Highlights from Lao/Cambodia trip

Beloved --
Hello from Chennai, India (again):

A few images from the time in Thailand, Lao and Cambodia. The crucified Ronald McDonald was on several lamposts in Chiang Mai. The moonrise and sunrise shots are across the Mekong from Thailand into Lao (near the Golden Triangle). The family picture is our Laotian guide--Somchit--and his auntie. And the parade of monks was during their early morning rounds in Luang Prabang.

I was invited into a drop in game of petanque in Luang Namtha with some of the locals and thanks to too much time playing bolle at home. But I did our side proud! And enjoyed the lao lao (rice moonshine).

We had a great hike in the Nam Ha Conservation Area of Lao, the highlight of which was a picnic on the ridgeline with banana leaf plates and freshly cut bamboo chopsticks. The meal featured sticky rice and something like babaganoush! We encountered Black Tai, Lanten, & Khmu tribespeople during the hike.

Luang Prabang (a UNESCO World Heritage site) is home to 4,000+ monks some of whom you see above on the early morning alms & food collection rounds. We each bought 4 kilos of oranges to distribute one-by-one to the monks in the early morning light.

Kayaking on the Nam Song river near Veng Vieng is more like a S. Florida Spring Break party with beer swilling European youth and blaring Bob Marely--very unexpected in this karsk rich part of Lao.

We had a short stay in Vientiane where the mighty Mekong appeared more like an un-navigable stream looking across the flats towards Thailand.

Phnom Penh: The Killing Fields, the S.21 prison, and a real roadside fight and probable murder that we all witnessed from the bus made it hard to sleep that night. There seems to be an underlayment of violence in this part of Cambodia.

Siem Reap/Angkor Wat (more pictures to follow, I promise): Sunrise visit for my 1st view of the temple complex. 5:30am tuk-tuk ride. Angkor Wat was built in the early 1100s. It was first Hindu and then Buddhist (like the ancient Khmer kingdom) and is considered the largest religious building in the world, having been photographed from space by early NASA astronauts.

We finished this tour with a trip to Tonle Sap, the largest freshwater body in SE Asia and a highly productive fishery--smelled like it, too. The floating villages of Tonle Sap are 30% Vietnamese and 70% Cambodia.

More details and pictures later. . . .

I love you and miss you all,

Jim