Andrej and Karen Brummer

The adventures of the Brummers

Monthly Archives: November 2011

Dre’s dad Tom’s visit

We bumped into Dre’s dad Tom on the border as if by well-timed fate.  We had come to the border for Karen to do a quick visa run and to pick up some sliced bread from Thailand; a trip that was going to take us the day and we would be back in Luang Namtha for Tom’s arrival the following day.  However, it would seem that we got our dates wrong, because just as Karen was heading down the stairs of immigration to get on the boat to Thailand, Dre called out and we both realised that Tom was standing right in front of us.  It was pretty cool, because we had talked about staying the night either in Chiang Rai (to meet him at the airport) or at the border to meet him when he crossed, but we were both unsure about exactly when he was arriving and we’d left our computers back in LNT so we figured it would all work out somehow.  So to meet at the border was really great – had we been 5 minutes earlier or he 5 minutes later, it is highly likely we would have missed each other and gotten separate transport back to Luang Namtha, so it really did work out well.

Journey to Muang Sing

We took Tom to see the usual sights around Luang Namtha, the waterfall, stupas, etc and also up to Muang Sing to spend some time seeing some villages. We visited our favourite Ahka village and Hmong village as well. It was great to be able to show Tom around because he really appreciated what he was seeing and seemed to really enjoy himself.

Beautiful Luang Namtha

On the way back out of the Hmong village we met up with a lovely little old lady who was hand making some handicrafts so we stopped for Tom to buy some, and continued riding back down the mountain with stunning views over Muang Sing.

Hmong village in Muang Sing, Luang Namtha provinceBoat trip on the Nam Tha river, Luang Namtha

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tom, Dre and Thong took a boys trip on a boat for a day on the Nam Tha river. They visited Lanten and Khmu tribe villages, and had lunch at the Forest Retreat confluence camp on the edge of the Nam Ha and Nam Tha rivers. All enjoyed the day a lot and came back to the shop for tequila shots!

Ban Soptud Lanten village in Luang Namtha

We had a really good time showing Tom around, and his insights into life in Laos from when he lived here 20 years ago proved to be really helpful for both us and Thong for understanding each other’s culture more. Our photos of Tom’s visit are here.

Our 6th wedding anniversary

Luang Namtha mountains and rice fields

We were really glad that during the week leading up to our wedding anniversary we took the time to do a few cool things, because on the day we ended up being insanely busy in the shop and only managed a couple of hours time out for ourselves.

Luang Namtha rice harvest, stack of rice stalks

We escaped by motorbike into the rice fields and sat on the left over rice stalks for a while and watched the sunset. It was a nice way to reflect on the last 6 years of married life and also just chill out. We’ve had some pretty cool adventures and we both can’t believe how lucky we are at getting to share that time with each other.

Luang Namtha harvesting the rice

During the week we also spent some time watching the rice harvest – wow what hard work it is! It always amazes us at the level of intensive labour that goes into rice growing, everything from the turning of the fields, planting, tending, harvesting, all of it is very hard work. Another highlight was meeting Simi and Caleb – they contacted us via this blog because they were coming to Luang Namtha and it happened that we all got on really well and we hope to catch up next year in Thailand or somewhere else in the world. One of the major benefits of being here in Luang Namtha is the amazing people we get to meet; we reckon about 5-10% of travellers who come into our shop become more than just aquaintances and are people who we’d definitely hang out with at home and/or again if given the chance. We are lucky to be developing a large network of friends from all over the world so it’s going to be yet another excuse to travel more in future. ;)

Meeting new friends in Luang Namtha Manylin's delicious cooking at Papaya Restaurant, Luang Namtha

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We spent our anniversary night eating at our favourite Lao restaurant in Luang Namtha; Papaya. We ordered a feast and Manylin’s cooking as always, lived up to expectations. A fantastic day and week, bring on the next year!

Kate and Marcos visit us

That Luang Namtha

Kate and Marcos came for a fleeting visit for a few days in early November.  We took them to Nam De waterfall, close to the town of Luang Namtha and spent some time in the village there playing with the kids and seeing village life.

We went up to the temple near to town and got a cool view over town, and then also went into the old town and went to the old stupa as well.

Old Stupa stairs in Luang Namtha

We spent some time riding around on motorbikes to see the various highlights of the area, and also in the shop, chilling out and drinking cocktails.

Cocktails at Forest Retreat Laos, Luang Namtha

We attempted to go to the Kao Rao caves too, but left it quite late in the day and the usual cave guy wasn’t there to give us torches so we ended up waiting a while to see if he showed up, and then hanging out in a rice paddy hut instead. All in all it seemed like Kate and Marcos were here for the blink of an eye, but the time that they were here was heaps of fun. Our photos are here.

Luang Prabang

We spent most of our time in Luang Prabang just chilling out and visiting a few things that we really loved last time, as well as visiting a few new temples. It was nice to spend time around the river, and just wandering around town.

Luang Prabang temple guard, Laos

We climbed Phou Si mountain again to watch the mist float off the mountains in the morning and it was still really cool to do it again a second time.

Early morning mist over the Nam Khan river and Luang Prabangs surrounding mountains, Laos

This time we were quite amazed at how much more touristy Luang Prabang has become – not surprised at the tourism numbers themselves because Laos is fast gaining it’s reputation as an amazing place to visit – just surprised at how it is being handled. As a UNESCO World Heritage Site, we were quite shocked to find that all of the temples now charge entrance fees, and have shops selling junk food and trinkets to tourists either inside the temple, or just outside. It seems somehow wrong to take these beautiful historical buildings and turn them into crass shop stalls to make another buck from falang. The idea of charging entrance fees for temple upkeep seems a good one, and in many parts of Laos this really does help towards maintaining and repairing the temples; it was sad to see that the temples with the highest entrance fees had rubbish in the grounds from the shop/stall vendors who were selling packaged products, and no rubbish bins around either, so fees are clearly just being pocketed and not used positively.

Also now there are signs up around LP saying that the morning alms giving for the monks has become such a huge tourist attraction that now they are trying to discourage tourists from purchasing sticky rice from the morning vendors – apparently now instead of locals giving to the monks, they prefer to sell products to the tourists to give to them; a strange paradox – the monks are still getting fed which has to be a good thing, but some locals are worried that the religious significance of the alms has gone. Very interesting to see the progress (if you can call it that?) of this town.

One of Luang Prabangs many temples, Laos

Anyway, we had a pleasant few days checking out Luang Prabang again, it was really nice to be back and we’re sure we’ll return again at some point! Our photos are here.