Cambodia

We`ll we arrived safe and sound in Cambodia yesterday.  The boat ride here was not as nice comfortwise as I thought it might be but it did the trick.  So far Phnom Penh has been very nice.  At night it is lit up like a Christmas tree and the streets are full of people, this is probably do to Independence day and the Water Festival.  The Water Festival was technically cancelled so while the boat races aren`t happening there are still some concerts going on and I guess there are less people here than there would have been.  What is interesting is how different the Cambodians look from the Vietnamese.  The Cambodians have much rounder eyes and look more India where as the Vietnamese have more slanted eye and look more Chinese.  It`s amazing how much people can change over a few hundred kilometers.

Nov 9 – The Mekong to Cambodia

We were up early again this morning, we breakfasted and met up with a new group of people who were taking the slow boat to Cambodia. After talking to a few people it seemed that one of the fast boats had been cancelled but some people hadn't been informed they were now taking the slow boat. I felt bad for these people because they had paid extra but hadn't even been told what was happening. We walked down to the river and prepared to board the boat. We had to wait around for a bit while the guide collected our passports, counted them, fretted that it wasn't the right number, than gave them back. We finally got on the boats, which were fairly small although reasonably comfortable. We went to a fish farm, which was essentially an enclosure below a floating house that raised fish to sell to the fisheries. Next we went to a Cham Minority house. The walk way from the boat was very sketchy, just pieces of wood nailed together, supported by some bamboo now and then. Our guide informed us that we should spread ourselves out over the walkway but not until one girl (smaller than me) had broken through the walk way and fell into the water. The two girls after her got very wet as well. This information would have been much more useful before we got off the boat. The home we went to was really just a scarf shop and had a loom to “show” us how scarfs are made. It was a little lame. We got back on the boat and continued on for awhile. While on the boat our guide had us fill out our visa information cards and collected our passports, pictures and fees to get Cambodian visas. It was $20 for the visa, $2 for paper work and $0.50 for the guide to take care of it all. We gave everything to the guide and he disappeared off the boat to take care of things while we continued along. We reached the Vietnamese boarder where we stopped for a bit to have lunch and wait for our guide to complete the visa process. Lunch was very over priced so Beau and I stuck to noodles and vegetables. After lunch and waiting around we got on a different boat to take us into Cambodia. This new boat sucked. We had wooden benches to sit on, barely enough room for everyone and the motor made the whole boat vibrate something fierce. Also it sat very low in the water. We stopped shortly after to go through the Cambodian boarder check point, while there Beau picked up a beer for the boat ride and I got some Winter Melon pop, it was weird, not bad but not necessarily good. We spent about an hour total on this boat but it seemed an eternity. My teeth were rattling around it vibrated so badly. We pulled up on the ground and there were mini buses waiting for us. We didn't understand how we would all fit in these buses but there were some seats in the back that folded down. The “trunk” space was used for seating not storage. All the bags were some how crammed into a space between the driver and the first set of seats which were rear facing. There were 13 of us crammed in the back of the bus. We had to keep an eye on the bags to make sure they didn't come crashing down on us! We had to stop shortly after we had gotten underway and get off the bus to walk a little ways. A large section of the road had been completely washed out and the driving area was quite muddy so the driver didn't want us to get stuck. Fortunately the Mekong has receded and there were no other section like this, the road was surprisingly good. We arrived at a bus station in the south of Phnom Penh and our next step was to get a tuk tuk, a motorcycle pulling a 4 seat carriage. We shared a tuk tuk with a dutch couple and the driver said he knew a cheap hotel so he took us there and the hotel seemed reasonable so we stayed. Our tuk tuk driver wanted our business for our stay in the city so he gave us a free ride to a no fee ATM. Right next to where this ATM was was a night market so we found some cheap noodle bowls for dinner with the Dutch couple, Bob and Rianna. While eating we heard some loud noises which we attributed to fireworks. It is Cambodian Independence day and the Water Festival. We headed back towards our hotel, there was a park near by that was done up for the Independence Day and had a live concert going on. We turned in after a little while for an early bed time, we were pretty wiped after our travel day.

