Fire Boat Festival

Earlier this month Luang Prabang celebrated Boun Lai Heau Fai (aka The Fire Boat Festival). The weeks before the festival are filled with people creating elaborate boats many of them resembling dragons. The day of they fill the boats with candles, lighting them, and sending them on their way down the Mekong River to burn up.

I can't imagine spending so much time building a boat from scratch only to watch it burn before my eyes. But I admit the sight of the boats sparkling down the river along with the lanterns that fill the sky like stars, and the floating candles twinkling as they too make their way along the river is mesmerizing.

If you want to come visit Laos during the Fire Boat Festival I suggest arriving in early October. Figuring out when the festival took place was almost an impossible task; everyone my friends and I asked told us a different date. All I can tell you for sure is that it takes place sometime around the second week of the month and when the moon is full.