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Tumult Mekong Tour
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Code: |
IDCN39 |
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Routes: |
Bangkok - Samphran -
Luang Prabang - Vientiane - Siem Reap |
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Duration: |
11 Days |
Itinerary in brief
Day 01: Bangkok - Arrival
Day 02: Bangkok
Day 03: Bangkok - Floating Market & Rose Garden
Day 04: Bangkok - Luang Prabang (Laos)
Day 05: Luang Prabang
Day 06: Kuangsi Waterfall - Pak Ou Caves
Day 07: Luang Prabang - Vientiane
Day 08: Vientiane - Siem Reap - Rolous Group of
Temples
Day 09: Angkor Thom & Ta Prohm
Day 10: Banteay Srei - Kbal Spean - Angkor Wat
Day 11: Siem Reap - Departure
Detail Itinerary
Places
Covered: City Centre,
Floating Market, Rose Garden, Patpong Night
Market, Main Street Thanon Sisavangvong, Mekong
River, Nam Khan River, Phousi Hill, Tribal
Market, National Museum, Wat Visoun, Wat Aham,
Wat Xieng Thong, Kuangsi Waterfall, Hand-weaving
Village of Ban Phanom, rice-wine making village
of Ban Sang Hai, Pak Ou Buddha Caves (Tham
Ting), Wat Sisaket, Haw Pha Kaew, Wat That
Luang, Patuxai, Morning Market, Rolous group
temples of Lolei, Bakong & Preah Ko, Angkor
Thom, Bayon, Phimeanakas, Elephant Terrace,
Terrace of the Leper King, Preah Khan, Neak
Pean, Ta Prohm, Ta Keo, Prasat Kravan, Banteay
Kdei, Banteay Srei, Kbal Spean (the "River of a
Thousand Lingas"), Kulen Mountain, Angkor Wat,
Bakheng Temple.
Day 01:
Bangkok - Arrival (Dinner)
Arrive in Bangkok airport meet and transfer to
hotel for check-in.
Have an orientation walk-about in the vicinity
of your hotel which is in the city centre.
Overnight at your selected hotel in Bangkok.
Day 02: Bangkok (Breakfast/ Dinner)
Buffet breakfast at the hotel.
Morning Bangkok city & temple tour to see what
makes this eclectic city throb with vibrancy of
life, traffic, smells of pungent foods and
roasting meats and contrast this hurly-burly
world with the serenity of its temples where
time seems rooted within their walls. Afternoon
at leisure to find out what Thai health and foot
massage is, drink coffee in a coffee cafe and
watch the human stream flow pass, walk the
lively streets to come at close quarters with
the Thai living and working in their city
environment. Tonight be entertained by a
fantastic show as you have dinner in an
astounding theatre-restaurant called Siam
Niramit.
Overnight at hotel in Bangkok.
Day 03: Bangkok - Floating Market & Rose
Garden (Breakfast/ Lunch)
Buffet breakfast at the hotel. Rise early to
take a trip to Bangkok’s largest and most
authentic floating market 80km southwest of the
city where a flotilla of sampans loaded with
local produce glide among boats of shoppers
buying their daily sustenance in a large canal
that is the marketplace. The sight of so many
sampans and rowboats milling around is
startlingly picturesque. We will row right up
next to these sampans and you can buy a comb of
bananas or a papaya or a bowl of hot steaming
noodles. And as the sampans and other boats
glide away for home, we too leave the floating
market to go and see a folk show and an elephant
show in the well-landscaped Rose Garden at
Samphran. Lunch at the Rose Garden restaurant.
It would be about 5.30pm before we arrive back
in the comfort of your hotel for a dip in the
pool. In the evening as the hundreds of stalls
selling all kinds of Thai and imported products
lit up and open for business, stroll in the
Patpong night market near your hotel.
Overnight at hotel in Bangkok.
Day 04: Bangkok - Luang Prabang (Laos)
(Breakfast/ Dinner)
Buffet breakfast at the hotel.