Floating Shanty House

Me on the sketchy walk way

Our crammed vibrating boat

The washed our road

Nov 10 – Phom Penh

Thankfully we were able to sleep in this morning...sort of. I woke up at 6:20 but went back to sleep for about an hour. By that time we were both awake. This was perfect timing to skype Mom and Dad though! We had a nice chat for about an hour and then Beau and I got on with our day. We had it in our head to check out the Royal Palace and the Central Market. We were informed though that the Palace would be closing for lunch at 11-2:30pm, so we headed to the market first. We had a nice walk along the river which is lined with all the world flags or at least most of them. From there we headed to the Central Market. This market is huge! It in a big building with stalls surrounding it outside. Beau and I both picked up some new clothes. I bought a turquoise quick dry t-shirt for $4 and a pair of comfy jersey cotton capris for $3 and Beau got another quick dry t-shirt for $4. It's tempting to restock our whole wardrobe but not necessary. We had lunch here which consisted of fresh shrimp spring rolls (would have been better if the shrimp had been shelled) and some shrimp, pork filled crepe which was yummy. We headed back to the hotel so I could put on pants to go to the Royal Palace. By the time we were going to head out again it was 3:15 and our receptionist informed us that you really needed 3hrs to explore it properly, it closed at 5, and it cost $6 for entry. We decided against the palace after that and head to find some cheap beers. We found a place that had draft beer for $0.50 so we had a couple and then headed to the market from last night to have some cheap food. We finished dinner right as the fireworks started so we hurried back to the water front to watch them. Afterwards we grabbed another beer then headed back to the hotel. While in the restaurant we were approached by some guys looking for donations to help a primary school. We didn't want to just give them money in case it was a scam but we got the guys info and will pick up some school supplies and donate them instead. On the way back Beau tried one of the dumpling type things, we think it was filled with bean sprouts, and I bought some popcorn which is more like Kettle corn so it was sweet but good. We are going to the killing fields tomorrow but hopefully we'll get to sleep in a little before we head out.

A pretty traffic circle in Phnom Penh

A temple

Fireworks over the river

Mui Ne

We've spent some time relaxing and checking out some of the scenery around Mui Ne.  We tried sledding on the sand dunes and it made me actually want winter and snow to go real sledding.  That's how pathetic it was, it was more funny than fun.  We had a lovely day today at the beach, it wasn't too windy so we weren't sitting in a whirlwind of sand.  The kitesurfers were probably sad though, we didn't see any kite out today.  Mui Ne has been really nice minus the rain tonight and our ant issues yesterday. We head to Ho Chi Minh City tomorrow morning.  My only complaint is that my feet and ankles are riddled with bug bites :( I'm learning a lot of self control by not scratching :S

