Cycling gently up the Mekong

Next morning, we found a Chinese restaurant where we ate a delicious stuffed omelette followed with toast and honey that Nicole had bought from a 7/11 (Thai small supermarket). The wind was still cold and blowing from the North but the road was pleasant enough and we now knew a few words in Thai. Cycled through Nakon Phanom which thankfully was flat (Nakhon Phanom means "City of hills") to arrive in Tha Uthen where we found a lovely little bungalow overlooking the Mekong (totally by chance as absolutely nothing was written in Roman script and we are still trying to work out the Thai script for guesthouse, hotel or accommodation or whatever word they use for "somewhere to sleep").

The owners cultivated the bank over the road beside the Mekong and our room, decorated with little painted stones and shells, had a little balcony with a view directly over the river and we watched flocks of white egrets fly past. Mrs Phenprapabuphsia, our host, invited us to supper with her family. It was all very friendly and when Mrs P's grand-mother saw our wrists with cotton bands (from the Baci ceremony in Ban Phonsim - for the intended effect, the strings must be kept for a minimum of 3 days, some people believe the strings should be allowed to naturally fall off, so we still have ours...), she rushed to get a phakhuan (sort of tiered vase decorated with flowers, folded banana leaves and branches with white cotton strings hanging down) and her and her husband tied another band of cotton on our writs with more chanting and blessings and wishes for a long life. How lovely!

We left Mrs P and her family early the next morning after a nice hot coffee and sad goodbyes. The road was pleasant, flatish, with little traffic and a crosswind. Whilst eating our fried rice lunch at one of the many make shift kitchen/restaurant by the road side, we were approached by 2 nurses who urged us to be careful and warned us against cycling in Laos (dangerous! many robbers! Don't go!). They looked at us with great pity and insisted in giving us some Ponstan (for menstruating pains (?!), antacid for indigestion but we managed to refuse Paracetamol when we showed them our own supplies!We arrived in Ban Phaeng by 1.30, cycled to the Mekong on a narrow bumpy road and found nothing much on the bank except a few stalls and a rustic immigration office (flanked by a couple of friendly but armed soldiers). Tuk-tuks were driving down the steep sandy embankment and across the sand flats to a few waiting boats. Tribal looking Lao women were bringing grasses for brooms and material for skirt to sell. We sat on a bench and had a noodle soup lunch between chatty laughing Lao women and a cockerel strutting along side us and we cycled back to our guesthouse for the night which read "Resort", clean, comfortable and with a hot shower but still only 6 pounds.