Everything you need to know about trekking in Luang Namtha, Laos
Interested in trekking in Laos but not sure how to go about organising it? Here’s everything you need to know about trekking in Luang Namtha - Laos’ premier adventure trekking destination.
Want to know more about what trekking in Luang Namtha is actually like? Check out this post about our crazy and incredible trekking experience in the Nam Ha National Park!
Contents
A little bit about Luang Namtha
The largest city in the province of the same name, Luang Namtha is the main starting point for hill-tribe treks in the Nam Ha National Protected Area.
It isn’t a particularly scenic town but don’t let that worry you as it has everything you need from accommodation and restaurants to a number of trekking agencies all conveniently located close together down the main road.
An Akha village house in the Nam Ha National Protected Area, Luang Namtha.
The Nam Ha NPA is 5km south of Luang Namtha and considered to be Laos’ top trekking and ecotourism destination. Covering 2224 square kilometres, the park is home to a range of ethnic hill-tribes (Hmong, Akha, Lanten, Khmu plus many others) and a variety of plant and animal life.
Looking for more posts on jungle trekking? Check out this complete guide to Gunung Mulu National Park in Malaysia, with jungle trekking, caving and more!
How to get to Luang Namtha
From other provinces in Laos by bus
Luang Namtha may be located in Northern Laos but is surprisingly accessible! The long-distance bus station serves the provinces of Oudomxay (3 hours), Luang Prabang (8 hours), Vientiane (22 hours) Huay Xai (4 hours) and even Mengla in China (2 hours).
The bus station is located 9km south of the main town, so you will have to jump on a tuk-tuk - this usually takes around 10 minutes drive and costs 20,000kip per person.
The driver will basically take you to the road in the town centre where all the tour agencies and guesthouses are - how convenient!
A typical Laotian bus.
From other districts in Luang Namtha province by bus
The district bus station is literally one minute away from the town centre and has buses going to and from Muang Sing (2 hours), Muang Long (3.5 hours), Vieng Phouka (1.5 hours), Nalae (3 hours) and Boten (1.5 hours - involves a border crossing from China).
We travelled from Muang Ngoi to Luang Namtha (via Nong Khiaw). The trip by boat and bus took us 7 hours and cost around 130,000kip per person. You can read about how we did this here.
Vincent looking thrilled to share a journey with carnivorous fish feed.
From Thailand by bus
Take a bus to the Thai border town of Chiang Kong and from there take a tuk-tuk to the Thai/Laos border.
Once you are through immigration in Thailand, you can take a shuttle bus over the Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge 4 (which costs 25 or 30 baht) to reach Laos’ immigration.
After that, you will need to get another tuk-tuk to take you to the long-distance Keo Champa bus station in Huay Xai (which is confusingly also known as Bokeo) - this should cost around 25,000kip.
If you are sick of buses and have more ca$hish to spend, you could consider flying from Vientiane. Lao Airlines operates regular flights from Vientiane to Luang Namtha on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 12:30pm and 14:00pm. The flight takes an hour.
Where to stay
There’s a number of guesthouses in Luang Namtha but not all of them receive rave reviews. After reading guest reviews until we thought our eyes would bleed, we decided to just rock up in Luang Namtha and see if we could stay at Zuela Guesthouse as it seemed to have received a decent write up from a few travellers.
Given that it was low season, we also thought that we could negotiate a cheaper price on a room than what they were offering on their website (this is probably not possible in high season).
We figured that in the worst-case scenario of there being no rooms available or the room being too expensive, there were still a few places we could try nearby. We were right: walk-in rates for a double fan room with ensuite bathroom was 80000kip per night (versus $20 on their website).
The rooms were basic but clean and comfortable and although there was poor water pressure in the shower (the case for many guesthouses and hotels all over Laos), at least it was hot! Rooms are cleaned every day which is a nice touch.
The guesthouse is centrally located near the night market and other restaurants.
It also has a restaurant, where they serve a pretty decent and reasonably priced breakfast (granola and yogurt was one of our favourites because they weren’t stingy with the granola like other places) and they also have a number of homemade baked goods like apple and carrot muffins.
We had dinner at the restaurant once after coming back from our trek and it was the worst meal I have ever had pretty terrible - overcooked and bland veggie burgers and oven chips.
A bad dinner is always disappointing.
If your clothes are filthy (as ours were after trekking), don’t worry because Zuela has a laundry service that costs 15,000kip per kg. The guesthouse also rents out scooters and bicycles at a reasonable price (from 80,000kip per day for the scooters and 10,000kip per day for bicycles).
Some of the staff at Zuela are friendly and others are...decidedly not! Smile, expect things to take ages and remember that sometimes there will be service without a smile.
This Travelfish guide on accommodation is really useful as it gives good detailed descriptions of what you can expect for your money at each place.
