Bolger Family Travels: January 2024

Wednesday, January 31, 2024

The Kuang Si Waterfall: A 20 Second Video Worth Watching

Photos Of The Spectacular Kuang Si Waterfalls

Waterfall selfie

Ron crossed the entire falls.

Becky and Vicky!

Vale was the first to go in.

A monk on his phone is a common sight.

The group.

I like this shot.

This is my favorite, other than the selfie.

A full scene of the uppermost falls.

Some bears in rehab.

Trailside flower.

This street vendor cooked us the

best grilled pork belly I've ever had.

The place to eat at the bottom of the trail.

Pop A Top, Again

Our first stop our first morning in Laos was to an interesting place call Ock Pop Tok, a living crafts center on the banks of the Mekong River.

(Aside: growing up, I never would have expected to have been to the Mekong -- it seemed so foreign and far away to me.)

(Editor: Technically speaking, it IS "foreign and far away")

It is a living crafts center that was founded and is run by women of Laos, for women of Laos. Their goal is to keep the textile traditions of Laos alive. Their goal is to teach young women how to make a living as artisan weavers.

Besides walking around the beautiful riverside setting, to me the most interesting part was the talk on the process of making silk, starting with silkworms. I never thought I'd see a silkworm, much less get to hold one. And yet did, passing a silkworm around even though it was hard to get off your finger.

Anyhow, it was a very interesting visit, and afterwards, we had time to shop (of course).

(Editor: Going back to the top of this blog post, I am impressed you were able to use a Jim Ed Brown song -- later a hit for Alan Jackson -- as the title. Writer: Who didn't see the center name, "Ock Pop Tok" and immediately think of "Pop A Top, Again"? Let's face, every reader immediately connected the two! Editor: I think you overestimate your readership's familiarity with '90s country music. Writer, pondering that point: Perhaps.

The silk presentation. (It's a little weird that

Ock Pop Tok is by women, for women, but

they had men giving the talks.

Carol, thrilled to hold a silkworm.

Close up of the silkworm.

Beautiful setting for Ock Pop Tok

For a beautiful view of the Mekong.

Small boat on the Mekong.

Quite the view.

Street scene outside the craft center.

Love It?. . .Yes. . .Larb It!

Prior to the trip, we went with friends to a Laos restaurant in Arlington, VA where we had some different Laotian dishes. Tom Sietsma, the famed Washington Post restaurant critic, loves the place, and especially raved about the Larb, which is a minced meat salad.

The menu at the Arlington restaurant spells it one way, Sietsma's review had it spelled a different way, and the menu at the Luang Prabang restaurant had it spelled yet another way. I'm going with the Luang Prabang restaurant's spelling, under the controversial theory that the people of Laos know how to correctly spell one of their national meals.

I thought the Larb at the Arlington restaurant was good, albeit not rave-worthy. Well, at restaurant Khaipaen, I ordered the duck Larb, and let me tell you, it was fantastic. Khaipaen is a a training and vocational restaurant, but you wouldn't know it from the great food and wonderful service. Gail ordered a soup of that she absolutely loved, Carol had the fish and chips and found them quite tasty. I would highly recommend Khaipaen for dinner the next time you are in Luang Prabang.

The goals of the training and vocational restaurant:

"Khaiphaen will give marginalized and at-risk youth the chance to receive professional restaurant training, safe accommodation and counselling, including work placement support after they graduate from the 18-month program."

(Source: SoManyMiles.com article by Cindy Fan)

(Editor: Don't say it. Writer: You guessed it -- I was a big Fan of her blog post!).

Duck Larb

Another revelation besides how wonderful the Larb is, was that you can buy beer in small or large bottles. The small bottles are close to US size, whilst the large beer bottles aren't quite wine magnum size, but you can picture it as close. Meanwhile, Carol enjoyed her Makphiet's Hibiscus and Lime Daiquiri.

Given the success of "Beerlao"

in Laos, I'm starting a craft

beer to be named "Beerusa."

