Settling in

Just over two weeks since we moved into Nasangvery (NasangVoi) and all is well. We had our first visitor when Australian Sue (our former landlady from the Greenhouse) came for lunch on Wednesday and we were invited round to Da (our current landlady)'s house to bake some bread and drink some beers on Saturday.

Damian and Da live in a super-modern villa on the next hilltop along from ours. There's a deep stream valley between our houses so we have a circuitous walk to get there although it's quite close as the crow flies. They live in an area Brent (landlord of the Fat Cat bar) slightly disparaging refers to as "the Hollywood Hills". I can see why. There's quite an expat community developing there with land bought up by Americans and Europeans for western-style houses. I like to think that our input is, on balance, positive given the money we bring in to spend locally. 

Da was trying out her Swiss mother-in-law's plaited bread recipe. I made some wholewheat breads as well.

Their house is very stylish with fabulous mountain views, swimming pool, beautiful garden and interesting artworks. This is a sheet of recycled plastic made from plastic waste collected and reformed by a new social enterprise in Luang Prabang called Patihoup. I'm quite keen to get them to make a bench and some panels for the garden here to replace the termite-eaten wooden planking

My tomato plants are coming along nicely, despite the lack of fertilizer.

I've been trying to work out how to make compost here. Most of our material is mango leaves at the moment. They are rather dry and look as though they will take a long time to break down. Da brought us a bottle of Dr Higa's EM (effective microorganisms) to help keep the septic tank working well. I'm going to add some to the compost heap to see whether that works. The soil here is rocky red clay and definitely needs more organic matter.

Today we bought two new bourgainvillea for the garden and a bag of some kind of compost from the local plant nursery. I'm looking forward to having more flowers to attract butterflies. 

This tiny jumping spider has lost one of its front legs. They are ant mimics and wave their legs around like antennae

Our next door neighbours built an eco-home made of adobe (known as the mud house). Unfortunately they've had to go back to Switzerland for 6 months for health reasons. Their housesitters David and Thelma are living there and looking after the two cats.

Meanwhile back in town the work to turn the lower Nam Khan River into a canal continues. Such a shame. They are making it much narrower than it was, which doesn't seem to be such a good idea to me.

This is our house as viewed from the temple on the other side of the valley. 

The platform behind is an abandoned viewpoint built by an American guy with a passion for microlights a few years ago. The land is owned by Damian and Da but they have no plans for it at the moment.

Once a week we buy our breakfast "kochee" (little baguette breads) from the bakery.

Sadly, our favourite haunt, the Red Bul bar, changed hands last week. We had to find

 a new place to watch the footie! It feels a bit like the end of an era. Pre-covid, the Red Bul was a great place where locals, expats and backpackers all mixed in a friendly, noisy atmosphere around the pool table. Times change and people move on.

Mekong sunset never fails to delight.

Our neighbours to the front have been adding an extension. The roofer just balances along the joists. No scaffolding, hard hat or, indeed, shoes!

Hotting up!

Back garden with new plants in place

Our new home

It's been a month of uncertainty. We weren't at all sure that we had made the right decision to accept a year's contract on a house that we had viewed for just half an hour in an area of town that we don't know. What if we had made a major mistake and would feel isolated away from our cosy town-centre life? Fortunately, two days here and we love it! We moved in on Thursday and have been finding what's here, exploring the local shops, learning how to order water, garbage collection etc. And today Trevann's starting to tackle the garden!

It's a good 30 minute walk to the normal bars and restaurants. But there are tuktuks if we feel too tired (or wobbly) to get home! And we've done there and back twice in one day without feeling exhausted.

It's a lovely peaceful place to sit and watch the world go by!

The views from our terrace are fabulous. We're facing north across the Mekong and up towards the mountains of Nong Khiaw. There's often a gentle breeze. Every day at 4 o'clock the monks in the temple on the left of this pic start up with the drums

At night we can leave the blinds up and enjoy the view across town. Because we're high up we're not overlooked

The garden is newly planted so needs to mature. This is the front garden which gets most sun in the morning. Once the bourgainvillea gets going it'll get more jungly

The little house sits on the side of the hill.

The terrace faces north and stays shaded all day, which is great.

Just the one room plus bathroom suits us fine. It stays nicely cool so far. Today the terrace was 32 degrees but inside was 23 (without air con). Comfortable, very clean and modern. We even have hot water!

Probably looks a bit smaller than it is in this view. We'll be gradually adding colour.

From our house there's a dirt road down the hill.

This is the main street through our village with general shops, hairdressers, mechanic, vegetables, etc. No toilet paper, milk or butter though! Everybody is friendly so far

Drying chillies and peppers.

Most of the houses in the village are now block and tile but there are several with corrugated tin rooves

 and even thatch. Plenty of construction always going on

On old-style wooden house

Remodelling the back garden. Because we're on the hillside the small back garden is terraced. The soil is red clay(?) and sets like concrete when dry. Trevann is making a start on improving the design. We have a mature mango tree plus young papaya and banana. I'm looking forward to mango season!