Temples and Markets — An Elegant Sufficiency

A bit of culture today - there are so many temples here, we relied on Ming to take us to the most interesting. I think she did rather well in making sure we stopped whilst we were still enjoying them!

We liked the fact that the temples we saw were all old - and looked it. Those we've seen in Bangkok have been gilded and polished so highly, all personality and spirit of place is sometimes lost. Not so here.

The roof lines were lovely and I took many photographs of them. I also enjoyed the stencilled interiors, so detailed and each one different. Every interior wall was decorate with such stencils or with small pieces of mirror stuck into the wet plaster before it dried.

Stacks of buddhas lined the sides of the temples, here creating a fascinating little group with one peering over the shoulder of another as if to ask "what are they up to over there?"

After a short nap and some p & q we took a ride in a tuk tuk back into town where we enjoyed a little independent exploring. We've booked dinner here tomorrow night whilst we were passing by - it's Friday so we can join in the special barbecue meal which sounds good fun.

Luang Prabang is a really attractive place and deserves its World Heritage status. We feel privileged to have been able to spend time here.

As darkness fell, we could see the lights of the night market at the other end of the street and headed in that direction like moths to a flame. Oh my goodness...so many silks, pieces of embroidery (reverse applique bedcovers a plenty) bags, slippers, paper lampshades, scarves, silver - almost everything was attractive and interesting and there was so little "tourist tat" that we took time to browse down both sides of the path.