ducks eat pineapple, apparently

I did my first bit of sightseeing in Laos yesterday - to the Boliven plateau to see a couple of waterfalls. I went with a group of Kiwis who are visiting the school to run a kid's program. The waterfalls were really beautiful – I’m not often underwhelmed by waterfalls. After seeing Iguazu Falls (on the tri-border of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay) I thought I might have ruined all other waterfalls for myself, but they seem to be one thing that never grows old. Lao OHS though is quite amusing at times. There was a staircase going down to the waterfall - that looked like it could get slippery. It led straight into the waterfall just before the top. 

Stairs leading down to the top of the falls..

The view of the falls from the bottom.

A rainbow

expensive eco-tourism

As well as seeing the first lot of falls we went to visit an 'ethnic village' where one of the girls, Thakmani, who works at the school's family lives. They were doing some weaving and selling some really beautiful fabrics. I'm a bit sad that I'm in Laos at the beginning of my trip when I really don't want to buy anything because I don’t want to carry anything. Thakmani's niece was there, who must be about three, and was super cute. The village, which tourists obviously pass through semi frequently, was full of kids wearing little lao tribal outfits standing out the front of their houses. It was interesting but had that staged kind of feeling. One good thing about Laos is the sales people are not nearly as aggressive as how I remember Vietnam and Cambodia.  

Thakmani working on a loom

Lao fabrics

Thakmani's niece who knows how cute she is.

The second set of waterfalls.

Apparently ducks like to eat pineapple. Who knew!?




An update on the pile of mud
To make the mud road able to be walked on again, the guy who owns a hostel across the road has dumped a pile of builders rubble on top of it. While it makes it more walkable when it's dry, consensus is that when it gets wet (and it's coming into the wet season...) it will probably make it more of a bog.