Into Each Heart Some Water Falls
The widest falls of South-east Asia
The mighty Mekong, coming all the way down from Tibet, is the lifeblood of Laos, it runs all through the country from north to south. It seems the country doesn’t want to let the river go and puts ‘4000 islands’ in its way. Si Phan Don is a collection of small and bigger islands that divide up the stream into a labyrinth of currents. Before the Mekong leaves Laos, a string of islands poses a barrier of solid rock on its way. On the left and right bank, there are waterfalls, while the canals that run between the islands have to pass through rapids.
Map of Si Phan Don - 4000 Islands
The Khon Phapheng Falls
The Khon Phapheng Falls are the largest of SE Asia. The highest falls reach 21 m. They are home to the pla buek, an endangered giant Mekong catfish, probably the largest freshwater fish in the world (up to 3 m and 300 kg).
The only train track in Laos
When Laos was part of colonial French Indochina, there were only about six hundred French officials in the country, but nevertheless France extracted quite some products from the land, among them very good coffee from the Bolaven plateau. Slowboats plied down the Mekong… until they came to the Falls. In 1893 the French built a 7km railway from Don Det, above the falls, to Don Khon, on the south side. The railway was abandoned in the 1940’s and today the rails and sleepers can be found in nearby houses and other constructions. A small locomotive is rusting away near Don Khon village. The train track is now a trail that you can walk all the way from one docking station to the other.
The north end of the rail track - The old locomotive - Overview of the river at Ban Hang Khone, the southern end of the railway. Cambodia is on the opposite side. The very rare and equally endangered Irrawaddy freshwater dolphins might be spotted here.
All photos, movies, and texts (except those signed by Touché Guimarães) were made/written by Guy Voets, and everything is published under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license (attribution, non-commercial, share-alike).
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Text in brown are links, either to another part of the website, or away from it. When marked with a *, the link goes outside, indicates where it takes you (e.g. wikipedia, youtube,...) in the left bottom corner of the page, and a new tab or page opens.
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photos from 2002.
photos from 2002.