Konglor Cave, underground river adventure!

Our crazy road trip around Thailand and Laos on a tricycle (saleng).

• Saleng expedition #48
• Na hin
• 86 km / 53 miles

To be honest, the Thekhek Loop wasn't planned in our trip and neither was visiting the Konglor Cave even though they are both marked as highlights of Laos. At the Konglor Cave in Khammouane a go and return 7,5 KM / 5 miles motorized boat (sort of kayak) underground river tour is on offer. In between the rides there is a break on the other side of the mountain close to visit a local village. Package tours with transportation, food and an English speaking guide are offered with prices over 100 dollars, depending on your pick-up location of course. After seeing many caves and doing many organized package tours I'm very skeptic about spending more money and time than necessary. The tight schedules, cramped minivans, pick-up/drop-off time waste, other tourists that slow me down or speed me up during my trip, too long or short explanations from a guide and all the commission stops in between for double or higher prices are just not worth it for me. The more I travel the less I enjoy those kind of trips. If you visit a natural wonder but tourism has taken it's not that 'natural' anymore and looses my interest. That is why I skipped the St Paul's Subterranean River National Park in The Philippines. It was impossible to organize the trip for a fair price yourself, offering only day-trips of waiting and queuing while the actual underground river cruise takes about one hour only. This time things worked out the other way!

We had our own transportation/the saleng, waited for some sort of good weather (I bought gloves!), had breakfast at our own pace in Na Hin, worked online for a while and just drove to Khammouane. Easy! Ok, it was 43 KM / 27 miles one way over dirt roads with a bit of rain but the views are quite scenic. It took us about 1,5 hour to get there. You just drive through town until you see the entrance gate. We paid 9.000 KIP to enter with two persons and the saleng.

We had to wake up a guide and pay for a guided boat tour, 120.000 KIP. Two headlights, flip-flops, a locker and life-jackets were included. There were no other tourists, probably because of the cold weather the past few days. The guide (no English) signaled us to follow him, he walked down the stairs and over the bamboo bridge while we were taking pictures of the beautiful lake in front. As soon as we turned around we lost him. Having no clue where to go, other than just entering the cave without guide, we followed the water and encountered some other tourists on their return. Our guide was waiting for us at the far end of the beginning of the cave, in the dark :)

As soon as we took off with the boat, it went pitch black. Since the weather was bad for the last few days the temperature change wasn't noticeable. The little headlights gave a small beam, not enough to see the beauty of the cave. It was more like being in a haunted house than a natural wonder. SCARY! Further and further down the cave we went without any visual reference. At a certain point the guide pulled the boat to the side telling us to get "off". Hmmmmm. Luckily he went out of the boat as well, he turned on 'lights'. Powered with electricity the light lit up a beautiful part of the cave with a walking path right through it. When we started walked over the path and taking pictures we lost our our guide out of sight (again)... He switched of a part of the lights and we heard the engine of the boat running again. Hoping that he would pick us up on the other side we continued walking towards the light. With all the echoeing in the cave we had no idea if our guide was going in our direction, but yes - he was! He arrived from the other side, picked us up and turned off the other part of the lights - completely dark again!
After about one hour we saw daylight again! Yeah! Time to see the local village!

While climbing up we saw 'the village', looking like a festival area on a rainy day. Some stalls to buy junk food and drinks, some wet tables and chairs with plastic covers above, a point to buy original souvenirs and a how they make them - weaving. The people were lovely and the woven products were amazing, but it had nothing to do with a local village, it was commercial. I hope this was just a rainy day experience and the real village lays behind this 'front-show'.

Some tips:

• Bringing a proper torch if you want to see something, even thought it takes a bit of the thrill out of the adventure;
• Make sure you can roll your trousers up to your knees (if you don't wear shorts) since you need to walk to your kayak through the water here and there;
• Have lunch before you go, in town there are many guest houses and a few restaurants offering Lao food.

This is part 2 of the Thakhek Loop with saleng.

To be continued, stay tuned!











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