29th – Silky smooth not so blue waterfall

The hotel’s restaurant is located further down the street so after that quick walk back and forth we met up at the reception at 0900, being picked up to start the day’s planned schedule.

A few minutes’ drive from the hotel took us to the etymology museum where we got to see and read a bit about the various local indigenous people groups and subgroups. I felt that it was very small considering the numerous groups but yet quite informative – had it been bigger it would probably have gotten a bit too dry.

From there we drove to the Ock Pop Tok Living Crafts Centre (a local place where they showed the process from caterpillar to silk and the products made from this). They had a show and tell about the dies they use to colour the different types of silk, and also a handful of people weaving some very intricately patterned cloths and wall carpets. Being told it could take up to three weeks to make just 1 meter didn’t sound very impressive until you saw how long a process was necessary just to make a single line. But the results were stunning. And some of the prices likewise, until you realized the time and energy required and the fact that you knew in this case that the products were genuine and not made from child labour.

Colours used and what they sue to dye the silk.

Intricate patterns.

View of the river.

Continuing to our last stop of the day we drove an hour out of the city to go to the Kuang Si Waterfall, a waterfall known for its blue colour. Except, it’s blue in the dry season, in the wet season it’s like the Mekong River – brown/grey from all the sediment the increased waterflow takes with it. And the extra volume is significant, so much so that swimming was prohibited, something that is otherwise popular to do in the normally blue waters. Also, some of the benched areas had been flooded. Walking down a different path than when coming up (which was a paved road) we quickly realized that the river was overflowing the path, making the descent more interesting. Halfway down you had to go barefooted as the path had gotten completely flooded, and half of us decided to turn around and go back up to take the paved road down while the rest soldiered on. Meeting at the bottom again we found out there had been a casualty on the flooded route; a show had been lost to the stream of the river. There was a bit of disagreement whether it had been sacrificed to a one-legged river spirit or that the spirits could settle with the one shoe as many more shoes had been similarly previously sacrificed.

They had a small moon bear sanctuary near the waterfall.

The Kuang Si Waterfall. Not particularly blue.

Slightly flooded.

A new passenger joined us on the way back to the hotel.

We returned to the hotel around 1600 where we relaxed a bit (some around or in the pool) until 1900 when we went out for dinner. The buffalo steak was good, the wine a nice match.

A couple of hours later we ended up in Utopia, a place where we had a few drinks. Considering certain previous nights it was probably good that they were not allowed to serve alcohol after 2300 (the city is UNESCO protected which limits how late you are allowed to serve alcohol) so walking back to the hotel a few beers were bought on the way which were enjoyed in one of our rooms. A potentially (relatively) early end to the day ended up not happening, instead we kept the company going until around 0230.