Similan Guide - News & Infos aus Südostasien und den Similan Inseln

I spent a beautiful evening at a place called Phaotoke Laoderm (www.phatokelaoderm.com) and enjoyed a nice Lao show (traditional dancing performances and music) together with some Lao meal (sticky rice, sea weed, chicken, keang som paa, naam pic with lots of vegs…).

The meal was great and very tasty and served around 7.30 pm on a big bamboo table like furniture called phatoke. The beerlao was served cold and with some ice cubes…

The performance consists of some classical royal dance pieces, such as the Hanuman monkey dance, and some very rural dances. They also showed some Hmong dance.
The costumes very very colorful and the performers had some great fun to show their skills to the rather small audience.

The Phatoke Lauderm is located within the Senglao hotel complex on the basement. The Hall is very nicely decorated and the staff is friendly, plentiful and very service minded. The place opened a month ago.

The price of 15 $ is for the entrance and for the meal. Drinks are extra.

During my last stay in Vientiane I read an interesting article about Lao Mountain
coffee and the Jhai Coffee Farmers Cooperative in Stay another day.

Lao Mountain Coffee (www.laomountaincoffee.com) is a Vientiane based coffee roasting company. They roast some specialty grade coffee from Laos famous coffee growing area in the South, the Bolaven Plateau.

In fact they are the only Fair Trade and organic coffee roasting company in Laos and one of only a few in South East Asia. They have developed a close relationship with the Fair Trade certified farmer group, the Jhai Coffee Farmers Cooperative (www.jhaicafe.com),
which resides in Champasak province. The Cooperative runs a tiny little office in Pakse town.
Day trips can be arranged to visit the small farms around Pakse town.

Steve Feldschneider (info@laomountain.com), the owner, invited me to visit Lao Mountain coffee, which is located in Ban Nongbone in Vientiane capital and only 200 meters away from the That Luang Stupa.

Upon my arrival at the Lao style Villa a nice breeze of freshly roasted and grounded coffee leaded me directly to the heart of the Lao Mountain Coffee company.

Steve welcomed me and gave me a brief overview of Laos coffee producing history. He also explained me about the roasting process and their special way to produce small amounts of coffee on order. Using small amounts of coffee at a time gives them the possibility to control the grade of roasting and the mixture of different coffee beans to a much better extend than in an ordinary coffee roasting company.

The fact that he has such well known names amongst his clients as Residence Phou Vao, Maison Souvannaphoum in Luang Prabang or the world famous Oriental hotel in Bangkok proves his roasting philosophy true.

Towards the end of my visit Steve told me about the cupping process. Cupping is the art of coffee tasting. Coffee consists of more than 800 different aromatic compounds, so coffee cupping is one of the most complex sensory experiences one can do.

Coffee beans from different growing areas, unwashed and washed, roasted and grounded are provided along with a professional instruction about coffee cupping.

Of course , there are also some cafe tables in the lush garden around the Villa, where a freshly roasted and grounded coffee can be tasted after a visit in the nearby That Luang Stupa.

The coffee cupping experience can be arranged for visitor upon prior notice. The program consists of the coffee cupping experience, the tour through the Villa’s compound, including the roasting and manufacturing areas of the company.
The program costs 150′000 Kip per person, including a fresh roasted and grounded pack of coffee, worth 5 $. Visitor can also get some hands on roasting and grounding experience.

Although the price of the coffee cupping program is a bit high - there is lots of fresh coffee and unique experiences involved, which one hardly can get elsewhere and for less money.

Needless to say that once Steve found out that I have a favour for Italian style coffee he offered me a special blend, which he prepared by himself. Well…

