Wow, once again I've neglected my poor old blog (still have to break in to it from Vietnam), and now I'm miles behind! Add to that the fact that I've temporarily lost some of my pictures of Vietnam due to my USB stick and memory card getting a virus, this might be a slightly rubbish blog. But I'll try my best!
Getting into Vietnam was a bit of a nightmare. I took a sleeper bus from Kunming to Hekou, which is the border crossing on the Chinese side. All I had to do was walk across the border to Lao Cai, then take a minibus to Sapa. Sounds easy, right? Nope. The bus dropped us in Hekou at 5am, and the border crossing didn't open for 3 hours. The town was literally dead - no people, no lights, nowhere to go. Luckily there was an English speaking Vietnamese guy with his family who also got off the bus, so we sat together in the street, surrounded by cockroaches and mozzies, until the sun came up and the border finally opened. Once on the other side, I got a nice taste of Vietnam to come - everyone was trying to rip me off, charging me triple to get the bus to Sapa. I had to fight my way from the crossing to the bus station, where I finally managed to pay the right price after some negotiations. Welcome to Vietnam!
Sapa was really breathtakingly beautiful, set high in the mountains and overlooking hundreds of rice terraces. I can't get enough of rice terraces, I love them! Especially seeing the workers with their conical hats painstakingly looking after their field. There wasn't much to do in Sapa apart from walking around the terraces and drinking bia hoi (the world's cheapest beer I think... 60p for a big jugful works for me!), so we decided to combine the two and go on a drunken wander to Cat Cat village with three British guys we'd met at the hostel. Well, lets just say it ended up with me having my second rice-terrace related accident. Yes, I fell over AGAIN and still have many bruises to show for it. I wonder if my shins will ever again not be covered in greeny purple splotches!
After Sapa, we made our way to Hanoi, which gave us our first experience of Vietnamese sleeper buses. And I thought the Chinese ones were uncomfortable! I think these buses are built specifically for 5 foot tall Asians, definitely not for me. The positions I've had to contort my body into recently have not been pleasant. This bus was particularly bad as the air con on the bottom bunks wasn't working. I haven't moaned about the heat yet in this blog so here goes...... it's sooooooooooooooo hot!!! Every day, it's mid thirties and with about 75% humidity, it's hard work just existing sometimes. But nonetheless, it's worth it to be here. Hanoi was lovely - bikes everywhere that you have to learn how to avoid (crossing the road is like an art form in Hanoi sometimes!), and lots of good food, interesting sights and fun times to be had in the hostels. Nikki and I went to see a traditional water puppet show one evening, so hilariously bad but great!
After a couple of days in Hanoi, we decided to escape the city and head to Halong bay for 3 days. It was AMAZING. Fantastic scenery of the karst peaks (like Yangshuo on water), which we got to kayak around on our first day. Our junk boat that we stayed on was great, and we were very lucky with the people we had on our boat. We got on particularly well with some lovely English boys, Seb, Leo and Josh, and an Irish girl called Ciara. The evening on the boat decended into carnage, with a game of ring of fire plus some moonshine that we'd bought from an old tribal lady near Sapa causing lots of cross dressing, naking jumping into the water (on the boys part!), and us boarding a nearby French boat to rock up and sing karaoke to them. It was one of the funniest nights on these travels so far, absolutely brilliant.
The next day was more civilised, with a bike ride around Cat Ba Island, then taking a boat to Monkey Island, where we stayed for the night. We had a private beach to ourselves, with cute little bungalows right by the beach. I could've happily stayed there a week, but unfortunately had to return to Hanoi the next day, from where we jumped onto another horrendous sleeper bus to Hue.
We only had 24 hours in Hue, but I loved it there. Nikki and I took a motorbike tour for half a day, which took us into the countryside, as well as to see various tombs and old bridges. So much fun. I would never have dreamt that I would enjoy being on the back of a bike so much!
