We started out the morning with the slightly wearying knowledge that our group of 10 would have to walk about 7 hours to get to the site because the rain had made the road impassable by truck. We were driven to a village a couple of hours from Houayxai and then walked from there. The first four or five hours of the walk were up and down steep gravelly roads which just about killed our knees and ankles. We also took a "shortcut" through the forest, which took us up and down slippery muddy hills. (But no leeches, yay!) This is a pic of a very mellow hill. I wasn't about to stop on one of the kneebreakers to take a photo!!:)
We trudged the final hour up a muddy trail to the camp kitchen, where we learned about the harnesses and ziplines before being escorted to Treehouse #1, named Mak Hai ( I think). The first zip was intimidating because I'd forgotten all about my mild fear of heights!! Whoops! But I triple checked my harness every time and was eventually able to enjoy the rush.Treehouse 1 was set at the top of a great valley in the upper branches of a huge fig tree, maybe 1oo feet off the ground, maybe more.
There was small kitchen/living area, 
two "rooms" with 3-person beds,
and the best shower in the world. The shower itself was nothing special, but the view of the forest was awe-inspiring. 
We all got a kick out of listening to and watching our pee fall 100 feet to the forest floor through the hole in the toilet!!
There was a sign to remind us not to throw toilet paper down the hole...
The second day we spent hiking and zipping around from treehouse to treehouse on the 11 lines inbetween. I'm very happy to report that I only had a total of 3 leeches all day. You hop on a zipline, secure yourself with the harness, and off you go racing across the treetops, through the canopy, high in the air. I can't do it justice really. You grab hold of your carabiner (the buckle that helps to keep you on the zipline and off the forest floor) and step off and let go. There's a very tangible point where you give up all control and .... just zip. They call it zipping for a reason... it sounds like a really loud zipper as you fly down the cable to your landing platform. You're flying 300 feet and more over the forest floor, among the upper branches looking down at the bamboo and out over this incredible hill-and-valley landscape.
My favorite zip...
Here I go!
Zipping into Treehouse3...
Looking up at treehouse 2...
Eight of us had stayed in treehouse 1 and two people had slept in treehouse2. Two of us decided to stay in treehouse 3 on the second night, farthest away from the main camp, and the rest stayed in treehouse1 again. Treehouse 3 was completely in its own league. It was an hour of walking and ziplining from treehouse1, so it felt very remote. The views were astounding; we could see for probably twenty miles across the hills and valleys of forest.
I stayed there with a South African fellow by the name of Aubrey. Aubrey was older than the rest of us by twenty years or so but he was more fit and capable than all of us put together. He was quite an outdoorsman, and I very much appreciated that he wanted to see wildlife as much as I did. We spent some time birdwatching before sunset
and then hit the hay. Aubrey had seen and heard gibbons that morning, and I was determined to at least hear them the next morning, so I was off to bed early that I might wake early.As I laid in my stifling mosquito net and tried to sleep, I heard the treehouse begin to be taken over by creatures of the night. There were not only rats but large tree squirrels visiting us that night. The squirrels are as big as large cats, with black backs and yellow bellies. They're quite lovely, but I didn't especially fancy them running around the treehouse at night, with only my canvas mosquito net between me and them. Well, luckily, I was with Aubrey, jungle guy extraordinaire. He chose not to sleep under the mosquito net for comfort's sake, and so stood a greater risk of being chewed on in the night. At one point I heard the thump thump thump of mid-sized mammal feet on the plank floors, and then I heard an authoritative HISSSSSSSS from Aubrey's direction, and the thump thump thump went off in the other direction!! So no worries there, the wildlife wasn't about to mess with Aubrey!
The early morning mist was heavy- we couldn't see more than 30 feet out of our treehouse. We sat on a bench looking out at the vaporous scene, talking softly, making little movement, when out of the mist rose an otherworldly ululation. The gibbons had begun to serenade us loudly from about 100 feet away. A low-pitched whooping was met by a higher pitched whooping, and the gibbons' individual songs weaved in and out of each other to create the most eerie operatic duet. It sounded like nothing so much as whale song. Whale song in the jungle, high in the tree canopy, surrounded by cloud. The duet rose in pitch, volume, and speed, reaching a crescendo where all the gibbons whooped at the same time in an insane melodious cacophony that was not of this earth. A moment of silence....and it began all over again...
Turn the volume up for this video to get the full effect!
We were treated to about ten minutes of this singing, and then Aubrey and I racked up and made our way back to Treehouse 1. During breakfast, we heard some gibbons singing again, but this time far down the valley. We were unable to see them, but we were treated to about 30 minutes of song. It was just as amazing, but didn't have near the atmosphere of the first singing. I was quite satisfied with the trip. All I had hoped for was to hear the gibbons sing, and that's just what I got.
Aubrey and I walked out of the forest. For me it was a horrible grilling walk. The cleat-like shoes I'd been wearing the whole time had zero arch support and my feet had begun to swell and give me a great deal of pain. I'd also reinjured the blisters I got on the way up but was too exhausted to bandage them. Two weeks later they're still healing!! The sun had come up and it was HOT, so I was moving like a snail. After about an hour of walking down a muddy forest path and straight up a gravelled hill, just when I was sure I'd never make it all the way back to the village- the truck came round the bend!!! As Aubrey said- my prayers had been answered. Mine, not his. Aubrey of course preferred to walk a little longer until the truck could drop off the newcomers and come back for us. Aubrey's hard core like that. So we made it back to the village and I got on the bus for Luang Namtha. The Gibbon Experience was absolutely amazing and I'll never forget it!
