We went for a weekend to Nam Lik Ecolodge on the Nam Lik River. The guy who manages the place is Richard, a French guy who has been living in Laos for 16 years. He is an amateur entomologist. He has an incredible collection of invertebrates he’s been collecting since managing the place. He also built a vivarium for snakes, fish, lizards, frogs, geckos etc. Needless to say Miranda was in heaven. He gave her a butterfly net and off she was hunting down all sorts of things. Richard pays the village kids to collect insects to feed the inhabitants of the vivarium. Each morning they show up with all sorts of ‘goodies’. He also has 4 kinds of poisonous snakes that villagers have brought him. During the day we went kayaking and hiking in the jungle.
There was a festival in the village while we were there and Richard invited us to visit his friend’s house. We sat around drinking Lao High, a fermented rice drink and beer, at 10 in the morning. We left around noon, although they continued until evening. The hosts were incredibly kind and offered us all kinds of things to munch on. The kids were really into a coconut and rice pudding they keep wrapped in banana leaves.
