Saturday, January 23, 2010

Xe Pian Trek

I came to Pakse mainly to do a trek to Xe Pian National Protected Area. This is supposed to be one of the most important protected areas in Laos because it is remote and hardly anyone lives there. I went to the tourist office to see if they had any treks going but they didn't. I checked Xplore Asia, a tour company near my hotel and they had a trek leaving the next day with 3 people. This sounded good.
While I was still in town I wanted to check out the big market 2km away. I rented a bicycle to ride there. While I was on my way I ran into Rohan, the New Zealander I did the Phou Hin Boun trek with days ago. He was looking for a hotel. He took a room at my hotel, Lankham and rented a bike and we rode to the market. He was also looking to trek to Xe Pian and when we came back from the market, we both signed up for the trek.

We had to be at the Xplore Asia office at 7am. I got up at 6.30 and Rohan and I ate at the Indian restaurant across the street. We left at 7.15 with our female guide, Son. It was an hour and a half drive to Kingfisher Resort where we picked up our other 3 trekkers. They were Russian couple Vlad and Nelly and Frenchman Matt. From here we had another hour and a half drive along a very bad road to the village of Pha Pho. We got our stuff together here, picked up our local guide and began trekking. We trekked through very nice and tall forest. Much nicer and more diverse than the forests of Phou Hin Boun. It felt great to be in the proper forest again. My guidebook says that this 2 day trek is the toughest they have done in Laos but I didn't think so. The 'barely visible trails' were clearly visible to me and the streams that we were supposedly to cross numerous times, were all dried up. There was no water the first day anywhere and I thought it was quite an easy and enjoyable trek. We left the forest for a small road like track that led to the village. We stopped here for a rest. It was here that my right knee and a few fingers started burning and were intensely itchy and uncomfortable. I had shorts on, which was my mistake. I must have brushed up against some nasty plant. Thankfully it didn't last too long but the itch came back as I poured water on it during my bucket shower. It was also at this point during our rest that I noticed some dried blood on my hand. I wasn't feeling any pain anywhere and couldn't figure out where it came from. Son noticed a little later that there was a bloody clot on my left ankle, just above my sock. It seems like I was the victim of my first leech in Laos! The forest was really dry and I didn't expect any leeches. No one else encountered any. Must have been a determined rogue. It was no big deal though. I washed off the blood later. It became slightly itchy 2 days later.

We walked this road for 1km and reached the very poor village of Ta Ong. We would be spending the night here in an eco-lodge located at the far end of the village. I liked the location of the lodge. It wasn't in the middle of the village so we didn't have people constantly staring at us or weren't completely overwhelmed by the noisy village. We relaxed here until dinner was ready in the village. The food was varied and delicious, much much better than the food on my last 2 treks. Of course, laolao was passed around after the meal. It wasn't as strong as some of the laolao I've had but still, 2 shots was enough for me. Matt and I hung out on the porch. The stars were good but the atmosphere was ruined by several places in the village. Even though they don't have electricity, they run a few generators. A few places were playing loud music over top of each other and another place had the volume on their video game turned up full blast. It could have been such a peaceful night. This racket continued till almost midnight.

The next day we got up at 6.30 and went for a hike in the forest. We were supposed to see some birds feeding but the tree had apparently finished fruiting. We heard a bit of commotion in the trees but saw nothing. We walked back to the village and went for breakfast. It rained during the night and the morning sky looked ominous. While we ate breakfast it started to rain. At the last minute while packing for this trip I decided to take my raincoat and I'm glad I did. I put the raincover on my pack and we all had to start hiking in the rain. It was really wet without cover but became less so once we entered the forest again. We walked about an hour and a half in the rain. It stopped just before we climbed up to a magnificent viewpoint. The rain left behind clouds of mist over the forest below us. It looked really cool as some of them climbed towards us and right past us. From here we walked another hour to a waiting boat. The sun came out and my pants dried as we rode the river. It was an enjoyable boat ride. There were 2 boats, well really just motorized canoes, 3 of us to each canoe. Our canoe was having problems. Turns out we ran out of gas! The oldest trick in the book! We had to hang on to the other canoe for a tow for the next 30 minutes. We came back to the village were we had started the trek and had lunch. Then it was the bumpy ride back to the smooth road and finally back to Pakse. Matt and I both took a room at Lankham. Rohan went to another hotel but we met up for dinner later. Rohan was leaving for the 4000 islands area south of here. Matt and I were heading to Tad Fan waterfalls.

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