I'm now in Hoi An, which is where you can get lots of tailoring done. I think I might have to get some shoes made to order, could be expensive but hopefully worth it! I'm off to the beach now, which is a short bicycle ride away. Oh it's a hard life for me!!
Getting into Vietnam was a bit of a nightmare. I took a sleeper bus from Kunming to Hekou, which is the border crossing on the Chinese side. All I had to do was walk across the border to Lao Cai, then take a minibus to Sapa. Sounds easy, right? Nope. The bus dropped us in Hekou at 5am, and the border crossing didn't open for 3 hours. The town was literally dead - no people, no lights, nowhere to go. Luckily there was an English speaking Vietnamese guy with his family who also got off the bus, so we sat together in the street, surrounded by cockroaches and mozzies, until the sun came up and the border finally opened. Once on the other side, I got a nice taste of Vietnam to come - everyone was trying to rip me off, charging me triple to get the bus to Sapa. I had to fight my way from the crossing to the bus station, where I finally managed to pay the right price after some negotiations. Welcome to Vietnam!
Sapa was really breathtakingly beautiful, set high in the mountains and overlooking hundreds of rice terraces. I can't get enough of rice terraces, I love them! Especially seeing the workers with their conical hats painstakingly looking after their field. There wasn't much to do in Sapa apart from walking around the terraces and drinking bia hoi (the world's cheapest beer I think... 60p for a big jugful works for me!), so we decided to combine the two and go on a drunken wander to Cat Cat village with three British guys we'd met at the hostel. Well, lets just say it ended up with me having my second rice-terrace related accident. Yes, I fell over AGAIN and still have many bruises to show for it. I wonder if my shins will ever again not be covered in greeny purple splotches!
After Sapa, we made our way to Hanoi, which gave us our first experience of Vietnamese sleeper buses. And I thought the Chinese ones were uncomfortable! I think these buses are built specifically for 5 foot tall Asians, definitely not for me. The positions I've had to contort my body into recently have not been pleasant. This bus was particularly bad as the air con on the bottom bunks wasn't working. I haven't moaned about the heat yet in this blog so here goes...... it's sooooooooooooooo hot!!! Every day, it's mid thirties and with about 75% humidity, it's hard work just existing sometimes. But nonetheless, it's worth it to be here. Hanoi was lovely - bikes everywhere that you have to learn how to avoid (crossing the road is like an art form in Hanoi sometimes!), and lots of good food, interesting sights and fun times to be had in the hostels. Nikki and I went to see a traditional water puppet show one evening, so hilariously bad but great!
After a couple of days in Hanoi, we decided to escape the city and head to Halong bay for 3 days. It was AMAZING. Fantastic scenery of the karst peaks (like Yangshuo on water), which we got to kayak around on our first day. Our junk boat that we stayed on was great, and we were very lucky with the people we had on our boat. We got on particularly well with some lovely English boys, Seb, Leo and Josh, and an Irish girl called Ciara. The evening on the boat decended into carnage, with a game of ring of fire plus some moonshine that we'd bought from an old tribal lady near Sapa causing lots of cross dressing, naking jumping into the water (on the boys part!), and us boarding a nearby French boat to rock up and sing karaoke to them. It was one of the funniest nights on these travels so far, absolutely brilliant.
The next day was more civilised, with a bike ride around Cat Ba Island, then taking a boat to Monkey Island, where we stayed for the night. We had a private beach to ourselves, with cute little bungalows right by the beach. I could've happily stayed there a week, but unfortunately had to return to Hanoi the next day, from where we jumped onto another horrendous sleeper bus to Hue.
We only had 24 hours in Hue, but I loved it there. Nikki and I took a motorbike tour for half a day, which took us into the countryside, as well as to see various tombs and old bridges. So much fun. I would never have dreamt that I would enjoy being on the back of a bike so much!
I'm now in Hoi An, which is where you can get lots of tailoring done. I think I might have to get some shoes made to order, could be expensive but hopefully worth it! I'm off to the beach now, which is a short bicycle ride away. Oh it's a hard life for me!!
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