At 9am meet in the hotel lobby to transfer to
the international airport for your flight to
Luang Prabang by PG632, dep.1130 /arr.1320. Upon
arrival, meet your guide at the airport and be
taken to your hotel. Go with your guide on a
walking tour of this heritage town which was
once a royal city of Laotian kings, in
particular in the main street, Thanon
Sisavangvong. You will not forget the wonderful
simplicity of the town and its sedate flow of
life beside the Mekong River and the smaller Nam
Khan River. You might like to have a Lao coffee
or tea with a baquette sandwich or pastry at Le
Café Ban Vat Sene at the top end of the main
street or at Luang Prabang Bakery in the middle
section of this main road. Climb the 329 steps
up Phousi Hill and see a panoramic view of Luang
Prabang city nestling between the Nam Khan and
the Mekong rivers. Upon your descent see the
tribal market at the foot of the hill as the
Hmong tribesmen would have set up their
makeshift stalls on the road to display their
home-made embroidery and other products. Have a
good Lao dinner at Pakhuay Mixay restaurant that
your guide will take you to.
Overnight at hotel, Luang Prabang.
Day 05: Luang Prabang (Breakfast/ Lunch)
Buffet breakfast at the hotel.
Morning sightseeing of Luang Prabang including
the former Royal Palace now the National Museum
for the memorabilia of the last Laotian King
Sisavangvong and other cultural treasures of
Laos before the Pathet Lao takeover. Visit Wat
Visoun, Wat Aham and Wat Xieng Thong - the best
of them all. Chat with the friendly English
speaking monks in these temples and take photos
with them. Learn how they study and live the
dharmma. Lunch at Visoun Restaurant. The
afternoon is free at leisure. (Suggest indulging
in the herbal steambath and massage at the Red
Cross building. Sauna is US$1 and one-hour
massage is US$2).
Overnight at hotel, Luang Prabang.
Day 06: Kuangsi Waterfall - Pak Ou Caves
(Breakfast/ Lunch/ Dinner)
Buffet breakfast at the hotel.
Morning trip by road to the Kuangsi Waterfall
about 30km to the south of Luang Prabang. On the
way visit the famous hand-weaving village of Ban
Phanom where very good embroidery works are made
by the villagers, and see some village life and
the weavers busy at their looms underneath their
houses. The Kuangsi Falls have water tumbling
over several tiers of limestone formations into
several turquoise pools that people enjoy wading
in set in natural jungle with birds in the
foliage of the trees. Lunch of French set menu
at the Elephant Blanc restaurant.
Afternoon excursion by boat upstream of the
Mekong River to visit Ban Sang Hai (a village
producing very good Lao rice-wine and embroidery
works) by the bank of the Mekong River on our
way to the Pak Ou caves. This village used to be
famous for its earthen jars but today it imports
such jars to contain its copious production of
rice-wine. Proceed by boat to the Pak Ou Buddha
Caves (Tham Ting) where local people bring
various kinds of Buddha images and sizes of
wooden elephants to place at this shrine for
reverence and good fortune. By now there are
hundreds if not thousands of these images inside
the main cave. See the light of the setting sun
strikes the limestone cliff opposite the caves.
Return to Luang Prabang. Dinner at Indochina
Spirit restaurant.
Overnight at hotel, Luang Prabang.
Day 07: Luang Prabang - Vientiane (Breakfast/
Dinner)
Breakfast at hotel.
Transfer to the airport for your flight from
Luang Prabang to Vientiane, the capital of Laos.
Upon arrival in Vientiane, meet your guide and
transfer to hotel for check-in. In the afternoon
tour the city. Sightseeing of Vientiane will
include Wat Sisaket (built by Prince Anou in
1818 of Thai design that was not destroyed by
the Thai invaders of the early Bangkok period),
Haw Pha Kaew (a former royal temple built in
1565 to house the Emerald Buddha that is now in
Bangkok since 1779), Wat That Luang (the holiest
of Lao temples that annually holds a huge
religious fair that attracts devotees from all
over Laos), and Patuxai (Laos' own Arc de
Triomphe). Dinner at Kua Lao restaurant.
