Huay Xai is not a place where you run out of days. It is a border town: one main street, a market, a temple on the hill and a pier where the boat leaves early in the morning. For most backpackers it is a single evening, and for the town itself that is exactly enough. We are not going to pretend otherwise.
What Huay Xai does have is two experiences that shape the rest of your trip through Laos, and both of them start here: the slow boat down the Mekong and the jungle of Bokeo. Those two are the reason you are standing here. Everything else fills the hours in between, and it fills them nicely: a terrace above the water, grilled fish from the market and the slow realisation that you have ended up in a different country from the one you were in yesterday.
So what do you do with that one evening, and what do you book before you get here?
Want the practical side first, like how to get there, where to sleep and how many days to give it? That is all on our Huay Xai page.
The slow boat to Luang Prabang
This is why Huay Xai is on the map. For two days you sit on a wooden boat drifting down the Mekong, with mountains on both sides, villages sliding past and not much else. There is no programme and no wifi, and that is exactly what makes it one of the best parts of the whole trip for a lot of backpackers.
The boat leaves early in the morning and takes two days, with an overnight stop halfway in the village of Pakbeng. Buy your ticket at the official office, not from a middleman. And expect the departure time to be flexible: the boat goes when it goes.
Bring a cushion or a thick jacket, because the benches are hard and you are on them for a long time. And stock up on food and water before you leave: two baguettes, fruit and some snacks. On board the choice is small and the prices are high. Doing the route the other way round, from Luang Prabang up to Huay Xai? The tour below sails in that direction.
Our verdict: absolutely, and give it the two days it takes
The Gibbon Experience
The second reason people stay longer, and the one activity travellers come to Huay Xai especially for. In the Bokeo Nature Reserve you sleep in huge treehouses thirty to forty metres up and get from tree to tree on ziplines up to five hundred metres long. Early in the morning you hear the gibbons singing, and with some luck you see them too.
You choose between a two-day and a three-day version, including guides, meals and your bed for the night. The two-day version starts at about €190. From Huay Xai it is around two hours’ drive into the park, and after that you go on foot. Book well ahead, because places are limited and in high season it fills up fast.
Have your harness checked at every zipline before you step off the platform. And if you come in the rainy season, bring shoes with real grip: the path to the treehouses turns into a mud bath.
Our verdict: book it before you enter Laos, not once you are already there
Sunset over the Mekong
Huay Xai sits on a slope above the river and looks straight across at Thailand. Around sunset the water turns orange, the lights come on across the river in Chiang Khong, and half the backpackers in Laos are sitting on a terrace with a beer in hand. This is when the town is at its best.
It costs you nothing more than your drinks, and a beer here is about €1. The cafes with the best view are up along the river, a short climb from the main street. There is nothing to book and nothing to plan.
Come between November and February and the sky is clear and the river is at a good level. From March to May smoke from the crop fires hangs in the hills and you see a lot less of the far bank.
Our verdict: the best two hours you will have here, and free
Wat Chom Khao Manilat
The temple on the hill above the water is more or less the only sight in town, and that does not make it any less worthwhile. You climb a flight of steps, stand among the buildings at the edge of the hill and have the Mekong, the bridge and Thailand all in one view.
It is in the centre, so you walk there from your hostel. Entry is free. Count on half an hour to three quarters of an hour, no more, and plan it for the afternoon you arrive: once you are through the border and have bought your boat ticket, it is just the right amount to fill the rest of your day.
Go at the end of the afternoon, and you can walk straight on to a terrace for the sunset.
Our verdict: go, and half an hour is just right
Eating at the night market
Huay Xai is a border town and the food matches: a handful of places along the main street and a small evening market. But this is your first taste of Lao food, and it is a different kitchen from the Thai one you have just come from. Laap with herbs and lime, tam mak hoong, sticky rice from the basket and Mekong fish off the charcoal grill.
A meal here costs about €2, so you can happily try a few things. Ask for khao jee as well, the Lao baguette: that doubles as your supplies for tomorrow’s boat.
Do not go too late, because this is not a town that keeps going into the small hours. The market is at its liveliest early in the evening.
Our verdict: make time for it, even if it is only for your boat supplies
Got time to spare in Huay Xai?
The slow boat or the speedboat
The slow boat to Luang Prabang is the most beautiful way to enter Laos: two days on the Mekong, with a night in Pakbeng. The speedboat does it in one day, but that means hours in a narrow little boat doing sixty kilometres an hour down a river full of rocks. If you take it anyway, do not get in without a helmet and a life jacket. We always take the slow one ourselves.
Your slow boat ticket from the official office
Every hostel, every little office and every tuk-tuk driver can sell you a ticket, and every time there is something added on top. Walk to the official office and buy it there: it saves money and you know for sure your ticket is right.
Sorting out money for the border
There are several ATMs in Huay Xai, so only change what you really need at the border crossing itself, because the rate there is a lot worse. If your passport needs a visa on arrival, do bring enough US dollars in cash, because cards are not accepted at the border.
An extra day in the area
With the temple, the market and the sunset you have seen the town itself in one afternoon. If you are not doing the Gibbon Experience and still have a day spare, Luang Namtha is a good call, four hours by bus, where the treks into the Nam Ha park start. Thailand across the river is also easy to reach.
Our top five in Huay Xai
Only got a few days? These are the five we would do no matter what:
- The slow boat to Luang Prabang, with the night in Pakbeng
- The Gibbon Experience, booked well in advance
- Sunset over the Mekong from a terrace by the river
- Wat Chom Khao Manilat at the end of the afternoon
- Lao food at the night market, including your supplies for the boat
Still got time after that? We would rather get straight on the road: overland you are in Luang Namtha in about four hours and in Oudomxay in around six.
So what do you really have to do in Huay Xai?
Honestly, there is nothing in the town itself that you will still be telling people about a year from now. Huay Xai is the front door of Laos, and the things you remember from here only happen once you are out of town: in the jungle of Bokeo or on the water towards Luang Prabang.
That makes this list short and the choice simple. Book the Gibbon Experience if you have the days and the budget for it, because it is the one experience here you will not find anywhere else. If you do not, just do the slow boat and use your afternoon for the temple and the river.
And do not treat that one evening as something to get through. Sit on a terrace above the Mekong before dark with a €1 beer, look across at Thailand, where you were walking this morning, and let it sink in that from tomorrow you have two days with nothing to do but float down a river. That is a pretty good way to arrive in a country.