Another story from Laos…

The Ancient town of Luang Prabang, which lies in the center of Laos, has been described as one of the most beautiful and preserved towns in Southeast Asia. In 1512 King Visounarat got Buddha image - the Pha Bang - as a gift from the Khmer monarchy, that is where the town became known as Luang (Great or Royal) Phabang (Prabang). Luang Prabang was the capital of Lane Xang (Laos) for many years until King Phothisarat moved the royal seat to Vientiane in 1545.
There are 34 Buddhist temples among colonial French and Chinese architecture, all nicely located within surrounding green mountains.
The Mekong River, which frames the western border of the town, is still used as transportation link within Vientiane, the capital of Laos, and other important cities along the Mekong River.
Its cultural traditions, rituals and artwork, which includes temple murals, woodcarving and pottery, make Luang Prabang an attractive cultural tourism destination and an ecotourism hub for the whole region, which allows visitors to do hiking, tracking, elephant trekking, kayaking and other adventurous activities in a spectacular natural environment with possibilities which cope for a wide range of interests. The town of Luang Prabang was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1995 due to its cultural and natural features. Luang Prabang is accessible by air directly from Bangkok, Vientiane and Chiang Mai, but also overland travel is an option from all directions. There is also a regular boat service on the Mekong River available.
Most of the visitors to Luang Prabang enjoy its cultural and historical heritage, stay in nice renovated guesthouses and small lodges for 20 to 30$ per night. However, there are also quite a few backpackers with an interest in Luang Prabang’s culture as well, but the will also enjoy some more adventurous excursions and day trips to the countryside of the ancient town. Laos is strongly promoted as an ecotourism destination in Asia, whit a lot of interesting national and international ecotourism projects and developments going on. A quick search in Google for “ecotourism” brought up a 150’000 hits and 108’000 hits for “sustainable tourism”.
The amount of visitors tripled within the last 10 years from around 400’000 in 1996 to about 1, 3 Mio in 2006 according to the Lao National Tourism Administration. About 1 Mio of the customers are Asians, where the visitor numbers from Thailand (600’000) is the biggest, followed by Vietnam (170’000) and China with 50’000 visitors in a year. China has now allowed its citizens to travel more freely to Laos. Therefore, Chinese tourists numbers to Laos are expected to rise and will probably account for 25% of the total number of visitors to Laos in the future. Europeans or Westerners account for about 200’000 tourists.

The pressures on Laos to modernize and develop its tourist infrastructure is rapidly increasing, there is a big demand to cater for an increasing amount of package tourism, which will have a significant impact on the development of Luang Prabang.

Therefore, the inscription of Luang Prabang on the World Heritage List in 1995 happened just at the right time, to preserve the town of Luang Prabang. With new roads being build from Vientiane and the Chinese border, the small town of Luang Prabang was about to rapidly expand and transform it - not an entirely positive development.
There is now a strict zoning law, which ensures that the character of the town is preserved by restricting advertising billboards and decreeing that no out-of-character buildings can be constructed, which means, that no photo-finishing shops or fast-food outlets can be opened in the old town. Big tourist buses are not allowed within the old quarter of the town. Luang Prabang promotes eco-friendly tourism in different ways, such as reinforcing the visitors to walk or ride a bicycle to explore Luang Prabang, closing roads to make space for the morning and night markets, and setting and enforcing speed limits within the whole town (quite unique in Asia). There are very good maps available, which make it a pleasure to walk around to visit the different attractions of the towns. All attractions are also well explained in Laotian, French and English language. There are many good web sites and books, with a lot of useful information on Luang Prabang available, so that the visitors can inform themselves easily. In the town are also some very good local tour guides available, so the cultural interested tourists can get there information from locals as well.
In the UNESCO plan, there are three zones: the old quarter, a peripheral zone, and natural zones along the Mekong River. The main problem is now how to maintain Luang Prabang as a World Heritage Site and accommodate the fast growing number of tourists that will be attracted.
The Luang Prabang authorities are handling increased tourism well so far. The plan is not to build new hotels, but rather modify existing mansions for use as hotels. The whole area has a lot of natural attractions within a short distance, such as caves, waterfalls, jungle and rivers and the plan of the Laos authorities is, to further develop sustainable tourism by involving local communities in the over all tourism development of the area, but also to direct some of the tourist to the neighboring attractions to take some pressure of Luang Prabang.
My recommendation is, to raise some of the entrance fees of the attractions for foreign visitors, which may take a little bit pressure of the attractions by reducing the amount of visitors to them. With the so collected money the local authorities would have the choice to renovate some public buildings, such as schools and government buildings, which will further improve the image of the town. Then, there are a few hotel developments well underway about 5 to 10 km outside of the town. I suggest providing some shuttle bus or other public transport to accommodate for the visitors need to go out to town, to prevent them of using private taxis and motorbikes. Then, I think, that the roads of the old quarter should and could be closed during the day time for private traffic to implement a pedestrian zone.
Laos has done a lot to improve its tourism facilities and to make it easier to obtain Visas for tourists, therefore tourism will further grow. Especially, when the fast growing and powerful neighbor China starts to travel, I think, tourism in Laos and basically in the whole region will change dramatically.