The Laos Slow Boat Trip: Exploring The Mekong River.

Before my adventure on the Laos slow boat to the countries second city Luang Prabang, I didn’t really know what a certain saying meant, at least practically. But I was about to find out what it meant:

“Live for the journey, not the destination”

The slow boat is a unique boat trip that travellers use to get from northern Thailand to Laos’ second city Luang Prabang. You can fly into Laos or get on a bus but the slow boat is by far the most relaxing, exciting, and unique choice for your travels.

At the end of me 1 month travelling through Thailand, I booked on as part as part of a package from Chiang Mai that took care of travel and tickets. The night before we stayed in Chiang Rai, Thailand. This is a border town next to Laos and short drive away from the slow boat port that is on the Laos side.

You can arrange your own travel and get a visa and boat ticket at the port, but there is the remote but real risk of the boats being fully booked.

The next morning I was picked up in the van to take us to the port and I met 3 very British guys; Brogan, Joe and Alex as well as 2 Yanks; Nick and Samantha. We were to stick together throughout our adventures in Laos and Vietnam.

I don’t know if it was in the van or later, but pretty early on Nick said the famous line “Live for the journey, not the destination” and it kind of stuck with me.

We went through Laos border control where we received our visas and we carried on our journey to the port along the Mekong River where we would get on our slow boat.

The boat for your journey

They call it a slow boat because it is exactly that – very slow.

It’s not designed for speed, really I don’t know what it’s designed for – but whatever it is designed for it has turned out amazing.

The base of the boat is made out of an old barge with a wooden structure built on top of it to provide some walls and a roof. The walls have big openings along the side where you can sit on the ledge with your legs and feet dangling out the side and watch the scenery roll past.

Inside the boat there is a mixture of van and what seem aeroplane seats arranged in rows for the seating. You can also head up to the front of the boat where the captain sits and you can ask if you can sit at the bow.

If he says yes you can walk out of the wooden structure onto a patio like section section right at the front for the boat where you can watch the river flow by.

The Journey on the Slow boat in Laos is a total of two days and one night.

Laos slow boat day 1

On the first day you set off from the starting port and travel along the large and powerful Mekong River surrounded by forests and mountains as far as the eye can see. This scenery is occasionally interrupted by passing a small farming town where the children come running out of their houses in the forest in order to wave at the passing boat.

The boat will also occasionally stop off at these towns, which are quite often just 3 or 4 buildings made out of wood and reeds, in order to pick up some locals and supplies.

You’ll find out that the area the slow boat travels through is known as the golden triangle. This is basically the Opium capital of the world. You never normally see the industry in action but on the slow boat journey we caught a glimpse.

As I was sitting on the ‘patio’ at the front of the boat I caught a glimpse of something poking out of the water that had reeds dragging behind it as it whizzed toward our boat. It definitely wasn’t an animal and it was travelling at some speed. As it came closer I said to myself “that’s a periscope” and before you knew it the little submarine had whizzed past our boat and down the river.

When it was passing, the captain pointed at it and laughed to one of his crew. It was a drug smuggling submarine. There was probably just one little person in there smuggling millions of dollars’ worth of cocaine down the Mekong for the drug lords. It was a glimpse of a world people rarely see.

Pak Beng overnight stay

After many hours meandering down the Mekong, transfixed at the scenery and getting to know people on the boat, we arrived at the small town of Pak Beng for our overnight stay.

Upon disembarking at the very makeshift peer, we were greeted by the towns’ kids begging for money and food. This catches you by surprise and can be quote intense and loads of tourists gave them there left over Pringles and change.

Accommodation at Pak Beng wasn’t part of the package apparently so the hotel owners were waiting at the port for us shouting out how they had the best rooms and how much they were. They could have said any amount of bullshit and we wouldn’t have known if it was true or not. So we went with the least dodgy looking guy.

Our accommodation was a short journey away and the accommodation owners herded as many of us into to back of a pick-up truck and whisked us away.

I forget the name of the hotel where we stayed at but the owner offered us weed multiple times and my friends became possessed in their sleep.

Laos slow boat trip day 2

On the second day they had overbooked the boat so we stayed in the back section where all the pots and pans are. These things happen a lot in these countries so you go with the flow and it was actually really cool. The area had shorter walls, was very open and it was like our own private little area; no one else came back there.

On this journey we had a completely different view as we saw the scenery disappear into the distance behind us instead of coming towards us. We were also able to see how strong the Mekong River is as the currents often produced white water around the back of boat.

Over the next few hours we chatted, played card games, napped, and watched the endless green scenery pass us by.

After a few hours we arrived at a port a couple of miles outside Luang Prabang.

We all hopped into the back of a motorcycle taxi and headed to a hostel we found on TripAdvisor.

We had arrived at our destination, but it was the journey that will stick in my mind as the best part.