3 days cycling and boating from Oudomxay to LuangPrabang via MuangKhua (MuangNgoy), PakOu Cave or vice versa
This fantastic tour will take you through authentic minority villages in the north of Laos. You will enjoy the great scenery along the road and down the historical NamOu River. While cycling you will be a witness of the beauty of the nature along the way.
Tour detail
Day 1: The tour starts from Samlaan Cycling office at 8 am. The trip follows the main road to Phongsaly. After 7 km it is time to test the strength of your legs with a 2 km climb followed by a short descent and some small undulating hills until km 14 after which there will be another 1.5 km climb. On the way to MuangLa we visit a Khmu village and a local roadside market where people from remote villages sell their non-timber forest products. In MuangLa we will take a short walk to see the hot springs and the salt mining area. After having some tea and fruits we will continue following the undulating hills with our bikes. In a Khmu village we are invited to the house of the village headman for a traditional lunch. After enjoying the lunch and break we will carry on along the NamPak river where you occasionally see people spinning for gold along the riverbank. Over night stay will be in Ban PakNumNoy where we arrive after 4 pm.
Distance: 68 km
Road conditions: Sealed road
Tour stages: Some short climbs otherwise quite flat
Attractions: Village life and nice scenery
Day 2: It is an easy day. After Lao style breakfast we have an option of cycling 16 km off road to visit an Akha village or we pedal on to MuangKhua passing by many ethnic villages as from Khmu, Lue and Tai Dam. These ethnic minorities immigrated from Vietnam during the Indochina War. After 21 km we will stop to taste the original Tai Dam’s whisky (made from rice) and have lunch. We will continue our ride along the green hillside where people grow their vegetables and rice. 11 km before arriving in the town of MuangKhua we will have a break and take a bath in the very gentle river of NamPak. Arrival in MuangKhua at 4 pm.
Distance: 32 or 48 km
Road conditions: Sealed road
Tour stages: average climbs, mostly down hill
Attractions: The beauty of landscape and mountains
Day 3: Today we take a rest from cycling and have a boat trip down stream the historical NamOu River.
En route you will be a witness of the very nice scenery along the NamOu riverbank. We will break the journey and do some short walk to visit a weaving village. Lunch will be arranged in MuangNgoy before we will continue to LuangPrabang. You will pass many villages that row up along the riverbank and occasionally you can watch local fisherman fishing. Joining into the Mekong we will stop to visit the holy PakOu cave, where hundreds of Buddha statues are placed. From here we will cruise down 1.30 hours to the world heritage site LuangPrabang.
We will arrive in LuangPrabang at 5.30 pm.
Distance: 8 Hours riding on boat
River conditions: depending on season and water level
Tour stages: some short walk
Attractions: weaving villages, PakOu cave
