Rain, storms and gale-force winds... in the idyllic Four Thousand Islands

Si Phan Don, or the Four Thousand Islands, was a somewhat late addition to the itinerary - I'd only heard of it for the first time the week before going. Described as a traveller's Mecca, with a "horizontal" vibe, where the order of the day is relaxing in a hammock with a book - it sounded like just what I needed! 

Getting there involved a 4am start and a 13-hour bus journey through some fairly remote bits of Cambodia and up across the border into Laos. Then a little rowing boat over to the island of Don Det. There are 3 main islands on which you can stay and Don Det is the most "developed". This basically means that there is a small dirt track with a few grocery stalls, cafés and people selling boat tours. It really couldn't have got much more laid back. 

A few of the Four Thousand Islands

The Four Thousand Islands are located in the widest stretch of the Mekong River and during the dry season thousands of sandbars emerge from the water. In the rainy season you can't see as many of the islands, instead trees and bushes appear to sprout out of the water. It certainly was idyllic. Sitting on the deck of my hotel, looking out over the still water with a cold Beerlao in my hand, I felt pretty content and decided to stay an extra day!

The view from the hotel terrace... completely peaceful

Unfortunately the next day I was woken by the sound of torrential rain, which continued for much of the subsequent day too. There were also a couple of pretty intense thunderstorms and winds which were so strong that the hotel walls were shaking. So although I did do a lot of reading and relaxing, it was in my hotel room rather than swaying in a hammock strung between two trees, as I'd envisaged. Oh well! 

OK, another day in the hotel then....

On my fourth day the rain stopped for a bit, and I felt that I ought to venture out and actually see something. I decided to take a little tour to try to spot the rare and endangered Irrawaddy dolphins which live off the coast of one of the islands. Unfortunately we didn't see much more than the occasional fin.

Somewhere out there, are Dolphins...

We then made a quick stop at the Khone Papheng Falls which are the largest waterfalls in South-East Asia.

Khone Papheng Falls

Don Det definitely felt like a sleepy backwater. The locals didn't really speak English, and they hadn't really got a firm grasp on tourism, but that kind of added to the charm. The dolphin tour consisted of us being driven along to a bit of beach where we were dumped on the shore with no instruction, until about half an hour later when a boat turned up and the driver gestured for us to get in. We sailed around for a bit (in silence) and then after we'd spotted a few fins, he pulled up at a different bank, got off and walked away. We gathered that was the end of the tour, but were a bit put-out that he'd docked right at the bottom of a steep grassy slope with no path and just left us there! My flip flops were already wet from having had to wade into the boat before, so I was slipping and sliding up the slope, mostly pulling myself up by grabbing hold of tree roots! And this was on the "developed" island!

All in all, Si Phan Don really was a beautiful place and I can only imagine what it would be like in the dry season with a blue sky and the sandy islands peeping above the blue-green water. Maybe I'll have to come back one day and find out!

Si Phan Don