Longlongboringboringboring bus journey to Ho Chi Mihn City (HCMC) / SaiGon. Intercepted by man waving a card for a guesthouse (creatively named “Room for Rent”), which sounded cheap and close, so Gillian and I followed the little man (not condescending; he was short) and plonked our bags down at Room for Rent to hunt for dinner. Room for Rent is down a little alley, off a park where half of the city comes out at dusk to do some kind of exercise. The most common sport is a sort of volleyball, played with a shuttlecock, but using feet as racquets. Anyhow, much excitement that night, started off well, but ended badly: we latched on to two Irish “lads” and had a great night out: nightclub, chewy dried squid, a bar where you get a free massage and popcorn with your 30p pint of beer… but at 4:30am when we went back to Room for Rent and I was halfway over the wall because we were locked out, Gillian’s wallet was stolen by some nasty little man who ran like the wind while I leapt after him screeching and waking up all of HCMC. Needless to say we never did see Gillian’s wallet again. We actually didn’t see much for a while because immediately afterwards the district had a blackout.

The next day, after 3.5 hours sleep (enough time for a hangover to kick in); we went to the police station THREE times. Cushy job, being a police-person in Vietnam. Desks in the interview room acted as beds for a few policemen while Gillian was interviewed, and it’s a strict rule that no more than one person may actually do anything constructive at any one time. Not much achieved that day, except dressing up in donut suits we found in a coffee shop and trying on bike helmets coloured as ladybirds.

The following day was crammed with culture. Attached ourselves to a tour to a Cao Dai temple (mad religion which kind of makes sense till you hear that Victor Hugo is a patron saint, alongside William Shakespeare and Napoleon Bonaparte…), then on the Cu Chi tunnels; tunnels where Vietnamese hid from the “mad, crazy, American devils” (quote from a film at the Cu Chi Tunnel centre) during the Vietnam War. There was an option to pay a heap of money to shoot a couple of rounds of an M60 automatic… which OF COURSE we had to do!

I wouldn’t make a good soldier: very noisy, guns.

During the next few days we wandered around HCMC, becoming regulars at the night market (mmmm, bbq “meat” on noodles…); visiting the War Museum (sad place, but a bit of a one-sided story, no?), the Reunification Museum (unofficially Vietnam’s largest collection of disconnected telephones and the most boring museum in the world), discovering coconut candy and Fanny Ice-cream (…); finding the Jade Emperor Pagoda (again and again and again); and getting stuck in a massive rain storm, hiding under a pagoda in a park for 2 hours with a soap opera film crew, singing songs about rain (just Gillian and I, not the film crew).

HCMC: Done! Next: Mekong Delta!

Cao Dai Temple

Bad girl, I know. I haven’t written for over 3 weeks and its like having not done your homework on Sunday night…

So! Arrived in MuiNé around lunchtime and checked into the hotel. Nice, with a swimming pool right on what would have been a beach if the sea was not doing a remarkable tsunami impression for the first 2 days we were in MuiNé (the walls of our room would shake each time a wave crashed against the sea wall… imagination would run riot in the middle of the night: convinced we would be swept out to sea).

The weather dictated that we do nothing for the first day or so – lots of red wine, Shithead, reading, watching HBO and BBC World (catching up on all the natural disasters we’ve missed). On our third day the storm quietened down long enough for us to hire a bike to see the sand dunes MuiNé is famous for (famous for dunes and wind surfers. Saw none of the latter, sadly…) Very odd scenery, like the Karoo or Namibia, in between tropical bits. On our last day in MuiNé we made a half-hearted attempt at finding a salt pan as well as breaking the bike (and I locked the key in the seat, which caused great excitement for about 10 minutes while a small boy tried – successfully – to retrieve it. Just goes to show how easy it is to nick things in a motorbike “boot”). Didn’t find the salt pan, so lay by the pool, minus tsunami-style waves, to slowly incinerate while waiting for the bus to Ho Chi Mihn City (HCMC) / SaiGon. (ouch ouch)

People definitely less aggressive, shouty and pokey the further south you go in Vietnam. Thank goodness.

PS that’s ouch ouch to getting burnt, not HCMC…

Whatever.

Off the train from Sapa and back on the road 3 hours later to HaLong Bay. Gillian and I picked up another straggler, Jess, and the 3 of us were the only backpackers on the little trip of utter luxury! Also the only 3 out of 20 to do the 3day/2night package and so were given a boat all to ourselves on the 2nd night, with chef and waiters. Aaah! Not much to report on for HaLong Bay: its very beautiful with pokey bits of rock peeking out of the water; ladies on boats selling drinks and snacks for extortionate prices; little activity except for a spot of kayaking, swimming, jumping off the top of the boat (7m: eeek!) and drunken Shithead in the evening (a card game, Mom&Dad. I did not name it).

After lunch on the last day (lunch, er, at 10:30am) we zoomed back at HaNoi at a snail’s pace to phaff around for 6hrs to get a train to HoiAn. Gillian and I tried out the “hard bed” option on the sleeper train to save… oh, about 7GBP each. Mistake. We had another 4 Vietnamese people in our (very small) cabin, 2 of whom looked like they were about to expire on the journey, and all of whom woke up at 5:15am with much shouting and rushing in and out, only to go back to sleep at 8am (honestly, is that necessary?). Gillian and I collectively hit our heads 9 times. It was not a fun journey.

