“What time does the bus leave?”, we asked.
“When it’s full”, came the reply.
So we sat patiently at the local bus station in Chiang Rai, observing our bus driver for any signs of our imminent departure. About an hour later we loaded our bags and squeezed onto our wooden bench seats. Clearly the seats were not made for Westerners. Orange flowers dangled from the driver’s mirror and a packet of biscuits in a bronze bowl sat there as some kind of offering to the Gods of transport.
The hilly road north to the Thai-Lao border was flanked by teak plantations and coconut groves. This was broken up by mandarin, banana and nut tree orchards, as we approached villages with rudimentary houses cobbled together from bamboo and corrugated iron. Through the bus window we saw skinny dogs lazing in the shade, small children playing with sticks, madly waving as they clocked our pale faces. Later, as we approached the infamous Mekong river, the land flattened out into neat parcels. Each parcel brimming with various sewn crops, some still smouldering after a recent burning off.
We finally arrived at the border; a large, monolithic marble building with sombre looking staff in military uniforms. We completed the mandatory forms and handed over US$40. The notes were so crisp and new that the officer had to check their authenticity under an ultraviolet light.
Soon we were ushered onto a luxury coach with plush seats for a two minute ride over the Mekong into the Kingdom of Laos. More visa processing. Finally, free to travel, we negotiated a fair price to get a short ride on a songthaew, a ute with bench seats with a beautifully decorated canopy, into the village of Huang Xia. Our first introduction to Laos and the base of the ‘Gibbon Experience’.
Our beautiful daughters, Seren and Lili, who had already flown the nest, were back in the family unit, along with their brother Solomon, myself and my husband Dave. We were braced for another family adventure. This trip took us from Thailand overland to Laos and into Cambodia.
To make Christmas memorable we had booked ourselves on the ‘Gibbon Experience’ – an epic adventure that included zip-lining through the jungle and sleeping in a tree house high in the forest canopy.
The ‘Gibbon Experience’ was created in an effort to conserve the Nam Kan National Park. Illegal logging, commercial cropping and excessive mismanagement of the land was rapidly eradicating the tropical forest. The project was established in 1996 with the mandate of ensuring a sustainable future for the Bokeo forest. The ‘Gibbon Experience’ provides full-time jobs to over 120 local forest people-working as guides, drivers, preparing food and maintaining the zip-lines and vast infrastructure. Portions of the costs go to reforestation and aid projects.
Whilst most of us felt excited, Sol remained reluctant, citing that “safety standards could be dodgy!”. Needless to say, the safety briefing was thorough; we donned our harnesses and headed to a small village tucked away in the hills. The first zip-line over the river helped to ease our way into it, followed by a long trek upwards through the humid, shady forest. Then, the real test, a 375m zip line across a shallow valley. To say it was exhilarating was an understatement; everyone seemed to be on an adrenaline high. There was plenty more zip-lining to come, with the longest distance covered, a staggering 570m, was-a thrilling ride which had us either whooping or screaming with both fear and excitement. By mid-afternoon we’d tackled more than ten zip-lines broken up by short hikes taking us deeper into the vast jungle. We also encountered a forest giant, a 500-year-old tree with a circumference so big it took five of us, stretched out linking hands, to make it around its girth.
One last zip-line to our treehouse, our home for the night. Perched high above the canopy, a sturdy construction that wouldn’t look out of place on the set of Avatar. It wasn’t long before local women zip-lined in with our dinner. They efficiently laid out our Laotian banquet and we ate like kings. Our guide, Sephon, left us a jar of local hooch which he referred to, with a sly giggle, as “happy water”. The locals disappeared back into the jungle leaving us to enjoy the sunset, as the jungle, teaming with life, thrummed all around us. We all took turns to sit on the loo with a view and slept soundly basking in the wonderful memories we just created.
Ali Johnson