88 km

We had yet another cool morning to ease us into our ride before it became hot. The rainy season must be getting started. We sure hope so. Before heading out of town we rode along the Mekong and saw a form of fishing we hadn’t seen before.

We both were going back and forth between feeling OK and not-so-great all day. Last night’s rain really cleared up a lot of the smoke we’ve been seeing in the air. Villagers use slash-and-burn on a small scale as a way to clear new fields for farming here, but we’ve also been hearing talk of how the Chinese are logging and burning huge plots in northern Laos, making money from the timber and then encouraging farmers to grow certain crops that the Chinese want to buy. We don’t know how true that is, but as we ride north we are seeing more and more smoke in the air and it’s really sad. This should be some of the cleanest air in Southeast Asia.