Things to Do in Nong Khai in May

Sala Kaew Ku is strange, enormous, and best experienced before the heat sets in. The park's towering concrete figures, some reaching 25 m (82 ft) tall, were built by the mystic Luang Pu Bunleua Sulilat over decades. They depict a hallucinatory mix of Buddhist and Hindu mythology that feels unlike anything else in Thailand. In May, arrive by 7 AM. The light is soft then. The air still carries a trace of coolness from the overnight low of 76°F (24°C). You will have the place almost entirely to yourself. The damp grass smells of rain from the night before. Birds nest in the hollow limbs of the larger statues. The quiet breaks only when a monk sweeps the paths. By 10 AM the concrete radiates stored heat. The experience becomes an endurance test. Treat this as a sunrise activity.

The paved promenade that runs along the Mekong in central Nong Khai stretches roughly 3 km (1.9 miles). It is flat. It is shaded in patches by tamarind trees. It is almost deserted before 7 AM. May mornings along the river carry the mineral smell of rising water mixed with charcoal smoke from the noodle vendors setting up their carts. The air temperature at 6 AM sits close to the 76°F (24°C) overnight low. This is your only comfortable cycling window. Extend the ride east toward the outskirts and you pass through rice paddies that have just been flooded for planting. The still water reflects the grey-pink sky. Bicycle rental is cheap and easy to arrange through guesthouses along the riverfront. This is a slow ride. It is not an athletic one. The point is the river itself: wide, fast, red-brown with sediment, with the low green hills of Laos directly across.

Nong Khai sits directly opposite the Lao capital, Vientiane. The First Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge connects them across 1.2 km (0.7 miles) of the Mekong. The crossing is straightforward. The whole trip, border formalities included, tends to take under an hour in low season. Vientiane in May shares Nong Khai's heat but has a different pace altogether: the crumbling French colonial shophouses along Rue Setthathirath, the gold-spired Pha That Luang stupa catching the morning light, the smell of freshly baked baguettes from Vietnamese-Lao bakeries that is unlike anything on the Thai side. May is low season for Laos too. This means shorter queues at immigration. It means a city that feels lived in rather than performed for tourists. Start early. Return by late afternoon before the evening storm rolls in from the west.

The night market that sets up along Rim Khong Road in the evenings is where Nong Khai eats, and in May the tables and plastic stools spill further onto the pavement because the evening air, while still warm, has lost the worst of the daytime fury. This is Isan cooking at its most uncompromising: som tam pla ra with its fermented-fish funk that hits your nose before you see the mortar, larb moo with toasted rice powder that crackles between your teeth, whole Mekong river fish grilled over charcoal until the skin blisters and chars. The sticky rice arrives in woven bamboo baskets, and you pull off clumps with your fingers and use them to pick up the larb. Vietnamese spring rolls, a legacy of the Vietnamese community that has lived in Nong Khai for generations, are rolled fresh at several stalls and filled with herbs that smell sharp and green. The market is best from about 5:30 PM onward, when the worst heat has broken and the river breeze, such as it is, starts to move.

Wat Pho Chai houses the Luang Pho Phra Sai, a gold-covered Buddha image that is Nong Khai's most revered object and, according to local tradition, was recovered from the Mekong after a boat capsized bringing it from Vientiane centuries ago. The temple interior is cool and dim, the air thick with sandalwood incense, and even in May it offers genuine respite from the heat outside. If your visit coincides with Visakha Bucha, the evening candlelit processions here are solemn and worth arranging your schedule around. Beyond Wat Pho Chai, several smaller neighborhood wats along the river are worth a slow morning visit: they are working temples, not tourist sites, and in May you are likely the only foreigner present. Dress conservatively, covering shoulders and knees, and leave your shoes at the entrance. The tile floors inside are cool underfoot and the silence after the street noise outside is startling.

When May's afternoon storms hit and the sky turns the colour of wet concrete, the Nong Khai Aquarium along the Mekong makes for an interesting few hours rather than a fallback plan. It focuses on freshwater species from the Mekong basin, including the giant Mekong catfish, a critically endangered fish that can grow to 3 m (9.8 ft) and weigh as much as a large adult. The tanks are dim and cool, the air-conditioning is aggressive after the humidity outside, and the displays on Mekong ecology give you context for the river you have been staring at from the promenade. It is not an excellent aquarium. But it is specific to this place in a way that most aquariums are not, and the focus on river ecology rather than tropical reef species makes it unusual. Allow about ninety minutes.