Maybe it has gotten better in the last 10 years.

When I did it, I was bored to death, my butt hurt from the small wooden benches, there was no place to use the toilet and I couldn't read with out feeling sick.

Eventually our big, slow boat flipped over in the night losing many people's belongings and we had to be resued by a boat passing by. When we got to Luang Prabang we found that our experience was fairly common. I would never take that trip again if there were any other way to do it.

it's definitely improved in that case UG. the small wooden benches are still present but you can buy cushions to put on them before boarding the boat. also with it not being peak season the boat is not full of passengers so you can shift the seats around and make yourself a bit of a more comfortable area. the boats have a western toilet on board and also a little bar / shop type affair selling beer, soft drinks and snacks. i travelled on it in may and we never got above 30km/h or so, so sickness wasn't a question. was just a lovely, lazy way to get down to luang prabang via some amazing landscape.

Sounds MUCH better.

Especially the bar and cushions bit.

Especially the bar and cushions bit.

Ah, the romance of river travel ...

Here's a few snaps of the scenery on the Mekong from when I did the trip 18 months ago ......