Where to eat
Luang Namtha has a few good and reasonably priced restaurants. Our favourites were:
Lai’s Place
Yummy tofu laab.
Lai’s Place is cheap with really friendly staff. We had both lunch and dinner here and were impressed!
We tried a very tasty red curry and tofu laab (I haven’t found that many places that serve vegetarian laab in Laos, so that was a bonus). We also tried their peanut jeow (a type of dip) which was delicious.
Peanut jeow
They are open all day and offer a massive menu that has quite a few traditional Northern Lao dishes from different ethnic minorities (including Akha and Black Tai cuisines) and lots of options for vegetarians and vegans.
They also offer Western dishes if that is what tickles your pickles.
Minority Restaurant
Another reasonably priced place that offers traditional Laotian food. We tried a few different dishes at Minority Restaurant including eggplant, peanut and tomato jeows that were served with sticky rice; sweet and sour fish and fresh vegetable spring rolls.
Although TripAdvisor says that the restaurant is open all day, when we were there the restaurant only opened at 4:00pm. This might be due to it being low season, but it is something to keep in mind. The menu is also quite small and there weren’t extensive options for vegetarians or vegans.
Which trekking company?
Someone gets a bit too excited about hiking.
The main road in Luang Namtha is basically lined with trekking agencies who all offer fairly similar trekking and adventure experiences.
Most of these companies have websites as well and so we spent an afternoon going on their websites and narrowing down the type of trek and experience that we were after and also working out what we were prepared to pay.
We also read A LOT of reviews on TripAdvisor (but don’t be swayed by just this - more on that later). We wanted to visit an Akha hill tribe during our trek in Luang Namtha, so we were after quite a specific experience.
We found this research useful because when we finally went into their offices we didn’t have to spend ages flipping through the huge folders containing trekking information and could just ask about the particular tours we were interested in.
Most of the trekking agencies will have boards outside their offices showing the number of people who have signed up to treks that are usually leaving the following day.
Joining a trek that already has people signed up to it means that the trekking cost per person is lower, which can only be a good thing!
I have read a few reviews saying that some agencies tell you that people have signed up to a trek already, thereby convincing you to book with them, only for you to turn up the next day to discover that they want to charge you a higher price because you are the only one on the trek.
We don’t like this funny business.
In our experience, all the agencies told us whether they had anyone signed up for the next day (including showing us the names and details of people - no data protection here!).
It is also worth checking where your trekking fee goes and making sure that the money is divided fairly between the agency, guides and the local villages that you will visit. Most agencies have a handy pie chart showing how your fee is distributed.
Here are our thoughts based on all the agencies we spoke to:
The Hiker
Ranked number 1 on TripAdvisor, The Hiker offers a massive range of 1-5 day tours, including trekking/hiking, combination tours involving trekking, hiking and kayaking, jungle survival tours and even tours where you can be driven to different villages by minivan.
It is possibly one of the most expensive agencies: the cost of The Last Akha Trails two-day trek ranges from $56 per person (for a group of 8) to $195 for a tour with just one person. This trek for two people was $95 per person.
We weren’t that impressed with the service when we visited the office: we asked about the tours on offer and the person we spoke to just seemed disinterested.
He then also told us that The Last Akha trails tour was no longer running because the hiking route to the village was now a rubber plantation and so the trekking was not very beautiful.
However, they were extraordinarily helpful over e-mail, sending me possible two-day treks and also followed up to ask if I needed any more help in deciding on a tour. So maybe they just aren’t great face to face!
Forest Retreat Laos
Ranked number 2 on Trip Advisor, Forest Retreat Laos has rave reviews and like The Hiker offers a range of trekking and adventure experiences, lasting from 1-4 days.
We were fairly interested in the two-day Ban Nalan trek which involved visits to Khmu and Lanten villages, however, we were still much more interested in visiting Akha hill tribes.
Their price for trekking is similar to The Hiker with a two-day trek starting from $55 per person (for a group of 8-10) and going up to $190 for a solo trek. The price for two people on a two-day trek was $100 per person. You can also make a booking with them over email.
When we visited the office, the person we spoke to was helpful and could explain in detail about what we could expect on the Ban Nalan trek.
However, when we asked whether they offered any treks to visit Akha villages, the man scoffed and said that “we could see Akha on the street in the main Luang Namtha town”. So we decided that they weren’t the tour agency for us.
Discovering Laos
Not to be left too far behind, Discovering Laos is ranked number 3 on TripAdvisor and like the previous two companies has received some stellar reviews.
They offer jungle trekking and homestay adventures lasting between 1-5 days, kayaking/rafting experiences, cycling tours, combination tours and 1-2 day minivan tours.
Like Forest Retreat Laos, this company offers a two-day trek involving a visit to Khmu and Lanten villages.