ABOUT THE GIBBON EXPERIENCE
Now, I have to give a little detail about why I think the Gibbon Experience is such a disappointment as a community conservation/ environmental ed program. This is really intended to reach travelers who are considering doing the Gibbon Experience, so friends and family can feel free to skip it. It's really not meant to be a bitch session but rather a constructive look at what GE promised vs what they delivered.
First and foremost, our guides weren't even around for most of our stay, and when they wrew, they were ineffectual at best. They came and dropped off food three times a day, showed us paths to take on the second day, and that was it. They didn't teach us, or me anyway, ANYTHING about the forest. Well, okay I got one of them to imitate a gibbon so we'd know the sound but that was it, and that was only with prompting. I asked some of my fellow Gibboners three questions afterwards-- "Do you know more about what the Gibbon Experience does for/with the community than you did when we started?" "Do you know more about the forest than when we started?"and "Why do gibbons sing?" The answers? NO, NO, and I DON'T KNOW. That's really really bad. I mean, when you're finished with something called "The GIBBON Experience" you should at least be pretty certain why the gibbons are singing. The negative answers to these questions really disturbed me. That screams failure for a company that purports to educate visitors.
The morning that Aubrey and heard the gibbons, our "guide" was there. After the gibbons stopped singing, the guide walked us down into the forest, eventually leading us to a place with a very open canopy and where the predominant vegetation was bamboo. Now, I don't know that much about gibbons but I was pretty certain that they were NOT going to be hanging out at that spot. After about 30 minutes of walking and not seeing the gibbons, the guide turned and shrugged and led us back. When we were back at treehouse 1 and heard the longer singing, Aubrey and I were listening intently when the guide (who was laying around and requisitioning the partcipants' left behind tobacco) took it upon himself to start belting out a Laos ballad. I couldn't believe it, and had to ask him to shush because we were listening to the gibbons. They didn't seem at all invested in the project or really trained very well.
The food was not great. I wouldn't believe it if you told me it was traditional Laos food. If not for the MSG it would have been nearly tasteless. I think it was what they thought Westerners would like. It was edible because we were hungry from the exertion but every meal was the same as the day before, and there was just enough food for all of us. The dishes were greasy and while there was soap, there was never a sponge to be seen. We also didn't have enough silverware for everyone so we had to share forks. I know that's a small thing but when you're sitting around with $2000 worth of participants, you start to think that maybe they can afford an extra fork.
My bedding was moldy and gross and I had to sleep on my sarong. My bedmate woke up with nasty bedbug bites all over her legs. In treehouse 3 my bedding had rat shit all over it, and had obviously not been cleaned recently. A rat had burrowed into the bedding and I felt the need to feel around to make sure that there wasn't a nest in there. Stuffing was everywhere. The floor hadn't been swept in who knows how long. There was no gas for the stove, which was just as well because there was no lighter to light it. When I mentioned this to the guide the next morning I was told that, well, we were only two people after all.
NOW...I now that sounds whingey, but anybody who knows me knows that I am an experienced and low-maintenance outdoorsy woman and that I can put up with a lot of discomfort. I knew very well it was not going to be a posh experience, and certainly didn't expect pressed linens or anything. But there are minimum standards after all, and other companies are managing it. The stories I heard from fellow participants about the guides' opium use made me wonder if the staff was really performing as they should or just sitting on their arses and collecting quite a plump paycheck (we were told about $3 a day, quite good in these parts). And really, for effectively $100 a night, there should at least be some minimum standards in place.
This story I heard third-hand: Two of the gibboners went down to get a new carabiner at the staff house and were made to wait around while the guides did something in the house. When they went in, there were opium pipes in plain view. I was also told third-hand that one of the participants in the group before us had gone down to the staff cabin and smoked opium with the guides every night. This is extremely disturbing since the Gibbon Experience says it is against this very kind of behavior that's supposedly so deleterious to Laos society. Maybe these stories are completely untrue.
Other organizations are somehwat transparent about their business practices and I would suggest to GE that they follow suit. I have no idea where my money went. On a trip taken a week later with another company, I noted that 5% of my fee went to the village chief, 20% to admin costs, so much went to this and that, etc. The only thing I gathered that GE spent its money on was to buy some tractors for the village. And , for all their insistence that the lower hills are not being deforested, there sure was some chainsaw operation going on as we came down off the hill. In all fairness, I've yet to email the French director to ask some pointed questions about where exactly the money goes and what kind of accountability there is for his staff. Perhaps he can shed some light. Until, I'd seriously suggest that anyone interested in GE ask them some real questions when you email for information. Then seriously consider whether you want to invest money in this NGO.
What the Gibbon Experience has got going for it is the "adventure travel" experience of living in the treetops and ziplining from hut to hut. Maybe they should drop the whole "we want to educate you about the forest and benefit the local community" song and stick with promoting themselves as an adventure tourism company.
Make sure you also see the below post for more comment on GE:
http://www.travelfish.org/board/post/laos/1871_Luang-Prabang-to-Gibbon-Experience/0
An eloquent and true-as-true-can-be-quote from above post:
The biggest disappointment for us was not the unqualified guides but rather the unprofessional management and poor business practices of Mr. Jeff the French-born, tree-climbing proprietor who turns out to be even more elusive than the gibbons. If Mr. Jeff is to continue on his mission to preserve the Bokeo forest he will need the ever-increasing support of eco-tourists such as those in our group. However if he continues to operate his enterprise in such a capricious fashion he will not only lose the support of tourists but also the people of Bokeo Provence and ultimately, the Lao government.
Okay, that's my piece. Big Cox is over and out...
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