This is a section on the Mekong River where there are a lot of rapids during the high waters of the rainy season, and the swirling waters have created an odd landscape of erosion in the rocks. This phenomenon can only be seen during the December to March dry season when the low water levels enable you to explore the shoreline.
Before we left the city, we stopped one more time at Big Ubon Breakfasts. This time, we each had the 1/2 English Breakfast, and we shared a bowl of fruit and yogurt..
Now that's a good way to start off the day!
It was almost a two hour drive each way. Again, not much to see along the way. Made it to the river at about 11:30am.
The Mekong River is almost 700 kms (434 miles) long.
The Mekong River floods every year from June through October.
This is all under water during that period!
He's a big fellow!
You can hire a boat from a river trip.
But we were there to see the 3,000 holes! You can only access this area during dry season. They operate a 4x4 pickup truck shuttle service to drive you over the access area, but it's only 1 km or so, so of course we walked it.
One of the larger holes.
Some of the holes hold water, and some don't.
It depends on whether the erosion has created a drain or not.
It's fun to climb around and explore.
Wow... very cool!
Ruth.
Hard to believe this is all under water for a few months of the year.
The swirling water creates holes of all sizes.
Me!
The locals call this area "the Mekong Grand Canyon".
Such a weird landscape.
We love exploring these types of places.
Again, hardly anybody else around.
We spent an hour and a half or so out exploring. Again, it was hot... around 33C (91F) and not much in the way of shade. But this time we had a good breeze as well, so that made it more bearable.
There are some food stands up near the entrance so went and had some lunch. Then back in the car to the next village north where I had marked off a couple more interesting things to see.
The earth around this big old tree has slowly eroded over the years during flood season.
It makes for an interesting perspective.
They've put warning barriers up to try to prevent people from climbing on the roots.
Next up was one of those rock overhangs that make for a good photo opportunity. But we couldn't find the right path to access it, and ended up clambering over a bunch of rocks on the shoreline.
A local riverboat.
The Mekong River looking north.
We found the spot!
GPS 15.834023, 105.38601
We're walking back to the car when I spot some kind of odd insect. Upon closer inspection, it was a funny looking wasp of some kind, and it was holding onto a bigger spider. It was dragging the spider across the path and tough to get a decent photo of...
I took about 6 photos and this was the best one.
In the village near where we parked the car.
Almost a two hour drive back to the city of Ubon, where we dropped off the car rental and made our way back to the Outside Inn where we had one final Mexican meal...
We shared a big salad.
Ruth had the tacos, and I had the same chicken enchiladas that I enjoyed when we arrived.
This morning, we are at Ubon Airport taking a direct one hour flight to Chiang Mai.
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Good deal on this 9' x 12' RV Patio Mat.
And in Canada...
Such fascinating landscapes! I love places like that. It really does remind me of some of the US national parks, kind of a strange mashup of Yellowstone, Arches, and the Grand Canyon. Love it!
ReplyDeleteWe really enjoy this kind of landscape, it makes exploring the area lots of fun. I think the national park in the US that it reminds me of is Capitol Reef NP because it was also a reef in the ocean at one time.
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