I never did buy a sweater before going up to Sapa-turns out I could have used one. The rice home made rice wine seemed to do a decent job keeping me warm.
Sapa is a town in northern Vietnam surrounded by mountains, valleys, and an abundance of man made terraces for cultivating rice. Many people live in the town of Sapa or the surrounding villages that make up the region. Several Mung and Dao tribes still thrive in this region and make a living either farming or following tourists. The people of these tribes still wear traditional garb, and live a very traditional life style, sans the cell phone that is...
I took the night train from Hanoi to Lao Cai, an 8 hour journey. Surprisingly I sleep for the majority of it and woke feeling like I had only been sleeping a few minutes. The first day I joined a group for a tour of BacHa Market, in a town about 70km away from Sapa. The ride there was long and fairly painful, as the Vietnamese tourists shared the microphone and sang karaoke the entire way there, mind you the microphone was not of the best quality, and neither was my patience.
The market itself was not too impressive, but still somewhat interesting. I coupled up with a solo traveler from England, and architect named Nick, and we explored the market together. Besides the normal fare, the only thing that caught my attention was the meat market, dog and all.
After a few hours at the market, tired of wandering around, Nick and I settled down for a beer and some good people watching before our scheduled lunch hour and bus ride to the next destination of the day, the China-Vietnam border.
Another hour or so on the bus, we got out and looked at a traditional Flower Mung village home. The woman working in this home was making traditional “happy water.” The only thing I can liken this particular happy water to is what we Texans call “moonshine.” Its corn based liquor, strong, nasty, and get you going. After a shot of this-mid day-I was ready to get going…to bed.
The bus ride to the border I was out like a light, a nice nap all in all give or take some neck pain. The border was about as interesting and exciting as when you cross over from Texas into Oklahoma, yet less beautiful and there is no formal welcome sign or travel center, only some electric fencing and an immigration office. Oh well, I guess I can say I have seen China now.
The rest of the day I got to take it easy at the Fansipan Hotel in Sapa. I had my own room with the most amazing shower, consistently hot shower, and clean comfy bed with crisp sheets. I went to bed at 8pm and didn’t wake up until my alarm went off. Rare.
The next day was the start of our two day trek. I joined a different group for this part of the trip. There were six of us total, five girls (three from Oz, one from Israel, and myself) and one guy (Ole from Alaska/Mexico). We had a guide named something like Juan but I can’t be bothered to attempt to spell it correctly in Vietnamese.
Day one was supposedly a 19km trek-sure didn’t feel like it. Easy as pie except for the one area where we had to walk down a steep hill for about thirty minutes. The entire time we walked, we were followed by several Mung tribal women. These women would ask us questions is English, attempt to build a sort of friendship, then at the right moment try to make a sale. Mainly they sold jewelry, and other odds and ends made from their woven fabrics. I somehow got off only buy a pair of ear rings for a measly 20,000 Dong ($1).
We had lunch about half way at some random wooden building in the mountains. Lunch consisted of the same exact thing I had for breakfast, a baguette, laughing cow cheese, and cucumber. Delightful. After lunch we continued on towards our homestay for the night. The homestay was in a larger village in one of the valleys and was quite luxurious considering the other homes we had seen on the trek out there. It was a large two story wooden home with a patio and pool table outdoors, and a small TV indoors. Granted the kitchen was all wood fired, and the home lacked most modern amenities, it was comfortable. Due to its touristy nature, the homestay sadly didn’t include much interaction with the actual family that lived there, they merely acted as a host instead. I felt this especially when I asked to help prepare our dinner, hoping to learn a few things and engage in some cultural interaction, and was turned down and told to go sit outside with the other foreigners. I did, however, at one point, convince one of the young girls to let me roll a few spring rolls before she fried them up. Needless to say she was impressed by my skills.
The evening meal was delicious. We ate a number of different dishes: chicken and mushrooms, tofu and tomatoes, pork, pig intestine (eek), spring rolls, and rice. One of the best meals I had in Vietnam. The night was passed playing pool, telling stories, drinking rice wine, and watching the local village men get drunk and smoke tobacco out of a giant bamboo pipe.
Day two was only 10km. Which felt even shorter as we took it slow, and stopped at several small villages and viewpoints. Its hard to describe these villages and their people, I think my pictures will do some justice. They seemed overall happy and carefree, and for the most part healthy despite the living conditions.
The end of the Sapa trek brought us back to Sapa where I did a bit of shopping in the street market/black market, and bought a sweater finally. I then went to a viewpoint café with Ole from the tour group and was convinced to have a cup of Vietnamese coffee with him-arguably the best damn cup of coffee I have ever had given I don’t like coffee.
From there it was a shower and another bus ride to Lao Cai for another night train. There was a mix up with my train ticket, apparently the tour company gave me a ticket for the day before I was suppose to leave, causing some frustration, a few cross words on my part, followed by it all working out alright-somehow. The night train back I didn’t sleep as well-it was bumpy and I kept waking-thinking it was going to derail and crash-not a good feeling.
I did get into Hanoi at about 5am that morning. After haggling with a few taxi drivers, I found a good price and transferred over to the hostel again. I went back to bed and woke up about 10am, ready for another day in the busy city of Hanoi.
My friend Collin, who I met in Thailand and Laos, was also in Hanoi at this point, so we partnered up to take on the city streets for the day. In all honestly, I don’t think we made it farther than about 2km from the hostel, but still, we had a good time. We searched for some real Vietnamese food, noodles and grilled pork called “bun chao.” For about $2 each we ate an incredible meal. Collin was excited to be introduced to some new food, and I was happy to have someone to share a meal with.
We walked around for a while in an attempt to find a traditional Vietnamese beverage made from white or black beans and ice. After walking around the busy streets, perusing all of the markets selling décor for the coming Chinese New Year, we finally came upon the small hole in the wall that was serving the beverage. The place was fairly busy-and seemed a popular cold treat for working women and men in the heat of the afternoon. It was definitely different, but Collin and I both agreed it was tasty.
The rest of the afternoon we lounged around-watched half of a horrible movie, Eagle Eye, what a waste of time…then settled for happy hour at the hostel’s bar instead. Into the evening we decided to go for a change of scenery and search for a bar outside of the hostel’s comfort zone. We ended up at a place I had eaten dinner at a week before, and the beer there was less than a dollar a glass. After some good conversation and good number of beers later we went for a walk around the lake and enjoyed some of the city lights, people watching, and did some tree climbing. The atmosphere around the lake was really nice, and convinced me that Hanoi did, after all, uphold some bit of charm.
I flew out early the next morning-after a major mistake on the date of my flight, and a loss of about $400. Note to self: always read the fine print. My flight was on the 10th, not the 11th. Well shit. I had a pretty horrible day, but by the end of it, sleeping in my comfortable bed in Kuala Lumpur, and knowing I would be flying out to Melbourne the following night, things were starting to look up again.
Sorry but no pictures for a while-I have yet to find an internet connection fast and cheap enough.
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