The trekking prices at Discovering Laos are slightly cheaper, with a two-day trek starting from $55 per person (for a group with 8 or more people) and going up to $152 for a solo trek. A two-day trek with just two people was priced at $89 per person.
You can book a trek with Discovering Laos via email or visit the office. We were really impressed with the service that we received when we dropped by the office: the staff member we spoke to was super friendly and he took us through all the tours and told us in detail what we could experience on the two-day tour.
Our feeling is that the focus of the majority of the tours from Discovery Laos is more on jungle trekking, jungle survival and nature than about visiting the ethnic minority villages, which meant that their treks didn’t exactly fit with what we wanted.
They also didn’t offer a trek to visit Akha villages (we decided to ask them about this in case there was an option to do this that wasn’t on their website).
Ethnic Travel Laos
Ranked number 5 on TripAdvisor, we initially really liked the sound of Ethnic Travel Laos because they had great reviews and also offered extremely reasonable prices - a two-day trek to visit the Akha hill tribe in Ban Phouvan village costs $70 per person if two people are going on the trek.
If more people join the trek (they can take groups as large as 8 people) it becomes cheaper so the cost can actually range from $47 - $70 per person. You can also make a booking via email and they offer 1-4 day tours, including trekking and kayaking combination tours, as well as motorbike tours.
Although they were our first choice, we didn’t end up booking with them because the person we spoke to when we visited the agency didn’t seem to be aware of the two-day trek option on their website and only offered us the one-day Akha hill tribe trek.
When we asked him about the two-day trek, he admitted that it was running but he wasn’t able to tell us much about what would be happening on the second day of the tour other than what was in the brochure.
We ended up visiting their office twice to get more details as we really liked the sound of the tour online, but as he couldn’t help us we decided not to book with them.
Into the Wild - the agency we booked with!
And coming in at number 6 on TripAdvisor is Into the Wild! Like all the other agencies, Into the Wild offers trekking tours lasting between 1-3 days, cycling, kayaking and minivan tours and even cooking courses.
We were interested in the two-day Ban Phouvan Akha Trails trek which included an overnight stay in an Akha village and visits to Lanten and Khmu villages as well.
Into the Wild has similar prices to other agencies, with a two-day trek starting from $65 for a group of 8 people to $150 for a single person.
Now time for a bit of honesty: this tour company wasn’t even on our radar when we were doing our research because the TripAdvisor reviews it had received weren’t as dazzling as the other companies.
In fact, there were some downright terrible reviews.
So they were the only company I didn’t even bother emailing beforehand to get more information. (For the record, you can book treks with Into the Wild online and via email).
However, after a disappointing chat with Ethnic Travel Laos, we wandered over to the Into the Wild office and asked about their treks anyway.
The owner of the agency described the two-day trek in lots of detail, showed us the route on a map and gave us a really good picture of what we could expect.
He also told us that two other people had booked the trek for the following day, so we could expect to pay $80 per person (which was actually slightly cheaper than the price for four people).
Since the price was only $10 more per person than what we expected to pay at Ethnic Travel Laos, we decided on balance to book with them because the cost was still reasonable and we would get to visit the Akha, which was basically what we wanted.
It was after this point that Into the Wild completely exceeded our expectations.
Firstly - our guide Bounmi was absolutely fantastic. He was professional, extremely knowledgeable, had a great command of English and was a fantastic cook.
He went above and beyond to ensure that our first experience of jungle trekking in Laos was memorable for all the right reasons.
Our guide, Bounmi, on the right.
Secondly, Into the Wild provided us with spare rucksacks and flashlights: travelling as we do with hand luggage only we were more than a little underprepared for the whole trekking experience, so the fact that they could lend us things was great and also saved us money.
And our next model next is Sasha, sporting a fetching rucksack borrowed from Into the Wild…
Thirdly, when we arrived at the office for our trek, the owner told us that the other two people who were supposed to be joining us had now opted to do a city tour on that day.
However, we didn’t have to pay any more for what had essentially become a private tour.
I understand having read some TripAdvisor reviews that this happens quite regularly with this agency and for some people who want to trek with a group, this can be very off-putting.
I don’t know if this is some kind of scam - as I said we didn’t need to pay any more so we were fine with it.
Having lunch on our tour with Into the Wild.
So what would we recommend?
Whilst we wouldn’t say that a guide can make or break a trek, having a good guide does enhance the experience.
So our recommendation would be to ask for Bounmi if you book a trek with Into the Wild as he was great! He has also received rave reviews from other people who trekked with him.
Big thumbs up from us!
A note about TripAdvisor
When we were doing our research, some of the negative reviews that we read about the different agencies weren’t about the treks or adventure experiences at all: they were to do with booking bus tickets! Definitely keep that in mind when you are looking at the rankings of the different companies.
