Around 8am a tuk-tuk truck from White Elephant Adventures arrived at our guesthouse. We hopped in the back, dropped our large backpacks off at their storage and we were on our way. We were very lucky to have a small group of only 5 people going on the trek, Fiona (a girl from England), Sherri, me and our two guides Kai and Keo. We heard that the children in the villages couldn’t afford paper notebooks so they had to write on small chalk boards and then erase what they wrote, so we asked our guides to stop at a store on our way out of town so that we could purchase some to take with us and give out to the children in need.

It was about an hour ride out of town to where we were dropped off to start the trek. With our small packs loaded down with bottles of water, a few necessities and the supplies we had just bought we set off through the rice fields. It was sooooo hot and humid!!! Over 90 degrees! The beginning of the trek was in the open fields where the scorching sun beat down on us. Thankfully, after an hour or so we came upon some shaded areas. The trail was a fairly skinny dirt path. We passed people working in the fields, water buffalo bathing in the river and we even had to get out of the way of some cows that were coming down the path in the opposite direction. We stopped for lunch in the shade by a small stream. The food (which the guides had carried for us) was really good. Lunch consisted of rice (of course!) with chicken curry and beef with vegetables. It was way too much food, so we gave our extras to a hill tribe man that was passing along the trail.

After a steep climb uphill (and a lot of sweat) we arrived at the first village, Had Kho which are part of the Khmu mountain dwellers. The children all came running and gathered round as Keo and Kai told us about this village and its people. The kids were soooo cute! Keo is a descendant of the Khmu people, which are the indigenous inhabitants of Northern Laos. We handed out some of the notebooks and pencils to the kids that needed them. In this village, there is only 1 classroom/hut and the kids that go to school all study together. Some children do not go to school, as some parents need the them to help in the fields.

The next part of the climb was tough…it was even more steep but the views were gorgeous! At the top of the mountain we looked out over the valley and our guides pointed to a village in the distance, “there is our next stop”. To the far right, at the top of another mountain you could just barely see a bit of red roof, “and that is the village where we will spend the night”. We thought they were joking, but they were quite serious. At least the next part of the journey was downhill but is was also steep and a bit slippery. Kai and Keo were super sweet and patient, constantly reminding us to go slow and be careful and they even found us bamboo hiking sticks to help us down the hill.

After about 2 hours we arrived at the Phapheng village, which is part of the Hmong Hill Tribe. The Hmong people originated from China and Kai is related to the Hmong people, so he could speak their local dialect. This village was much larger than the first one and there were tons of animals (pigs, dogs, turkeys, chickens, etc.) running loose all over the place. School was in session when we arrived so we peeked our heads in and passed out notebooks and pencils to the children that didn’t have any. Fiona had learned to count to 10 in Lao and the children got a real kick out of hearing her count. We also got to see the inside of the chief’s home, who is also the village shaman. According to believers, shaman’s can treat illness and are capable of entering supernatural realms to provide answers for humans.

We continued onto the next village up another huge hill. Our final destination for the day was the Mok Chong village which is a mix of Khmu and Hmong people. It was about 5pm when we arrived and we were exhausted. Our clothes and backpacks had white residue all over them from the salt we had sweat out during our journey. Keo had told us there was a stream that we could rinse off in at the village. We changed into our swimsuits and headed down the hill to discover that the “stream” was just a small stream of cool water coming out of a bamboo pipe…Fiona and I grabbed the bucket and joined the locals in filling it up and pouring it over ourselves. It was actually very refreshing. 

We sat at the table outside as the animals and children ran around us. Sherri brought out her i-phone, which she had 1 music video on and about twenty children and a few adults gathered round watching with wide eyes. Kai cooked an amazing dinner of vegetables, chicken and rice which we ate by candlelight. Afterwards we took a couple shots of Lao whiskey with Kai and Keo. We were exhausted from the long day so we called it an early night and crawled under our mosquito nets and into our sleep sacks.

The roosters started crowing while it was still dark outside…we waited for the sun to come up and eventually we pulled ourselves out of bed. Prepared for our second day we stopped by the school to give out the remaining notebooks and pencils. This school was actually quite big in comparison to the others. There were 3 classrooms and tons of kids. We set off down the hill for about a two hour hike back to the road where we met up with some additional travellers to kayak down the Nam Khan river. We spent the rest of the day on the river…we even kayaked down through a few rapids, which I’m proud to say we made through without falling out of the kayak! Unlike the guys from England who flipped their kayaks over in every rapid. On the way down the river we passed a large group of kids playing in the water…we paddled over to them and soon about 10 laughing, smiling children were climbing all over our kayak.  We didn’t think we’d ever get out of there! It was hilarious!

All in all it was an amazing adventure!