The Mekong works hard. Across 4,900 kilometres from Tibet to Vietnam, this river feeds, waters, transports and employs tens of millions. It has many strands, each throbbing with activity and colour, chock-full of vessels from huge barges to narrow sampans. And us, a baker’s dozen of wide-eyed travellers on the boutique Toum Tiou II.
Then the light fades and we have the Mekong seemingly to ourselves, toasting fiery sunsets from ’s top deck. It’s the relaxing time, because in daylight hours we, too, are working hard, albeit on-shore, skirting alongside