Carol's beaming at the taste

of her Hibiscus & Lime Daiquiri.

Alas, most of the gin & tonics

she's had here in SE Asia

have underwhelmed, but

the daiquiri starred.

Another highlight was walking through the Luang Prabang night market on our way to the restaurant. It's quite a scene, and the place was packed. Think of it as a massive flea market selling everything from elephant pants to carved elephants, clothes and tschotchkes, and even more. The street, narrowed by little stalls with the goods on the ground or on hangers on each side, was packed. It would be a pickpocket's dream, but fortunately none of us were picked. Or pocketed.

(Spoiler alert: No, I didn't buy elephant pants. Instead, I bought elephant shorts. And yes, if you join us occasionally in our backyard for food and wine on summer nights, I WILL be wearing my elephant shorts. You've been warned.

It was another fun group dinner.

Country Number 42

Landing in Luang Prabang, Laos is a revelation. The sky was clear; it didn't remain that way, sad trombone, and the surrounding mountains are gorgeous.

Alas, I didn't take any pictures walking off the plane, across the tarmac, and into the terminal. You don't mess around in a communist country by slowing to take your camera out and taking a bunch of pictures.

One lady ahead of us veered away from the terminal because she wanted to take a picture of the terminal, primarily because the huge "Welcome to Luang Prabang" is pretty cool.

That's it, that's the post. But do know if you go to Luang Prabang, the airport is a stunning setting. It's not quite the remarkable view of the Remarkables (mountain range) in Queenstown, New Zealand, but it's definitely on the top five list.

A Visit To A Family Home

We did a home visit for dinner. It was an interesting opportunity to see how a multi-generational family lives in Chiang Mai. Located outside the city, the property had multiple buildings serving different purposes.

I don’t remember how many family members lived there, but the number is in double digits. Hosting groups of tourists such as ourselves for dinner is a way they make money. It’s interesting, as only the men gave talks, while women busied themselves in the background preparing food.

Before dinner, they showed us around the property, starting first with making a small bouquet of flowers to leave on the family’s “prayer icon” (my words, not theirs – I just don’t remember what it is called). Apparently the tradition is to place the little model temple/building on the east side of the property to greet the day. We placed our bouquets on the model, and (those who wished to) did a short, silent prayer or simply nodded in that direction.

Following the tradition, we took our shoes off and went up the outside stairs where we sat on tiny chairs (you either sit on the floor or on really tiny chairs in SE Asia) while a younger male family member (25-30 years old maybe?).

He gave us certain Thai things to try – something similar to chewing tobacco that, if used for many years, turns your teeth black. You chewed betel bark and a leaf (not sure of the name). As I’m writing this, Ron assures me that it significantly numbed his mouth. It has an anti-bacterial property, serving as a substitute for toothpaste, as well as serving to freshen their breath.

Apparently a mouthful of black teeth is prized in Thai society. Prized not to the point where people fake blacken their teeth for their Tinder profile picture, but it could happen.

The next thing was an “exotic and strange tasting” tea that has a lot of salt (Ron believes it helps while working in the field. Carol points out that they chewed it, and said it didn’t have much flavor/taste at all.

I didn’t try either – I had spent enough on fixing my dental issues over the last four decades that I sure didn’t want to chose black teeth or cracked teeth, and I don’t like tea.

After that, we toured around the small (jungle/woods) in the backyard, A stream ran through it, and our man pointed out the various trees and what they used the leaves and/or nuts for. We were given helpful advice not to stand under the coconut tree. Just seeing the dozens and dozens of coconuts on the ground led me to believe that was good advice.

We came back to the main sitting area in the backyard, where they rolled tobacco in banana leaves and folks smoked it (once again I passed). Ron says it tasted much better than he expected.

I remember Ron tried everything whilst I tried nothing, and he’s conveniently sitting in the row ahead of me on our flight from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City as I write this post, so I’ve been relying on both his recall and Carol’s recall.

