Bargin' it from Thailand to China on the Mekong

Well, finally some time to update this with those pics/stories I promised...

This may be a bit over informative for some, as I will try to make this a place where people who want to do the same trip can get some information (I get some strange hits from google). I will probably add more information in the next week.

Contrary to what others have written on the net, this trip is possible year round. Usually the boats travel from Chiang Saen to JingHong. This time of year though (the dry seaon - anytime from February to early July we were told) the trip will only go as far an GuanLei in YunNan. From GuanLei it is a 5 hour bus ride to JingHong, or two days on a bike.

From July to December, this river trip can be done in two days and two nights. The risk of doing it late in the dry season is that it's possible that the trip will take longer. Possibly a lot longer. Our captain told us that the last trip took him 16 days... if we weren't too scared, we were welcome to come aboard.

The Chinese government controls the dam that controls the flow of water, so if you decide to do this trip in the dry season, you may find yourself anchored somewhere between here and nowhere (as we found ourselves doing a couple of afternoons) waiting for the water to come up. I can tell you that it comes up pretty slow.

Because this trip can take a lot longer in the dry season, the boat captains will try to charge more. We read on the net that 300 yuan was a pretty standard fare, but we met one cyclist in Lao who paid 600, and another guy who had paid 400. So, you're going to need to bargain. Our captain started at 500... eventually he explained that the trip could take a long long time, and he would need to feed us during that time. Food costs money. Eventually we worked out a deal where we would pay 350 if the trip was 3 days or less, 400 if it was 4 or 5 days, and 500 if it was more than five days. Seemed reasonable. Payment to be made on arrival!

Actually, when we got to Chiang Saen, the only boat in port was heading to Myanmar. The captain of that boat informed us that there were 5 boats 10 km up river at the Golden Triangle, and sure enough there were. Don't rely on Thai Immigration for information about the boats; they have no idea.

So, if you don't find any boats in Chiang Saen, you know what to do.

We headed up the road and arranged passage. Then the captain of that boat found a car and drove us back to Chiang Saen where we went through immigration and formally "departed" Thailand. At this point we walked out of immigration back onto the street - countryless - and drove back to the boat.

Anyway, here are some pictures.

Ahh... yes. This is the boat. mmm hmmm. Nice one. Up top, behind the front deck you can see four windows of the living quarters... There were eight rooms, each with four beds... This boat is called 红星号 or "The Red Star".

These Thai labourers loaded up the boat - shouldering three 10 kg boxes of dry Longyan (a fruit... aka "dragon eyes") down the hill - for about 8 hours.

We left just after dark and travelled for about four hours in the dark using spot lights... I took this picture early the next morning just after we set off. That's the cook (or "the boy" as Brett and I named him) swabin' the deck. We would usually travel until 9 or 10 in the evening before ancoring for a good nights sleep. The crew would get up at around 5:00 am, and we would set off before the sun rose.

On the bridge: "Mi se de" Yang at the wheel and I can't remember his name on the throttle. There was a huge poster of Mao on the door behind Mr. Yang that I wish I could have gotten in this picture.

When we went through a shallow section, two of the guys would stand at the front of the barge and probe the water with long bamboo poles, yelling out directions as we inched up the river. We were frequently beached on sand bars, and twice we had to just stop all together and wait for an indefinate time. During these times, the captain would come and give us doomsday predictions about how the trip would probably take 8 to 10 days. He was serious.

This was a crazy rapids section where the water flowed so fast that we needed the winch to pull the boat through. The barge had a winch up front powered by a huge deisel engine. Four or five members of the crew got off the boat and dragged the cable a hundred meters up stream where they found a suitably big rock. We inched up stream with the winch and the boats two engines all at full throttle. It was a little hairy. I guess that barge above didn't make it.

Here are a couple of barges parked early morning on the Lao side of the river.

A couple hours later, while I was reading on deck, I saw a bloated dead body eddying on the side of the river. Rough.

We kept on moving.

What to do? Did the crew see it? I have to say, I paniced a little (it's not everyday you see such a thing). I spent a minute or two working out what I was going to say to the captain. I went to the bridge and knocked on the door. I said something like "你们有没有看到水里的人? 他死掉了!" "Did you see that guy in the the water? He was dead!"

