“You’ll be pleased to hear that the long boat trip that Mum had not been looking forward to turned out to be a real surprise.”
Although the boats are now mainly passenger boats, there turned out to be far more cargo on board than we realised, both in the hold and on the roof. A bit of planning managed to secure two ‘soft’ seats for us for the whole of the trip instead of the school-type wooden benches!
There were hot drinks for sale on board for a short time and the toilet was clean. We were on the boats for 9 hours each day and comfortably watched the scenery slide slowly by.
We pre-booked a room in Sarika ‘Hotel’ in PakBeng by phone the previous day and it was a good job we did as it was full when we arrived, as was lots of other accommodation even though the down-stream boat had not arrived. It was basic but no sightings of small four legged inhabitants.
The evening meal, including the best ‘sticky rice and mango pudding’ in the world was served on a veranda overlooking the Mekong. The next morning’s breakfast was also very good.