Overnight at hotel, Vientiane.
Day 08: Vientiane - Siem Reap - Rolous Group
of Temples (Breakfast/ Lunch)
Breakfast at the hotel. Check out of the hotel
after breakfast. Visit the large sprawling
morning market to have an insight into the kinds
of food consumed daily by the Lao people in
Vientiane. You will see a host of edible
products including frog legs so loved by the
former French colonialists in the city, and
baquettes by the basketfuls, a whole range of
vegetables and many other things. Transfer to
the airport for your flight to Siem Reap (in
Cambodia).
Upon arrival, be met by your guide and taken to
lunch at Angkor Reach restaurant before going to
your city hotel for check-in. Afternoon tour to
the Rolous group temples of Lolei, Bakong and
Preah Ko all built in the pre-Angkor period
(850-893) to see the precedents of the great
Angkor period temples. These temples will
establish in your mind the chronology of temple
architecture in Angkor as temple-building
developed and declined over a period of 600
years.
Overnight at hotel, Siem Reap.
Day 09: Angkor Thom & Ta Prohm (Breakfast/
Lunch/ Dinner)
Breakfast at the hotel. Morning tour of Angkor
Thom, the great city located next to Angkor Wat.
Angkor Thom was the greatest achievement of King
Jayavarman VII. Built in the 12th century, it
extends almost 4 square miles and is enclosed by
a wall 26 feet high, 7.5 miles long and
surrounded by an originally crocodile-infested
moat. This great city contains many structures
built to honour the Buddha and amenities for the
king and people to enjoy. The area is surrounded
by five monumental gates more than 65 feet high,
each dominated by 5 huge carved faces of the
king himself represented as the Buddha
Avalokitesvara, facing north, south, east, west
and centre. In front of the south gate are giant
statues of 54 gods on the left, 54 demons on the
right. In the centre is the Bayon, a massive
cluster of towers carved with 216 faces of the
king. More great carvings are found on the 4000
feet of interior walls that are covered with
bas-reliefs showing 11,000 figures engaged in
battles, ceremonial pageants and everyday life
of 12th century Angkor. Visit Phimeanakas, a
10th century temple built by Jayavarman V; the
Elephant Terrace, a viewing platform from which
the kings of Angkor watched military
processions; the Terrace of the Leper King,
supposedly named after the builder of Angkor
Thom whom legend says was afflicted with
leprosy. Visit also Preah Khan dedicated to
Buddhism and Neak Pean, both built by Jayavarman
VII, the latter a healing place. Lunch at
Jasmine Angkor restaurant. Afternoon sightseeing
of Ta Prohm which is not restored and left to
the elements with giant trees embracing its
stone works, giving Ta Prohm its unique
character. We are able to visualize and perhaps
feel how Henri Mouhot the Frenchman who
discovered Angkor must have experienced when he
stumbled upon the jungle covered ruins of Angkor
in the mid-19th century. If there is still time
we visit also Ta Keo, an 11th century sandstone
temple dedicated to Shiva, Prasat Kravan,
Banteay Kdei, and others. Return to your hotel
to refresh yourself.
Dinner at New Bayon Restaurant.
Overnight at hotel, Siem Reap.
Day 10: Banteay Srei - Kbal Spean - Angkor
Wat (Breakfast/ Lunch/ Dinner)
Breakfast at the hotel. Morning departure at
8.30am to tour Banteay Srei and Kbal Spean in
the Kulen Mountains. The temple of Banteay Srei,
38 km from Siem Reap. is the only pink sandstone
temple exquisitely carved, dated before Angkor
Day 11: Siem Reap - Departure (Breakfast)
Breakfast at the hotel. Free until time to
transfer to the airport for your departure
flight.
End of Tour & Services
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