"Mmmm", they said. "He was probably having a bath and fell in".

We continued up the river.

I asked what we should do.

They said no problem, it was taken care of.

It was left at that.

The last morning of the trip, at least 100 km south of China, we woke up to find the Mekong raging. The water had risen at least a meter over night. The dam had been opened. Everyone was pretty excited. High water means a lot less work for the crew.

After exactly 3 days and 3 nights, we made it to GuanLei. The crew invited us to stay another night on the boat, and to head out for a night on the town. Before we got off the boat, we had a huge meal with six or seven dishes. They offered, and we drank a big glass of 百酒 (bai jiu, the strongest fire water I've ever drank) to toast the trip. Later we went into town to look around and play some pool. It was a great introduction to China.

You can check out Brett's blog for another version of this...

In the next posting I will explain how we learn Chinese by watching Chinese soap operas. Interesting and educational.

中国到了

We arrived on the evening of the 2nd, and spent yesterday cycling north towards JingHong.

The boat ride was great. We made it - along with the crew of seven and what must have been nearly a thousand tons of dried Longyan - from Chiang Saen to GuanLei in three days and three nights. I have many good stories to tell, including the one about winching the barge through fast and low water, the threat of a two week trip, the giant lizard (dead of course) that the crew bought from some Lao hunters, the dead body, and of course the night out on the town with the boys after we got into port.

But those stories are for another time.

Unfortunatly, this internet cafe won't let me plug in my camera, likely for fear that I will send out sensitive pictures. Ha.

Unsuprisingly, I can't actually look at this blog from China, the compromise being that I can post. This of course is due to what's known as "The Great Firewall of China". You can read about it on Wikipedia (which I find is also blocked) if you search under that term.

I will write more and post some pics from JingHong in a few days.

Nifty

Found this map, and thought I would draw on it in order to give you an idea of where I am, where I was, and where I am going.

There it is.

In particular, please take note of the difference in spellings, and difference in geographical locations of "Taiwan" and "Thailand". Eureka!

Check out the mountains west of Kunming. Dem's called the Himalaya. Oh boy.

Last of Laos

My two week Lao visa expired, and I got out just in time feeling like I would as well. Not so bad like that, but it was this trip's first serious case of la duzi (worst since India).

First off, this picture is for those parents who have discovered that their children, recently returned from Asia - innocence lost - have converted to vegetarianism. I hope this gives you some insight as to why they did something like that without telling you.

Here is a pic of Lao looking it's best. A small village on a misty early morning high in the mountains near Kasi.

And here, not five km down the road, is Lao looking it's worst. Now I don't want to get into a discussion concerning slash and burn farming (whether or not one has any right to inflict modern environmental values on hill tribe cultures who have been doing this type of thing for thousands of years), but I have to wonder what this guy thought when he looked out from his door the morning after he burned off this hill side.

River side village.

These are backpackers. This is what backpackers do. THE waterfall near Laung Prabang. A nice one.

Early morning on the Mekong. After being held up in Laung Prabang for far too long, we found we didn't have time to cycle out of Lao as planned. The only option was a two day (ten hours each!) ferry up the river to the Thai border.

Now in Chiang Mai, second or third biggest city in Thailand I think (though at 700,000 it pales to Bangkok's 8 or 9 million). An allright place to spend a few days eating excellent food and relaxing while we wait for our visas for China. The best we could get out of them was a double entry 3 month visa. As I understand it, this means I can stay for 3 months, and then I have to leave... but then I can just turn around and go right back in for another 3 months.

We left our bikes up in Chiang Saen - staging point for the aforementioned barge to YunNan. Two days ago there were at least five barges being loaded for the return trip, and hopefully there will be a few new ones by the time we get back. Chiang Saen is a port town in the golden triangle, the point where Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand's borders come together, and where an awful lot of opium used to be grown. We will return in a few days with those visas and arrange passage for the three day trip; again along the Mekong, where it forms the border between Myanmar and Laos.

In other news, following a vision involving a pigeon that I had during my ten day meditation, my lost camera has been located.

Next posting will be from somewhere in southwest China I guess.