Getting to Don Khon, Laos.

Yesterday was a heavy travel day. Though only 250 km and with a promised travel time of 6-7 hours, the journey from Kratie to Don Khon took about 12 hours. Lots of sitting in the mid-day heat waiting for....? And the road! I'm sure that there are many war zones on the planet that enjoy better asphalt than we did on the trip between Kratie and Streng Trang. Don Khon is one of a pair of islands - Don Det is the other, a young person's party mecca (they took one look at me and told me I would not be able to stay there) - on the Mekong in Laos, which are separated by 100 meters of river channel. As all of the other passengers on the 10 seat passenger ferry (please don't read the word "ferry" and imagine something BC Ferries would run, it very much is not) were bound for Don Det, we were told we would have to walk the 1 km from Det to Khon rather than drop us at Khon as i typical. One would think after a month in Southeast Asia I would be able to smell bullshit when it is served. But no. We walked the first two km and then caught a tuk tuk for the final 3 km. Do you think the same people who operate the ferry also operate the tuk tuk service on the islands?

We wandered the resort strip of Don Khon to the ringing of, "sorry, we are full, full, full", 'till almost the last of the resorts and at last came upon 4 little rooms on stilts over the Mekong. Spartina but clean with hot water at $10 a night. There is a photo from our porch below. We are here for at least 3 nights so, just to bore you completely (you can just not read it), I'll break this up into a number of posts.