Nov 3 – Sand Dunes

We woke up this morning to an unpleasant surprise. Ants. They had found our stash off candied ginger and were all over the inside of the bad... booo! We found them else where in the room so we decided to change hotels. After breakfast we moved to the hotel across the street, it's on the beach side but doesn't actually have beach access, which is fine since there is access just down the street. We rented a motorcycle so we could check out the sand dunes. Our first stop were the red sand dunes. We were flagged aside and told we could park for free if we bought a drink after. Beers were a little overpriced but not too bad. We haggled for our plastic slides, they wanted 50,000d/slide we got 2 for 50,000d. A kid led us and our slides on to the sand dune to go sledding. We walked along the dunes and stopped at a specific spot which was apparently the sled run. Beau kept asking if we could try in other areas but the kid said no. He took our sleds and threw sand down the hill and then put a bunch on top of the sled. Beau sat on his sled and got pulled down the hill. It was no where near as thrilling as sledding on snow. I did a little better, able to get more speed, probably because I'm lighter. We tried a few runs and gave up. It was very underwhelming. As we walked back the kid kept asking for a tip, we gave him 6,000d but then while we were drinking our beers he and his friend kept asking to buy him a Coke. At 20,000d it was not going to happen so we just ignored him. We were very hot, sweaty and sandy; the beers went down nicely. Beau asked if there was a place to swim and we were told there was a waterfall 5min down the road. We were headed that way anyways so we set off skeptical about finding a waterfall. It wasn't the right terrain. We didn't see a waterfall but we found a spot to go swimming in the ocean. It was very nice to cool off. We were in a quiet little cul-de-sac so I got to try the motorcycle. It was fun but scary, I'll leave learning more about motorcycles till I get back to Canada. We continued on to find the white sand dunes. They were a bit harder to find but find them we did. We were offered sled rides again or to rent an ATV (which was extortionate). We just walked over and took some pictures though. We headed back into Mui Ne for a late lunch, we had our hearts set on Mexican but the prices were much too high. We found another place down the road and ordered, I got curry and Beau some shrimp with cashews. The food arrived and what did Beau see in his rice...ants. Today was not our day for ants. There were some in my rice too and also in the other portions Beau was given. Ugghhh! The food that didn't have any ants was very tasty but we weren't satisfied due to the lack of rice. We had it in our minds that we wanted to see a nice sun set, we headed to the east side of the beach to watch the sunset. It was cloudy so there wasn't much to see. We came back for a shower and headed to the night time seafood restaurants. Scores of little places pop up as the sun sets, all selling fresh seafood. We had tiger prawns and scallops. They were delicious. It cost more than a noodle bowl would but was sooo worth it. For about $10 we had 0.5kg tiger prawns, 0.5kg scallops, a plate of noodles with vegetables and a couple of beers. We are doing it again tomorrow night!! After dinner we headed back to Joe's Bar, where the live music was, and enjoyed a couple more beers while listening the keyboardist. He was very good but I think we both prefer the guitarist, he's back tomorrow night so you can guess where we'll be.

The Red Sand Dunes

Beau about to go sledding

Beau getting pulled down the hill

Me motorcycling

The White Sand Dunes

Nov 4 – Relaxing at the Beach

We had a nice leisurely start to our day complete with some mango for breakfast, Yum! We thought to try a different kind of vermicelli bowl for breakfast but instead of crab vermicelli I ended up with crab soup complete with tofu, pork sausage, and beef blood. Not quite what I expected but I guess it was okay. We sat on the beach for most of the rest of the day. Aahhh relaxing. We went swimming and watched some fisher men netting some little fishies. We had lunch on the beach and a little afternoon nap/read out of the sun. We headed back to the seafood restaurants for dinner. Tonight we had steamed and bbq clams, steamed snails, bbq crab, some veges with garlic and of course beer to drink. We had 1.6kg of sea food all for 12 dollars. It was amazing. As we finished our meal it was starting to spit, we stopped off at our room on the way to Joe's to wash the sea food off our hands and the heavens open. It poured so we waited it out inside. When the rain stopped we checked out Joe's to see if the music was happening still. It was but the dry seats were taken and it seemed it might rain again. We came back to our hotel and played some crib in the restaurant with a beer. As we were finishing up our game it started raining again, fortunately it was just a quick dash to our room. We've had a couple of power outages but a generator has kicked in so we have power again. I just hope it does go all night since we are right next to it.

Mountain Climbing and Back to the Beach

We are back at the beach in a town called Mui Ne.  It's a windsurfers/kiteboarders haven! Dad would love it :) Before leaving Da Lat we tackled Lang Bian Mountain, which was an all day hike for us.  The drive between Da Lat and Mui Ne was terrifying and bumpy but we arrived.  I'm looking forward to some beach time if the wind ever dies down.

