Travel day -- Luang Prabang, Laos (May 19)

This morning we headed to the airport for a two-hour trip to Luang Prabang, the ancient capital of Laos.  Our guide answered something that had been a puzzlement for me:  Laos? or Lao?  Lao is what the native people call the country, but the French, who colonized it, called it Laos; the French then called the people Lao and the language Lao.  The Laotians call the country, the people, and the language "Lao."  So use whichever term you wish, I guess, but Lao would be preferable to the Lao.

We saw the famous Mekong River.

Flight on a puddle-jumper prop plane went well, as did the lunch at a restaurant with very American food run by a Canadian couple.  I had a BLT and Harold had a Rueben -- that's how American it was!

We transferred from our bus to a "jumbo," our mode of transportation in Luang Prabang because large vehicles are not allowed in the city (not a very large one).  A "Jumbo" is basically a large tuk-tuk, holding 6 people in the back end with a motorcycle pulling us all.  Sometimes our guide would hop on the front end with the driver.

We checked into our hotel (lovely but with lousy internet which is why I'm sitting in the hot lobby writing this posting) and had a couple of hours of rest before we headed downtown to check out the place and to go to a temple.

The Golden City Temple (Wat Xiang Thong)

The temple is considered to be Luang Prabang's finest and is also considered one of Laos' best monasteries.  Amongst its 20 buildings, some built in the 1500s, is included the funeral carriage holding the cremated remains of the last king of Lao.  After this last king died in 1975, the country came under Communist control, and the kings were no longer welcome in the country (duh).

beautiful mosaics

these mosaics tell stories with morals (like fables) in little segments on the wall

the funeral carriage of the last king of Laos; his remains are in the gold urn.

But back to the kings -- Wat Xiang Thong was a royal temple under the patronage of the kings who were also crowned in the Wat there, then after they died the urns containing their ashes were (and are) kept here.   Thus for the old-timers (and the silent royalty lovers), it's an important location.

One of the especially beautiful features was all of the mosaics telling stories of the Buddha and also telling moral teaching tales.  Our guide, Sean, said he brought his children there to tell them the stories relating to the mosaics and to explain the morals behind the stories.  See above pictures to see the mosaics.