It is also worthwhile remembering that different guides will run treks in different ways, even though they work for the same tour agency.
Basically, just because you read an amazing review about a guide who goes the extra mile to make the trek incredible, remember: the person you get might not necessarily do that, even if you book with the same company that you read about!
If you really like the sound of a guide, our advice would be to make sure you ask for them by name when you make your booking.
What to expect on a trek
Vincent getting comfy in our accommodation for the night.
Facilities on a trek are basic: the village we visited only had solar-powered electricity and the hut we stayed in didn’t have any.
There was a toilet, but it was a basic squat and the only shower available was a public one in the middle of the village. If you need the toilet during the trek, you have to find somewhere private behind a bush (not hard in a jungle), do your business and go.
If reading this makes you break out into hives, then perhaps a jungle trekking experience isn’t for you.
This was basic but after 6 hours walking, we didn’t care.
The village that we stayed in - the very public shower with a water pump is on the left where a lady is doing her dishes.
It’s a jungle, so be prepared to make friends with bugs, leeches, spiders, and the odd snake. There are also plenty of mosquitoes and some really bloody annoying flies that seem to spend all day trying to land in your eyes.
Trekking in this region is physically challenging - on a two-day trek you walk for around 6 hours each day.
Our trek was described as ‘moderately’ challenging, but there were some sections that were very steep and even our guide seemed tired!
If you are trekking in the rainy season, it will be even more difficult - you will slip and fall over and you will definitely get very muddy.
Hiking in Laos can be hard work.
Apparently there was a path here.
The guide on your trek prepares all your food. If you have specific dietary requirements let the tour agency know and they should be able to cater for you.
We told Into the Wild that we were vegetarians and they had no problem accommodating us. The food they gave us was delicious!
I can’t even begin to explain how bloody good this was.
The tour agency will also provide all of your water - they gave us two 1.5 litre bottles of water each to carry on the first day and our guide carried additional bottles as well.
The village that we stayed in had a shop where we could get more water for the second day if we needed to.
What to pack
Small backpack with a rain cover (we actually bought our rain covers in Luang Prabang for £5 each and they were well worth the investment!)
If, like us, you travel light, you can ask the tour agency if they can provide backpacks as well, though be prepared that they won’t be of the best quality. The backpack I got from Into the Wild had certainly seen better days but did the job.
A decent trekking daypack is also a good investment - read our guide to the best daypacks for women here.
Dry change of clothes to wear at night
Quick-dry clothing for the trek - gym gear works well.
Shoes with a decent grip. Hiking boots are probably the best thing to wear, but we wore trainers and they seemed to work okay
Sarong for women if you are going to have a shower
Small towel
Suncream.
Mosquito repellent
Dry bag for your valuable items
Swimwear (some treks take you to waterfalls and rivers where you can have a swim)
Lightweight poncho or raincoat
Other things to do in Luang Namtha
After our two-day trek with Into the Wild, we hired bicycles from Zuela and explored the area around Luang Namtha by ourselves.
Zuela gave us a map of the area that had two bicycle/scooter routes shown on it (most other guesthouses and bicycle hire places will do the same) and we followed this to visit Hmong, Khmu and Lanten villages by ourselves.
We met this lovely Hmong lady on a visit to a village - she invited us into her house to hang out!
This is something we would definitely recommend if you are on a tight budget or you don’t want to visit villages and ethnic tribes as part of a formal tour. There are signs on the roads giving fairly clear directions to different villages so just hop on your bike and give it a go!
There are also a number of waterfalls in the area - we visited one near a sort-of museum depicting Lanten weaving culture, but unfortunately, it wasn’t that impressive. We were probably just unlucky!
Scenes of traditional village life are just a cycle away from the centre of Luang Namtha.
If you hire a motorbike, we’d recommend the 58km trip to Muang Sing. The scenery from Luang Namtha to Muang Sing is incredibly beautiful. Whilst the trip takes around two hours, some sections of the road are in quite bad condition, so a trip with an overnight stay is best.
Nine ethnic groups reside in Muang Sing: you can hire a guide to show you around or even have a homestay experience in one of the villages.
If you prefer to do a self-guided tour, this blog post outlines how to get around and the different hill tribes you can visit in the area.
A lady from the Lanten ethnic group.
Luang Namtha market is also worth spending a couple of hours in as there are lots of interesting food stuffs on display.
And if you need to get a haircut (which Vincent was desperate to do) there are a couple of barbershops and hairdressers too.
Finally, we found this Wikivoyage page really useful in helping us to plan our hill-tribe trekking adventure in Luang Namtha and it also gave us ideas on where we could go afterwards. Definitely worth checking it out!
And that’s it! Happy trekking!
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Did you find this useful? Have you trekked in Luang Namtha or anywhere else in Laos? We’d love to hear from you, so drop us a line in the comments below!
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