Nov 1 – Lang Bian Mountain

With the research we had done on Lang Bian Mountain we thought it would take us 3-4 hrs to hike round trip. We set off for the mountain after having “egg bread” for breakfast. We didn't end up picking up more food as since we thought it wouldn't be that long of hike. We arrived at the bottom of the mountain around 11am. You can pay 40,000 dong per person for a jeep to take you up to the radio tower and back down. The guy at the admission counter said it was 6km and 3hrs round trip. We decided to walk. We started walking up the road but figured there had to be a path to walk up so we started walking through the trees. The forest here is similar to home with lots of pine trees. After about 1.5hrs of bushwhacking and “trail” following we came to a labelled fork in the road. The sign pointed to the left saying radio tower 2km and the right saying peak (2190m) 3km. We knew we wanted to get to the peak so we went right. This part of the hike started off nice and flat, a relief after the uphill we had just climbed. It did not stay flat though. We started going up again and the vegetation changed to be more jungley. The up became vertical and we had to climb over roots and fallen trees. Finally we made it to the top. It took about an hour from the fork, I'm pretty sure we hiked more than 3km! The view from the top was awesome. We were in much need of a break and sat down for some snacks. Another couple had braved the hike up but other than that we were the only people on the peak. They had taken the walking path up, we would have if we could have found it. It isn't well signed at the bottom. We took some pictures and after catching our breath we headed back down. Down was just as hard as up because we had to try not to slide all the way to the bottom, it went much quicker though. Once we reached the fork Beau wanted to go over to the radio tower. It was only another 2km. The radio tower is where all the jeeps take people. It was an easy walk over to there and surprisingly the area was almost deserted. There were no tourists at that time. We contemplated eating up there but decided after another rest to head back down. It was around 4pm by this time, we figured we should try to get back before dark. We asked the staff about another walking path down and actually found it. It was just a break in some shrubs. Along the path the way up was marked with spray painted arrows. The way down was pretty steep. By this time my legs were quite sore and tired. We made it back to the bike in about an hour and headed back into town while the sun was going down. We had some dinner back in town, returned the bike and headed back to the hotel. We were both pretty tired. The hike was worth it for the view from the top but they could do with better sign postage for the walking path. I guess they just want everyone to take the jeep up.

The mountain as seen from the fork

Going up up up

The view of Da Lat from the top

At the top

Nov 2 – Mui Ne

We caught a bus to Mui Ne this morning. We were sad to see Da Lat go but we have to keep going since our visas expire on the 10^th! Our bus was actually a minibus with 16 seats and 2 people on stools. We also didn't have A/C this time. I think the roads were the worst we have been on so far. Huge, deep post holes everywhere, parts of the road gave out some time ago and the weeds have grown in, the brush along the side of the road was badly encroaching. We almost hit a motorcycle that was in our lane coming around a corner. That put our hearts in our throats, even the locals seemed disconcerted. We fortunately made it to Mui Ne in one piece. The area we are in is called Mui Ne Beach and is essentially one road that runs along the beach with hotels and restaurants on either side, Mui Ne Village is further along. The bus dropped us off around 11am and it was hot. We checked out a few hotels and found one for cheap. It's not on the beach but we only are spending $9. We put on our beach clothes and set off for some lunch and beach. We ate at a little seafood restaurant on the beach and then walked along it. It's very windy here but it's becoming one of the hottest places in Asia for windsurfing and kiteboarding. We walked towards the kitesurfers and watched them for awhile. We asked at one place how much lessons were but it's way out of our price range. There weren't many places to sit on the beach because of the wind and the highish tide. We decided to see if we could find a cheap place on the beach. We looked at a whole bunch but none seemed to have a nice beach front with reasonable priced. Pfft like we were going to pay $30-50 a night for a beach front resort. We had dinner at a restaurant on the beach, sand included. Pretty sure my feet were eaten by sand flies. After dinner we went to a bar down the street that had live music. The guy was really good, just him and his guitar. We had a very enjoyable night listening to music while drinking beer!

