Road Trip to Tha Thom

This coming year MCC will begin a nutrition and food security project in a remote district in Laos. Two weeks ago I had an opportunity to travel to the district. Now considering MCC's priority is to work with the most marginalized communities, it should not have come as surprise when it took us five hours to travel less than 100 km. I was told the roads were not good, but somehow until you've been on a road trip which ended up being two days longer than you expected because of road conditions, it's hard to comprehend. Currently they are in the midst of constructing a new road and it is estimated the road will by completed in four years. The MCC project is to be completed in 2014. Will the roads be finished in time for MCC to experience the luxury?

For lunch we stopped at that the police station in a small village and enjoyed our carry lunch of sticky rice, stir fried vegetables, chicken and pork on the front porch.

And then we you encounter a road block, you just have to stop and wait until a path is cleared. While waiting we were invited to relax and take a nap under the shade of a villager's home.

After returning to the desired road, after missing a turn that resulted in our vehicle getting hung up on the rear suspension while attempting to cross a creek with no bridge, we were faced with the next road block.

MUD! MUD! MUD! A culvert broke and the road disappeared, as the water from the mountain created a giant mud hole. With 10 logging trucks in front of us attempting to pass through the "mud hole" and another similar place in the road ahead, we decided to turn around and go back the way we had come, adding two days to our trip.

For those of you who have travelled the Alaska Highway, I imagine this trip was not much different than what it would have been like on the Alaska Highway 50 years ago.

Regardless of the road conditions the mountain views are absolutely spectacular.