Monday, March 03, 2003

Hilltribe Trek - Day 3

It was actually warm last night, not nearly as cool as the night before. We got up about 7:30-8:00, had some awesome Laos coffee and breakfast, and headed out about 9:30.

Oh, I should point out, last night Guy presented two options for us for the return trip. One was to head back down from this village back to the original river, where a boat would take us to the waterfall, where we could swim and relax, then tuk-tuk it back to the town. Or, we could hike along the mountain top to a few more tribes, and visit a huge cave, before heading back to the river, and the waterfall. The first option is the "standard" trek. We decided to go for the 2nd option, it would cost a little more because we'd have to take a 25 minute board ride down the river to our original starting point, but a few people tought it'd be cool to see the cave.

So, off we trek about 9:30. We walked through the village, and stopped at an opium "garden", where they were just about to finish harvesting the rest of the opium crop for that year. Opium only grows in the high altitudes. Getting opium from the bulbs of the plants is very tedious and time consuming. The plants have bulbs on them, the opium comes from a thin layer of skin between the outside skin and the bulb itself. You have to take a knife and make a fine slice on the outside of the bulb, and a white-colouried liquid will ooze out. This is the opium. The rest of the plant has no "drug qualities". Heroine is made from opium.

We continued along the top of the mountain, through meadows and tall grass and shrubs, getting all scraped up. After another village, we started our descent, and down and down and down we went. We were running low on water (there ain't no 7-11's in the hill-tribe villages!), so we tried to ration.

At one point, Courtney slipped and started falling down a cliff. Fortunately, Suzie was there to grab her backpack and get her back up on the trail. She skinned her knee and shin, but she's fine other than that. Of course, Court and Suzie have a good laugh about it as we hike along.

As we descneded, we ran out of water. Everyone is getting dehydrated. At our next stop, we stopped at a cave. Guy and the 3 guys hike up to the cave opening. Very cool. Guy lit about a dozen candles in the cave as we hike along, and it was lit up in this cool glow. Some awesome stalacmite and stalagtite formations too. The tree roots from above hang into the cave. While we're in the cave, my arms and legs and stomach and all over broke out in this red, itchy rash. I knew I shouldn't scratch, but it felt sooo good to scratch all over! And my body had stopped perspiring.

While we're in the cave, the girls walked ahead to the village, and sat down with some village women. Of course, they can't communicate at all. The hill tribe women gave them some water to wash themselves down. One of the tribe women had a baby that did some projectile diarhea thing (Rebecca said it was glowing poop), and the puppies ran over and licked it all up. They were kind of grossed out over that.

We pickd up the girls and walked to another home in the village and rested. As we sat in the home, my scratching got worse, but I kept scratching. When we were going to leave the house, Courtney wasn't feeling well, no energy, kind of dizzy. So I carried Courtney backpack for her. I could tell she was kind of out of it.

We continue walking, and we descend more and more, before finally reaching the village. We all run to the store, and she has a bunch of bottled water available for us. We all start drinking. I remember chugging my 1 litre in a matter of minutes, and as I drank, my pores opened up all over my body, and I started to sweat profusely, all over my body. My itchy rash started to away almost immediately. I had heat stroke, and I didn't have enough liquid in me to even sweat anymore. As we sat and drank, we bought some snack, and, as usual, all the kids are swarming around us, gawking and talking amongst themselves, about these strange, white "falang". We had lunch here as well, which was actually quite good, a fairly spicy noodle soup. Getting water and food back into our systems brought everyone back to life.

We continued hiking, it's flat now, and hiked to the Nam Khan river, where we had trouble finding a boat with a motor that could pick us up and take us downriver. Finally a young boy came across in a boat, using a long bamboo rod to push the boat, while his dad (grandpa? or some other adult?) retrieved the motor for the boat. The boy picked us up, and we all barely fit into the small boat. It was leaking quite bad. We got back to the other side, and the man came down with an outboard motor, hooked it up, and he started motoring up the Nam Kan river. Along the way, we had to pull over, and everyone had to move up a seat, so the kid could bail water at the back of the boat. We were taking on quite a bit of water. It's getting late at this point, and we decide to not visit the waterfall, but go straight to town and get a tuk-tuk. Of course, that's assuming that there's actually a tuk-tuk there waiting for us.

We get back to town, and low-and-behold, there's our tuk-tuk waiting!! We got a drink from the store, then drove back into town, got our packs, and took the tuk-tuk to the same guest house that Guy is staying at, as he tells us it's very nice, and cheap. It is very nice, and we get a large room, with a shared bath for $4US/night. The bed is sooooo soft and comfy!!! It's a fair distance from downtown though, but it is walking distance.

We had a nice hot shower, our first bathing in 3 days, and we're all caked in dirt.

The six of us (the trekkers) decide to meet at 9:00 at the night market for supper. Rebecca and Aaron didn't show up, so Court and I and Jon and Suzie went for supper. Rebecca and Aaron showed up later, after we were done eating.

Walked back to the night market, bought some dessert, then our tuk-tuk brought us back to our guest house about 11:00.

Vong Vichith is the name of the guest house.

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