Mui Ne Beach

Kitesurfers Galore

Da Lat, Waterfalls, and Silk

We've had a good couple of days in Da Lat so far. The weather has been gorgeous although it cools off at night, reminds me of mid September in Kelowna. There is some beautiful scenery and many waterfalls. Da Lat has some interesting architecture, it's still French Colonial for the most part but the colours are not what you would expect. Many houses are very brightly coloured, lime green, sky blue, hot pink. Some have sparkly pillars and clashing roofs. The other thing I have noticed is there are more large houses, typically Vietnamese houses are skinny, tall and long, these much wider. I think it has to go with Western influence, a couple of houses could have fit right in anywhere in North America. 

 

Oct 30 – Da Lat

We were up early since we were told to be at the bus stop for 6:30am. We had Pho for breakfast and by the time we finish our hotel reception had actually opened so we could check out. We trekked down to the bus stop and waited and waited. The bus showed up at 7:30am and then we picked up 2 other people and set off for Da Lat around 8am. It would have been nice to sleep a little more instead of waiting for an hour for the stupid bus. Also there were only 4 passengers on the bus! We are now wondering if the bus was actually full yesterday or else maybe it would have only been us on it. We slept a little on the ride up but as we neared Da Lat, it's 1500m above sea level, there was some incredible scenery. The clouds were lifting from the mountains so it looked almost like it was raining up. Very Cool! We arrived around 11am, much soon than we had expected thank goodness. We checked into the hotel we were dropped off at, it was clean and I was being lazy. We had my computer issue to take care of, the power adapter stopped working last night. We found a computer repair shop very easily (I was shocked how easy it was) and while we had lunch the guy replaced to cord for under $5. SWEET! We had a nice leisurely walk around Lake Xuan Huong, the man-made lake in the middle of Da Lat. It was quite hot in the sunshine but nothing compared to the coast. There's no humidity here. Near the end of the lake are the Da Lat flower gardens. They were quite pretty. Da Lat is apparently known for it's plants and produce. We saw many green houses during the drive up. To cool off we stopped for drink at a cafe and thought the fruit syrup drinks sounded interesting. Beau got lychee and I got apple, they were very sweet, surprise its syrup. Beau watered his down so he could drink it. We cooled off a little too much in the shade. The nice breeze which cooled me while walking now made me cold. We nipped back to the hotel to get some sleeves on before finding some dinner. Dinner was pretty good, chow mein noodles with squid, but we got talking to the guy at the table next to us, he was an Aussie. We had a nice chat with him and walked around the night market a bit. There were some hot drinks being served at some stalls, it was hot soy milk. We had one that was peanut flavoured, it was tasty and weird. It had a fuzzy texture to it but I liked it.

Lake Xuan Huong

 

