And our companions were also lost because they were going too fast. Following the intended direction, we ended up in a dark little street, where the locals laughed at us again. A few minutes later, we were laughing too, because the motorbike suddenly ran out of petrol.

There is a petrol situation. So every small shop has a chance of selling petrol. It happened this time too. I had to push the motorbike a few hundred meters, and then buy a liter of petrol at five times the price.

So we finally reached the bowling alley, where after 5 minutes of playing, the electricity went out and we waited half an hour for it to come back on. Two days later we went there again to play with another group. Then the power went out after our first bowling and we waited for an hour, but the power didn’t come back, but they gave us our money back.

I found that the power outage here is part of the experience.

After bowling, we even went to two discos, which resulted in a night of dancing and a massive Easter hangover, but that’s another story.

Farewell

One of the advantages of this lifestyle that I am living now is the possibility of good relationships that come easily.

This path is usually taken by open-minded people who easily and willingly connect with each other.

And I think most of us also know that whether the journey lasts 1 hour, a day or a week, the end in most cases will be separation.

Personally, I do separation with the same ease as getting to know each other.

We can meet again anywhere in the world. If we visit each other’s country, we can go to the other. We can message each other even months later.

So separation is not the same as forgetting.

We all said that one of the highlights of our trip was the time spent together.

I sent this message to the group the next day:

I’m just organizing the pics and videos. It was an amazing trip. The most pleasent moment for me was when you guys formed a line front of me with the 3 bikes. I really loved the aligned movment of your bikes. Relaxing, beautiful, it was a moment…

Yes. This trip was a moment!