Luang Prabang

Our final route into Luang Prabang was Vang Vieng - Kasi - Kiou Ka Cham - Luang Prabang.

We spent four days in Luang Prabang. It is a World Heritage City because of its incredible collection of Buddhist Wats (temples), and its setting in the mountains of Northern Laos. We spent plenty of time visiting the temples... and there are a lot!

We visited Phu Si, Wat Mai Suwannaphumaham, Wat That Luang, Wat Manolom, and Wat Xieng Thong, among others.

I was in love with all the carvings and statues in both the new and old wats. The wats still in use usually coated their carvings with gold paint.

A closeup at Wat Xieng Thong (Golden City Monastery).

Luang Prabang has become quite touristy in the last couple of years. The special tourist night market is quite a spectacle. It seemed to be endless (till we found the end) and was full of interesting souvenirs and local crafts. It was also a fun place to work on your bargaining skills. We also found that the street food vendors at the night market had the best food in town... and damn cheap to boot!

Across the street from our guesthouse, at Wat Chum Khong, this loud ritual took place at 4 oclock (pm and AM!).

With a lot of Buddhist Wats comes lots of monks. Luang Prabang actually has hundreds of "novices". Novices are young men and boys that come from the surrounding villages to get an education and learn to become a monk. When they complete high school, they usually go back to village life, and some return in older years.

Boo!

We spent a lot of time talking to these "novices" as they were very excited to practice their english, or lack of, with us.

Unfortunately, knowledge of many of the beautiful crafts that go into making and preserving these Wats is disappearing. This novice was part of a program in which the crafts are deliberately taught by lay people or monks in order to reinstill the knowledge on how to upkeep the temples in the younger generations.

Every morning at close to 6:00am, the locals "give alms" to the monks. Some three hundred monks walk down the roads while local buddhists kneel down and provide them with their food.