Da Lat Gardens

Oct 31 – Elephant Waterfalls and Silk Center

One of the handy things about our hotel is free breakfast. We had “Egg Bread” and coffee; it was scrambled eggs and a baguette. While we ate the motorcycle Beau had rented for us the night before was dropped off. It was only $3 for the day, I guess we've be getting ripped off for $4-5. We knew we wanted to check out some falls and a silk center near Nam Bam village. We set off into the countryside. It was a lovely drive, very lush and scenic but quite a winding road. We stopped a few times for pictures, there were coffee plants growing everywhere and some other big shrubs that looked similar to poinsettias. We saw some easy rider bike pull into a house just outside of the village so we pulled over too. There was sign out front about rice wine/whiskey making and coffee. We tacked on to their little tour about how to make the rice alcohol. The guide poured a shot into a metal pan and lit it on fire. There was a huge flame and all the liquid burned off till the pan was dry again. Pretty potent stuff. In another area the guide showed us were the people kept weasels. They had quite a few of them. The reason for the weasels is because what they call Weasel Coffee is a delicacy. The weasels eat the coffee beans and poop them out. The beans are collected from the poop and then dried and roasted. The price of weasel coffee is about 5 times that of regular coffee. At this same place a couple that had been on our boat trip in Nha Trang came in. We got talking with them and their guide and the guide said we could follow there car to the silk center and Elephant Waterfall. We followed them to the Cuong Hoan Traditional Silk Center. It was so cool! There were all the silk worm cocoons and we could watch the process of making silk. They boil the cocoons, then spin them on to large wheels, the wheels are then spun to dry the threads, the wheels are then spun on to spools and the spools are used in the looms to make fabric. On the looms are these bamboo sheets which are the pattern for the fabric, they tell the loom, mechanically, how the fabric should be woven. I was in a little bit of heaven and they sold fabric... I bought myself some to make a dress. I couldn't resist but the fabric is beautiful and how often do you get to buy silk from the manufacturer which is a traditional silk center in Vietnam! While I was trying to pick fabric the other group had left but we got directions from one of the workers to Elephant Waterfall. Turns out it was just down the road. It's an awkward climb down to the bottom of the falls but the view was spectacular and worth the muddy hands and shoes. You could get quite up close to the falls but you got quite wet too. Beau got up close and wet while I didn't. It didn't take long for him to dry. We got some great photos. There was also a little restaurant at the top by the parking lot. We had some yummy Pho soup, it would have been even better if it was made with rice noodles not instant noodles, they use those a lot here. Next we continued along the road for a bit till we found another waterfall we had read about, Lien Khuong Falls. We stopped at a cafe that over looked the falls while we enjoyed a beer. There was yet another waterfall on Beau's list that was close to Da Lat, Datanla falls, so we decided to stop in there on our way back to the city. The falls were nice but there was this weird roller coaster type thing that could take you up and down through the trees to get to the falls. There were about 6 water falls in the area but only Datanla Falls was accessible by foot. Two others could be viewed from a cable car but we weren't willing to pay. Datanla was a nice looking waterfall, there was a couple there having wedding photos taken. We went back into the city and stopped at the Hang Nga Crazy House. It's this guest house built by some lady architect that is just totally bizarre. It has weird passageways, odd shaped rooms, caves, awkward bridges. It's described by Lonely Planet as Alice-in-Wonderland like. It was very odd and definitely crazy. We got some dinner at a place that advertised the vermicelli bowls I love. Unfortunately for Beau, they only had enough left for one serving, so he had some sort of rice dish with egg and pork. We got some of the hot soy beverage again, although this time we were told it was coco flavoured but tasted like the one last night. We picked up some dried fruit and nuts for a hiking snack for tomorrow. We are going to tackle Lang Bian Mountain, it's going to be a 4hr hike round trip. I think we are going to pick up something more for lunch in the morning.

 

Our Scenic drive from Da Lat to Nam Bam

Boiling the silk cocoons and spinning the silk treads

The Loom, the upper left is the fabric pattern

Elephant Waterfall

Beau getting wet next to the falls

At the bottom of the falls

Elephant Waterfall

Hang Nga Crazy House

Sapa Trekking

Our Sapa trekking trip was awesome.  We saw some amazing sights, although the valley gets foggy and smokey.  The smoke is from the rice fields.  The rice harvest is almost over so they burn the left over stalks to help reseed and fertilize the land. Makes for smokey pictures :(  We tried rice wine, which is awful, and had a great night at our home stay.  It was definitely worth the extra money to start the trip further from the tourists!

