Hi Gram,
Today was exciting and terrifying in such a rewarding way! We got up and did our normal morning walk – where I got a pic of typical parking here – and breakfast, then headed over to rent a car for the day. We want to go see some sights outside of the main tourist center of town, and what better way than to rent our very own clown car?

After some translation attempts, paperwork, and cash, I was handed the keys and given a brief overview of a little red QUTE (I’m guessing pronounced “cutie”). We loaded up the car, which was full once we added the two of us small humans and our backpack, and headed out of town. The first thing I noticed was the difference in shifting. In every other manual transmission I’ve had, the gears were stacked in a zig zag pattern. Up for first, then down and a little to the side for second, etc. This car just has up for higher gear and down for lower, similar to how newer American cars have an optional manual mode that lets you take over gear shifting from the automatic transmission. It only took me a few tries before I had that adjustment locked into my brain, although I did make the same “up when I meant down” mistake a few more times throughout the day.

We did see the first scooter accident that I’ve seen since arriving in SE Asia. An older local guy just gunned it, it seems, which led to shooting to the right and falling over. It was a one person accident between him and the ground. Bystanders walked over, carried him and the scooter to the curb, and made sure he was alright. He looked shaken but not injured as we passed him. 

A couple of side notes: First of all, the windows on this car slide sideways instead of rolling down. They’re heavily tinted, which means that you can’t see through the glass when one half is slid over the other. This gives enough of a view to see the mirror but the vehicles beside me are nearly invisible. This makes turning hard as you have to crane your neck to look through the narrow open gap. That and the feeble engine made turning into traffic spicy.

The next thing I noticed was the gear ratio. I’m used to each gear overlapping a bit. The top range of one gear is the bottom of the next. Here, they seem more stacked, making shifting feel like Tarzan swinging through the jungle. Jam the accelerator down until it whines and you start losing acceleration, then hurry up and shift into the next, hoping momentum carries you so the next gear can catch without chugging too hard and killing the engine. Spicy.

All of this made for plenty of laughter and gasping as I navigated traffic, shifted, and watched the GPS on my lap. A couple of winding roads, the poor state of pavement here (when the roads are paved at all) and trucks to pass, and we already felt invigorated by the time we reached the train station, our first stop, a few km later.

The train station turned out to be a bust – there was a long line to buy tickets and they only accepted Kip cash, of which I did not have enough. We decided to buy our tickets online, the new-fashioned way, and headed off to our next stop. The map showed a plethora of elephant sanctuaries, parks, and reserves. A little digging the night before showed that many of them still saddled the animals for rides, kept them chained, and treated them poorly. We had no interest in giving those sorts of places money, but luckily there was a park nearby that had good reviews of feeding and bathing them – or just looking at them without interaction, so we headed that way.

The GPS had us turn sharply onto a dirt road that we followed for a few km before emerging back onto pavement. In this tiny car with tiny wheels and the suspension and steering of a go-cart, it was a slow exciting drive! We pulled into Mandalou Sanctuary and followed a path through manicured grounds until we came to a gazebo with a gentleman who offered help. Unfortunately, there were no tours available for a walk-up basis but we were welcome to sit on their terrace and enjoy some free tea or coffee. He was the most polite and gentle person that I could have imagined in that role. We felt grateful and welcomed, even though he was basically telling us “no”.

Already sufficiently caffeinated, we thanked them for the offer then headed next door to Chateau Orientale, on his recommendation, which offered stunning views from their restaurant. For a 10,000 Kip fee, they let us park in the grass lot and walk the rest of the way. We were the only ones parked in the lot and found a number of cars parked up closer to the building, so I think we were tricked… but for the equivalent of $0.50 and a nice little walk, I hope the “parking attendant” gets a little something extra for the family dinner tonight.

The grounds were beautiful, with winding paths past individual cottages tucked into mature landscaping. The path climbed a little towards the toilet area – including the outdoor urinals frequent in SE Asia – then dipped and deposited us at the cafe, an eclectic building with lounge chairs, sleeping pads, super comfy booths with lots of pillows, and a stunning view down onto the river. We chose a booth towards one end and nested in. I chose a nice salad with chicken and she chose a Lao noodle dish with chicken, then took some pics and looked at the boats passing by below us. When lunch was served, they brought her the soup that she ordered. They brought me chicken fingers and sticky rice, which wasn’t what I ordered, but was one of the other things that I had thought of getting so I just smiled and dug in.

We had a leisurely lunch, seeing at one point a man riding an elephant down and across the river. I’ve heard that riding elephants is bad for the their backs, so I was a little bummed to see that. After a little more web searching, I learned that the Chateau Orientale is adjacent to a reserve where saved elephants are brought to retire, living out the rest of their lives in peace. He was just straddling it bareback, riding up near the neck as opposed to having a basket strapped to the back. I’m not sure if the weight of a single human anywhere on the back is detrimental or if it’s the big platforms they used to strap onto them that did the damage. I noted it down as something to look up later, but found differing opinions on whether a single person riding on the neck was harmful or not. My guess is that one man riding up near the head through a reserve built to save the animals from working and getting beaten is less harmful than a pile of people in a circus setting. I choose to believe this elephant was living her best life available.

After lunch, we got back in the clown car and bounced down dirt, gravel, and poorly paved roads through a cluster of houses until we found ourselves walking the last hundred meters down to a river. We hired a ferry to take us down the river and to the other side, then up some stairs (a lot of hills and stairs in this area) to a platform.

There, we handed over another 25,000 Kip ($1.21) to see some nature trails and waterfalls. They weren’t the biggest or fiercest waterfalls I’ve seen, but they provided a nice background of white noise and scenery. We crossed a few bridges that made me nervous, climbed some steps carved into dirt hills, and wandered along trails.

At points, we felt like we were the only people there. It was peaceful and a nice little adventure. As we looped around, we came back to piles of tourists and vendors that soon overwhelmed me. After a quick stop to watch the waterfalls and drink from our water bottles, I decided it was time to head back down to the river and catch our ferry back to the car.

Sometimes, I just need to retreat to my home base. That used to be my specific bed in my exact bedroom in my apartment that I’d lived in for years. I’ve pushed my boundaries over the last 17 years to be comfortable enough expanding what my “home base” was. At first, it was the home of my parents or a close friend, then expanded to other friends houses, and now I’m comfortable enough to just get back to my hotel room or other place local to where I am. These other rooms and bases still don’t fully replace my home – I still often feel anxious and uneasy – but they are good enough to keep me from a full blown panic. They give me a chance to calm down and recharge my batteries.

The boat ride, both there and back, was comfortable and serene. It was a narrow boat, wide enough for one person per bench and low to the water with a prop that extended another 10 feet behind us. We enjoyed the scenery pass by and I caught a grin on the boat pilot’s face when he saw me shielding Nattiya’s eyes from the sun that was beating down. Back at the port, we climbed back up the hill and found our golf cart right were we left it.

The ride back was just as exciting with hills that strained the engine, dirt roads that challenged the tires, and traffic that challenged our sanity.

I messaged the guy we rented it from to let him know that we’d be returning it tonight. He met us at his makeshift office, where he immediately told me “no refunds! You pay for 24 hours no matter what!” I smiled and agreed, not worried about the $24, including fuel, that bought me all these new memories and experiences. We walked the last few blocks back to the room, glad to have quietness around us.