Dan's Adventure

Trekking in Laos promised beautiful landscapes, untouched forests, remote villages, an abundance of wildlife and very few other tourists. I arrived in Udomxai from Luang Prabang hoping to set out on a trek from there as it had been touted on several websites as being a great place to start from due to its proximity to hills and hill tribes. Udomxai is one of those places that most people just pass through so it is very rare for the treks organised by the tourist office to actually take place. When I arrived there hadn’t been a single trek for the last 2 weeks and the price of hiring a guide to take me on a three day trek on my own was prohibitively expensive. The following morning I headed to Luang Namtha.

The Nam Ha protected area is one of the largest in Laos. The protected areas still have people living in them, but the government has been relocating villages into areas that have less impact upon the environment and are close to roads. Throughout Laos villages can be seen perched high on the hill tops, shouldering the road as it winds around the hills, the majority of these villages have all been moved to their current locations over the last few years as the government has tried to save the forests. The effects of logging and slash and burn farming was taking its toll on the forests so the government decided to step in. Nam Ha is in the area north of Luang Namtha making it the perfect place to set out on a trek into the protected area from.

One of the most reputable trekking companies in Laos is Green Discovery. They offer trekking, kayaking and other activities from all of the main tourist hot spots in Laos including Vientiane, Vang Vieng, Luang Prabang and Luang Namtha. I had read up on one of their treks whilst in Luang Prabang and when I met two others that were thinking of doing the same one the three of us decided to book there and then.

Eight of us set out from Luang Namtha with our guide and his assistant for a two day, one night trek into the Nam Ha protected area. We drove for an hour to our start point where we proceeded to walk through a new Khamu village and up into the hills. All of the first morning was spent climbing through a cloud with our efforts rewarded when we finally got above it and had a fantastic view over the valley below.

Our night was spent beside a river where we were serenaded by a frog chorus that didn’t stop at all during the night. The walls of our bamboo hut didn’t filter it out, nor did it block the sound of the rooster cock-a-doodle-dooing early in the morning. Still, it was a good night. Our guide prepared a tasty dinner of sticky rice (the staple of every meal on the trek), pumpkin and veggies along with some beef for the carnivores. The chief of the village we were staying at joined us for dinner and with the aid of our guide as translator, he told us about their village, the Khamu people and shared a bottle of Lao Lao whisky with us. Lao Lao is made from sticky rice by most villages, is extremely potent and has a horrific after taste, but it would be rude not to accept a drink.

The following morning we ate breakfast and started our walk back to Luang Namtha. Through jungle, fields and a Lanten village, it was amazing to see the change in environments as we walked. One section of our route was along a track that is rarely used by the villagers and as a result is pretty overgrown and had several trees fallen on it. We climbed up and over, along fallen trunks and watched as our guide hacked a path through with his machete.

In total we walked around 16km over the two days with between around 6 hours of walking on each day. It wasn’t too far a distance, but the vast majority was up hill so it wore us out. On all accounts, the trek delivered. We saw no other tourists, the villagers were surprisingly shy because they weren’t visited constantly by treks, the scenery was brilliant and although we didn’t see much wildlife, we certainly heard it.