Oct 18 - Trekking
Today we got to go trekking. The day started off with a motorbike ride from Sapa to the village of Ta Van. This is where the guy, Jorge, we were meeting had spent the night.  Most trekking trips go from Sapa and spend the night in Ta Van.  It was a little confusing when we arrived because they didn't realize we had been promised breakfast but we were fed pancakes (crepes) so it was all good. We set off on our walk with our guide Chi Li from the H'Mong (Mung) tribe.  It was a beautiful day. The sun came out and there was a bit of a breeze. It had been cold in Sapa since it has a much higher elevation, 1600m, so we had to shed all our layers. The walk was very nice but awkward at times. The trail zigzagged up and down the rice terraces. You had to watch your step a lot of the time because the trail was muddy and slippery. We went through a bamboo forest and stopped for a rest beside a beautiful water fall. We had lunch in the village of Xian Tao Cai.  Before we had lunch we were mobbed  by the locals trying to sell their wares. I somehow got away without buying anything.  Beau bought a belt/head band and some sort of whistle thing. We then continued on our journey. We got stuck behind a water buffalo for a little ways. There were marijuana plants growing along the side of the road. They make there clothing out of hemp. I hadn't noticed the plants before until our guide pointed them out.  We took another break in Su Pan and hooked up with two girls, Ester and Gena and their guide, Ly Sa.  We had a steep walk down the mountain to Ban Ho. This part of the walk wasn't all that scenic there was construction, big water pipe lines, and power lines. Across the valley one hillside was completely deforested and a road was being cut into the mountain side. Our guides said it was because of the Chinese. We made it to our home-stay and were happy to put our feet up. The home-stays are government regulated; they have to have a western toilet, electricity and a mattress for each person. Our beds were on the second floor, the family lived on the main floor with the kitchen and living area it was all open air. We got to eat dinner with our guides and our hosts. They prepared a ton of food. We were also served rice wine which tastes a little like vodka but thank goodness less potent but you do shoot it. Our host was really into it, we learned to cheers in Vietnamese Một hai ba, yo (1,2,3, yo). We drank about 3.5L of rice wine between 8 people. It was hilarious then our host started a dance party to some cheese 80's music video he had on the tv. We got some great stories out of our guide Ly Sa. She told us about her having an arranged marriage at 14 and how she kept telling him to "go away". She married this guy at 19 and now they have 4 children. Her husband has a girlfriend but Ly Sa says she's okay with it but the girlfriend can't marry her husband. If she wants to she has to come work for Ly Sa's family. We couldn't tell if it was common place or not to have multiple wives. She told some other stories many of which involved her saying "you crazy" and "go away" and "I kill you". It was a pretty awesome night.

The waterfall and our lunch spot

Our Home Stay

The beds

Dance party with our host

Oct 19 – Back to Sapa and Hanoi
There were roosters crowing every 30 min or less from about 5 am to when we got up. We had another delicious breakfast of crepes. We set off on another walk which was straight up hill. We arrived at Nan Ton village and looked around the school but we didn't see much else before we headed back down. It was very hot out but we got to go swimming in a river which was icy cold. We had some lunch and then the girls and their guide set off to meet their ride back to Sapa. We, unfortunately, had about an hour to kill before leaving. Mike played some cards with the hosts daughter and a little boy. It mostly consisted of throwing cards around. The ride back to Sapa was as uneventful as a minibus ride can get on a twisty turny 1.5 lane road can be. There was a room available to shower in at the hotel but there about 8 of us wanting to use it. So Beau and I went in search of some food. We found a market where the locals could buy meats, vegetables and fish. In the meat section you had to dodge little puddles of blood. There was a good little street food stall where we got some fried noodles for dinner. After eating we went back to the hotel for a nice cold shower. Hot would have been preferable. We took the shuttle back to Lao Cai and had a couple beers with Mike and an Aussie guy who was on our bus. We got on the train and settled in for our 9 hr train ride back to Hanoi. 

Our group minus Beau

The view

Where we went swimming brrrrr

Hanoi

(This was supposed to be posted 3 days ago but the internet was being dumb, I'll post about Halong Bay tomorrow)

This is our second day in Hanoi and I think we are starting to figure out how to get around.  The city is quite a mash of streets.  Tomorrow we take a 2 night trip Halong Bay so we'll be out of touch for a couple of days but it's sure to be quite the party!!

