410 steps to climb....but another upgrade!

Our guide for the next few days was a quiet guy called Xue, pronounced Sue. We were due to climb Mount Phousi after droppping our belongings at the hotel but Xue asked if we would be ok to start the tour now then check in later; we agreed, not knowing that this would allow us to see the sun setting over Luang Prabang.

We were warned that there were 410 steps to climb to get to the top stouppa; it was still roasting even at 4.30pm! The view was beautiful, and only ruined but the sheer number of people wanting to see the sunset. We got some lovely pictures before heading back down the hill towards the night market. 











The night market is huge; there are over 500 stalls with locals selling their wears.





Xue introduced us to his wife, who has a stall at the market,  and one of his daughters, he has five kids in all! We walked through the market before getting back into our bus to take us to the hotel. It was literally a 2 minute drive so we knew it would be easy to walk back into town. We were greeted with a welcome drink of mango juice and something else (even our guide didn’t know!), some peanuts, river weed (like seaweed) and fried banana. We went through the customary check-in procedure before being told we had been upgraded; the joys of being a honeymoon couple! We were  given the deluxe room, apparently the best in the hotel.





After relaxing in the room for an hour or so, and devouring the lychees in the fruit basket and a beer (thanks again trailfinders, another free mini-bar!), we decided to walk back to town for some dinner. The guide recommended a few restaurants to go to, so we went to his favourite, Coconut Garden. It was a 20 minute walk, back through the night market but w managed to find the restaurant quite easily. It was heaving, usually a good sign! We ordered grilled chicken skewers, vegetable spring rolls, beef with onions and chilli and some sticky rice....everything was delicious, particularly the brown sticky rice which had a unique taste. Dinner cost 165,000 Kip, or £14.69!



After devouring dinner, we sauntered back to the hotel, deciding to have a drink at the bar. I had a gin and tonic, it was almost half the price of dinner, albeit in a pint glass!

Our guide was meeting us as 9.30am next morning so we headed back to the room and try to get over the jet lag....

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