Luang Prabang is a pleasant, low-key town, but it seemed like everything is pretty packaged, so we rested for a few days, decided this was a good time to say goodbye to wonderful, wonderful Laos, and took the boat up the Mekong to the Thai border. It was a pretty trip but what was most unique was the indomitable Mekong itself, surging with great force around giant rocks, forming giant whirlpools in the wake, We were on the slow boat, but they also had speed boats taking people up and down, all wearing helmets and careening through the water at ear-blasting levels. Call it 'Scenery Light,' maybe. We had planned to cross the border on the second day of the boat trip, but by the time we pulled in town, the little ferries AND the border had closed, so we looked for hotels with a nice couple we met on the boat from Paris, Paul and Claire.