CONTINUED DESTINATION: LAOS

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"You ready?" asked the border agent, clapping his hands, as soon as a decent amount of us were lounging on the veranda. "Come, come."

He led us to a new pick-up truck that ferried us along dusty roads to our boat. It was tied to a sandy part of the river without a dock. Instead, we all boarded by means of a plank—no easy feat with heavy backpacks—and settled on the boat. Soon, the engine hammered to life, and a kid climbed up on the tin roof and shoved us off with a pole. The boat swung in a half circle, and we headed down river.

At first, the scenery held my attention. The Mekong is a a swift, chocolate-colored river that cuts wide bends through hills fringed with jungle and fog. At narrower points, clumps of black rocks jut out like teeth, and shifting sandbars hold flocks of birds. Every few miles, a thatched-hut village clings to the side of a hill next to a terraced rice field.

As beautiful as the scenery is, I soon grew restless. The day was hot and humid, and the sun streamed in through the open sides of the boat. The diesel engine thumped loudly, and the wooden seat dug into my back. Every so often, a speedboat buzzed by us like an overgrown mosquito. It was good that my attention turned inside the boat. Given that I was in a cramped boat with 35 people, and our only refreshment was a cooler filled with delicious liters of Beer Lao, it was a good time to make friends.

Within two hours, half the beer was gone, and I'd met nearly everyone on the boat. There were three German students from Heidelberg, a Belgian bell-hop and a computer programmer from Quebec. Someone pulled out a deck of cards, a lively book exchange began, and, soon, most of us were sitting on the pile of luggage or stretching out our legs on the boat's roof.

Best of all was a flamboyant businessman dressed in a Hawaiian shirt and Hawaiian shorts with mismatched patterns. He came from Vienna, where he had been a workaholic. A year earlier, he had left his company, rented his apartment and decided to wander the world.

"I am done working," he told me. "It is very cheap here, so I can stay forever." It seemed like a good idea at the time. "I don't like beer," he added, pulling a dubious bottle of Thai whiskey out of his bag.

By the time the sun was falling, we were a close-knit group. Our boat passed into a small gorge, made a wide arc in the river and pulled up to a wharf. This was our stopover point—a village named Pak Beng.

Together, we straggled up a steep hill to a dusty, thatched hut town that smelled of peppers and curry. Barefoot children with big eyes stared at us from the safety of their doorways. "Saibadee," they said quietly.

We were handily shuttled into hotels with dramatic decks that looked out over the gorge. It was my first night in a Laotian town, and soon after we arrived, the lights came on. Like most of Northern Laos, Pak Beng only gets twelve hours of electricity per day, and all at once, its assorted fans, lights and coolers sprang to life. Dinner was curry soup and sticky rice, washed down with many bottles of Beer Lao. Sleeping was easy under my mosquito net.

The next morning, we ate baguettes and butter—one of Laos' few nods to its French colonial past. Then, we sauntered down to the beach and found that our boat was gone. "Panne," breakdown, said one of the German students. She gestured to a different—and much smaller—boat. It was our replacement.

Undaunted, we threw our backpacks on the roof and clambered inside the boat. At first, the only seat I could find was on the floor, next to a Laotian family who were eating a kind of brown nut attached to a leafy branch. They offered me a few nuts, which tasted vaguely like peanuts. I passed a bottle of water to the family—it was a good start.

Soon, more travelers arrived, and I got pushed up to a small ledge next to the engine. It was cramped, but I counted myself lucky. Tourists have reported being stranded for days at some leg or another of the river.

That day, the slow boat lived up to its name. It slunk deep in the water, struggling to push waves off its bow. There was no room for card games or book exchanges, and the crew wouldn't let us climb on the roof. Worst of all, our morale suffered as no one had brought a cooler of beer.

Instead, we tried to read and sleep. Some of the passengers had hangovers that turned into motion sickness, and they spent the day staring greenly at the water. For the rest of us, the river became more interesting, with long sand bars, towhead islands, and tiny villages. I watched men fishing with spears among the rocks and a group of people using an elephant to haul logs out of the river. Nearly everywhere, water buffalo watched us from the banks.

At noon, about half of the passengers realized they'd forgotten to bring food, and the rest of us had to share out what we had. I'd picked up a sandwich at Pak Beng, made of an old baguette, some greens, and something resembling cheese. Some of it went to the general fund, and the rest became my lunch.

Finally, there was some excitement—the boat began listing to one side. The crew started shouting, and, before long, we pulled off into a small beach where everyone jumped out of the boat. Half of the passengers dove into the bushes with rolls of toilet paper in their hands, while the rest of us milled about, watching the crew repack the bags on the roof. The businessman from Vienna nearly panicked when he saw his suitcase dropped onto the beach.

"You can't trust them," he said, as he ran over to make sure nothing precious—his Thai whiskey, perhaps—got left behind. Somehow that broke the stagnant mood, and the next few hours went much more quickly.

The hills became larger and rockier, and the channels became narrower and swifter. Signs of life appeared—an occasional Wat temple poked over a hill. There was a curious cave cut into the mountain and larger villages with tin roofs. Finally, a long boat with policemen happily waving at us motored by our boat. "Saibadee," they yelled. Within a few minutes, we saw the high hilltop of Luang Prabang—we'd made it.

I could say many things about Luang Prabang. It's a beautiful, isolated city, where the monks rise at dawn and circle the streets in their orange robes with begging bowls. I had fun exploring the city with all the friends I'd made on the boat (indeed, most of us traveled by the same route all the way through Laos). If I had wanted only to visit Luang Prabang, I could have done it by plane and slept in a fancy French hotel. Because I really wanted to see Laos, I'm glad I made my way to Huay Xai. A slow boat is definitely the way.

Joe Shepter is a freelance journalist and photographer who writes primarily about travel, history and graphic design.

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