Word: prabang
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...mellifluous name hints at hidden wonders, and Luang Prabang has certainly achieved cult status among travelers since UNESCO pronounced it the best-preserved city in Southeast Asia six years ago and put it on the World Heritage list. "What a delightful paradise of idleness this country protects, by the fierce barrier of the stream, against progress and ambition for which it has no need," wrote Marthe Bassene, a resident French doctor's wife, in 1909. Her words have since been immortalized in the august pages of the Lonely Planet. "Will Luang Prabang be ... the refuge of the last dreamers...
...Luang Prabang has no McDonald's, no 7-Eleven, no ATMS. It doesn't have a single place to get a cash advance on MasterCard?as I discovered to my embarrassment?which resulted in a last day spent in penury hiding in my hotel. The town is refreshingly free of things to do, apart from wander around, drink coffee and beer in caf?s, and soak up the ambiance. A dust-choked side trip to the gorgeous Kuangsi waterfalls or a jaunt down the river to the Pak Ou caves, which are crammed with ancient Buddha images, make up the extent...
...long can Luang Prabang's slumber last? There are ominous signs of a rude awakening. In the old quarter's main street, Sisavangvong Road, tourists now outnumber locals. Satellite dishes bristle from roofs and backyards, sucking from the ether a steady stream of inane Thai game shows. Internet shops spring up daily, each filled with earnest backpackers clicking away. Highway 13 from Vientiane is now paved, putting the capital just a day's drive away...
...Luang Prabang's charms seem safe enough if the abject failure of its first full moon-style party, modeled on Thailand's island raves, is anything to go by. "Us backpackers have got to make our own fun," said a shaggy type who bounded up to me in Sisavangvong Road and thrust a flyer proclaiming the birth of the Full Mekong Party into my hand. "I'm the Great Disco Dane," he explained, assuring me the party would be "wicked." Around 9 p.m., I ventured down to the sandy strip where the ferries land?to find about 20 people sipping...
...SMOOTH SAILING It was the romance of it all that persuaded me to take the slow boat to Luang Prabang from Huay Xai, meandering down the Mekong through a veil of river mist like some intrepid adventurer of old ... Well, O.K., romance and fear: the fast boats have a reputation for dispatching passengers to the murky depths...