After that, it was time for appetizers before dinner. And there so many appetizers that we probably didn’t even need dinner!. We sat on the tiny benches chowing down, before shifting to sitting on the ground for dinner.

I demurred on sitting, given my bad knee, and brought a chair over to the large group circle. The dinner food was quite tasty.

As good as the food was, the highlight for me the beer. In Thailand you can get a small beer (regular bottle size) or a large beer – which is twice the size and only costs about 20% more. It’s much cheaper to buy the one larger beer than two regular beers. So you kind of have to buy the large. Think of it like a magnum of wine compared to a bottle of wine.

Anyhow, they brought out my beer, and it had a huge chunk of ice sculpture on the outside of the bottle. As Chuck Thompson would say, “Ain’t the beer cold!” And it was.

Photos From The Home Visit

The family patriarch.

The group all sitting on the floor,

except me. I'm on a chair.

Ron, the old man, and a

hand-rolled Thai cigar.

The massive spider was the highlight

of the walk in the wood.

Banyan trees are always cool.

Becky and Bun (pronounced "Boon")

light up a hand-rolled Thai stogie.

Tuesday, January 30, 2024

Chiang Mai: My Kind Of Town

Our last full day in Chiang Mai, we had a free morning. A bunch of the group headed into the old city, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site (Of course, “UNESCO means ‘you must go!’”).

Bun gave us a map and suggested going to certain temples. Carol found a self-guided walking tour online. We didn’t do either, but we used parts of both plans. We ended up going into at least six different temples (maybe seven), including some smaller ones that weren’t mentioned on the map or in the walking tour.

Some of the group ran out of gas after a while, but I was loving it. Whether it is cathedrals, castles, palaces, or temples, looking at stuff older than the United States will never not be interesting to me.

(As an aside, it’s interesting that Buddhists claim Buddhism is not a religion, and yet there are prayers, temples, and other sorts of religious similarities. I’m not sure I buy the claim that it’s not a religion.)

Although there are big differences between the cathedrals and old churches of Europe and the Buddhist temples of Southeast Asia, there are similarities as well. For example, both consist of impressive structures with amazing artwork and design.

Among the temples we hit were Wat Chiang Man, Wat Lokmoee, and, well, a bunch of others. I ended up being the leader of the group, mostly because my GPS worked. Looking for the famous temple dedicated to horses, the Wat Khuan Khama temple, we went to one temple just on the other side of the old city moat, as indicated on the map, but it wasn’t it. However, that “wrong” temple was black and white on the outside, creating its own kind of beauty.

Carol had spotted the horse temple first. It was on the inside of the moat (the moat separates Old Town Chiang Mai from well, NQAOTCMT (Not Quite As Old Town Chiang Mai Thailand).

(Editor: I’m betting NQAOTCMT is NOT the actual name. Writer: Whoa – for once you got it right! Editor: The snark is annoying, but since you spelled “whoa” correctly unlike all the youngsters today who spell it wrong, I’ll let the snark go.)

I loved going into all of the random temples, large or small, but I heard some grumbles from others that they had seen more than enough temples for one morning in Chiang Mai. It was lunch time, so I led the group to a nearby highly-rated restaurant.

Alas it was closed for the week. And by closed, I mean the big gate was locked, and the place looked abandoned. Thankfully there was a sign on the front saying it was closed for the week, or I would have thought it about a day away from falling to pieces.

My trusty iPhone showed us another place near by, which proved to be quite a pleasant place to break for lunch. After lunch, we flagged down a tuk tuk to return to the hotel. (Btw, as I write this, multiple days behind, I can’t even picture the hotel we stayed in!)

Bun has taught me a lot about Southeast Asia on this trip, but perhaps the most important thing is to negotiate the fare for the trip in advance for a tuk tuk.

Photos From Chiang Mai Temples

Here's a bunch of photos from various and sundry Chiang Mai temples. They are pretty cool. If you don't agree, you have my permission to scroll past them.

(Editor: "Sundry" is an awesome word. You don't use it enough. Writer: I'll try harder!)