The camp sits at the point where three countries meet – Laos across the river, Myanmar over the road, and the Mekong drawing the border between them.
Mornings were nine degrees and full fog, with elephants already at breakfast. The days were built around them: how the mahouts train and communicate with them, walking beside them down to the river, then standing back while they swam.
In between, a pad thai class – vegetarian, and mostly rice noodle, tofu, red onion, garlic, peanuts, pickles and chives – a long-tail boat out to the tripoint itself, and a market that reminded me of Granville Island, if Granville Island sold passion fruit off the floor.
The temple's pagoda is seven hundred and twenty-seven years old.
The nights were the part I did not expect. Pitch black, and the stars made the camera work a great deal harder than the elephants did.