Oct 11 - Hanoi

We were going to wake up for the walking tour at 9ambut the alarm went off and I said there is no way I'm getting up right now. So we slept till about 11am. Once we got up we walked down the road to a little restaurant. I had fried noodles with beef and Beau had rice with crab. It was quite good. We followed the map we had from the hostel and took a walking tour around the Old Quarter. It was quite interesting. There were streets devoted to different things like shoes, metal, wood, it was crazy. We walked around Hoan Kiem Lake. After walking around for most of the day we ran into a guy, Yan. we met this morning who is also our dorm mate. He had befriended two South African girls. Beau played some Foosball with Yan, we had some beers, it's 2 for 1 beer between 5 and 6 at our hostel. We headed out to find some dinner with our new friends. Dinner wasn't as good as lunch was but it was still okay. Yan and the girls were going to the Water Puppet show around 9pm so we tagged along to see about getting tickets for tomorrow night. There were still tickets available for the late show so we went. It was interesting... it was about farming I think. The music was incredible, there was a unique instrument, the Dan Bau, which only had one string. It makes a unique sound. We did enjoy the experience though. We went to bed pretty early since it had been a long day with the train from China this morning.

The Dan Bau

A water puppet

Oct 12 –  Old Quarter Walking Tour

This morning we got up in plenty of time to catch the Old Quarter walking tour. It covered a lot of the same areas that we had yesterday but we had a guide so the commentary really helped. Hanoi used to consist of 36 streets each was devoted to a specific item. The tour was great. We saw some temples/places of worship and how typical houses in Vietnam are deep and skinny. We were also shown some good places to eat. There is a DIY street which has metal products and wood products. We had lunch at a fish noodle soup places which was quite good. After that we hunted up a place for Beau to get his hair cut. It is very hot and humid in Hanoi. Beau got a very good hair cut for $5, so he is much happier now. We went to the temple at the center of the lake. It is devoted to the tortoise of the lake. The legend has it that a fisherman recieved a sword from the lake, he used the sword to defeat the invading Chinese. He then became king and the tortoise reclaimed the sword for the lake. The lake was then renamed “Ho Hoan Kiem” which translates to “Lake of the Sword Restored.” There is still one giant tortoise left alive in the lake today. Again we meandered through the streets of Hanoi's Old Quarter. We made it back to the hostel for cheap beer and started to organize ourselves for our Halong Bay tour. We met our new dorm mates and spent some time swapping travel stories. We actually have some now! We got dinner at a nice restaurant down the road from our hostel and them picked up some cheaper beers to drink back at the hostel.

The metal street, these are burners that the Vietnamese use to burn fake money for their ancestors.

Mmmmm fish soup

Beau's new hair cut!

Vietnam!

We made it to Vietnam this morning, which means I can access my blog again! We had an amazing time in China and are looking forward to our next adventure in Vietnam.  So far my big downer of the last week is that my feet and ankles are covered in bug bites! They are driving me nuts :( Here's what happened on our trip from China to Vietnam.

Oct 10 - Nanning, China to Hanoi, Vietnam

We boarded a train this morning from Guilin to Nanning.  It was about a 5hr train ride.  Pretty uneventful.  We arrived in Nanning and looked into buying our train tickets to Hanoi.  Before buying our tickets we had to find a bank as we were about $20 short for the train.  we tried a couple of bank machines but they weren't "Plus" machines so our cards didn't work.  We had a bit of a walk with our bags and the sweltering heat but we found a bank and were able to buy our tickets.  We had to kill about 4 hrs in the train station which sucked but it passed fairly quickly.  The train left at about 6:45pm and was scheduled to arrive in Hanoi at 4:45am.  We didn't get much sleep since we had to go through Chinese customs around 11pm and then Vietnamese customs around 12am.  So we had about 4 hrs of sleep.  We arrived in Hanoi and a Chinese guy Beau had been talking to tried to help us get a cab.  Of course since it was crazy early they were charging a fortune.  They wanted to charge us 200,000VND ($10) to go about 4kms.  We got them down to 80K and had them drop us off at a random hostel we picked.  Which turned out to be closed for the night, some Vietnamese guy tried to get us to go with him to a hotel but as we were walking we found another hostel that was in the guide book so we opted for that one.  We had to wait about an hour to be allowed to check in but once we did the rooms were neat and clean so we went to bed for a bit.