From Danang, where the train delivered us (to platform 9, although I still haven’t seen a single platform in Vietnam yet; you must tumble from the train like a broken sack of rice), we caught a minivan that ran out of petrol a few times to HoiAn. The journey there was quite an eye-opener: the central coast of Vietnam was hit badly by Typhoon Ketsana and there were piles of debris along the roadside, under palm trees battered by the storm. HaNoi itself seemed to have sprung back to life easily and the Vietnamese Sales Force was in full swing: “buysomethingfrommeee!” squeals at every turn. Gillian came across the best sales pitch though:

• Gillian: “How much is this book?”
• Lady: “Fifty thousand”
• Gillian: “How about I give you forty?”
• Lady: “Fifty-five”
• Gillian: “But it was just fifty!”
• Lady: “You don’t like fifty, I don’t like forty”

Gillian bought the book.

Although its pretty, there’s not a heap of things to do in HoiAn, but the thing to do is get clothes tailored. We both got a couple of dresses/skirts made. 3 dresses and a skirt, custom-made by hand (there’s that sales pitch again), all for $38. Bargain!

We went for a little walk out of the “tourist area” on our last day. You could tell by walking though the streets how high the water had risen and how much damage had been done. Apparently the worst flood in central Vietnam for 3 years, with over 100 dead, mostly children. Pretty sad.

From there we hopped back to the other side of the river for our cooking course. I am an expert… chopper! And eater! I didn’t learn much, but who cares! The chilly and lemongrass snapper and deep fried wantons with sweet and sour sauce was delish. Don’t ask me to make it again though…

From the cooking course we rolled each other back to the hotel to pack in anticipation for The Sleeper Bus to MuiNe. We had discovered the most uncomfortable way to get around the country! The times I did get to sleep I woke up with my legs dangling over the side and the safety belt under my arms. Probably quite comfortable if you are the shape and size of a chop stick.

Which I am not, after eating noodles for the last 5 months.

sneaky junk in ha long bay

After tumbling off the train we were squashed into a minivan to Sapa and instructed to stay in a hotel of the drivers “recommendation” (aside: Vietnamese people come across as rather hard and unpleasant: lots of snorting, shoving, pushing, shouting, poking. There are exceptions, but few and far between).

It was pouring with rain, but the weather forecast wasn’t looking good for the next few days (Typhoon Ketsana was losing momentum, but still doing its thing), so we bought what looked (and felt) like boiler suits with wellies, hired the coolest (cheapest) bikes in town, and hit the road. First on the itinerary was Cat Cat, a tourist trap cultural village. Amazing views of the mountains and rice paddies, but you get the feeling that no one actually lives there and its all for show. So after puffing up and down a few hills in the world’s most insulated waterproof clothes, we spurned the cultural trap and followed our noses, finding locals with their umbrellas who needed lifts on the back of our bikes down windy and muddy roads.

We found a little cave entrance just outside another cultural trap which I thought looked quite fun to explore. Just as we were going in, a man came running up behind us asking if we wanted the electricity turned on. Initially we said no (cheapskates that we are), then changed our minds when we realized the cave was longer than we had thought. On came the lights and he told us there was a big chamber at the end with a beautiful lake. Gillian turned back, thinking scrambling around in muddy, skinny passages wasn’t really her thing, but I decided to carry on. About 2 minutes later Gillian called: “Apparently the electricity only lasts ½ an hour!” “Cool, I won’t be too long, just want to see the big chamber!”. A minute later: “Apparently it takes 2 hours to get there!”. The mind boggles. I turned back.

That evening we found some cheap wine, hot chocolate and phó (noodle soup. Initially unsure of the pronunciation: poo? foo? poe? foe? Turns out its “fer”), and watched/translated Vietnamese soap operas.

The next morning we went on the hunt for some carved boulders and a rattan bridge. While searching we went up a very bumppppy road clearly not made for motorized vehicles, ditched our bikes and met a little lady who invited us to her house. We were so off the beaten track (any kind of track actually), that she seemed over the moon to have us and so invited a few friends to come over and gape. She did try the hard sell to which we submitted; and we must have given her too much dong because beamed and threw in extra bracelets and invited us to stay for lunch, thankfully nothing more adventurous than phó and com tãm (rice) with heaps of chilly sauce. After much nodding and “mmmm”ing we look our leave to find the elusive boulders and/or bridge.

We landed in another cultural trap, Ban Ho, which has a “spectacular waterfall” (hmmm). Getting off our bikes we were accosted by 10 women who grabbed our arms and dragged us there, shouting “Careful! Careful!” every 10 seconds, and pulled us over slippery rocks, achieving nothing more than almost pushing me into the river a few times and putting me in a bad mood. Back in the village, after having the women thrust bags and cushion cases in our faces, squealing “buysomethingfrommeeeee!” we gave 2 of them a lift to their homes in the near dark.

Our last day in Sapa actually saw the sun, so we took the bikes up to Tram Ton pass to see another “spectacular waterfall”. We carried on into the next province for a bit of a bike ride and had to stop a few times to wait for trucks to clear mud and rubble from recent landslides, and saw a truck that had overturned on the road, its bizarre mix of content being raided. Soon after I was almost squashed by a large truck we turned back and headed back to town for some lunch in the market, to the little lady next to the cow legs and chicken feet. Gillian made the vital mistake of expressing an interest in a beautiful blanket and was tackled by 15 women all trying to get her to buy theirs. As we walked through town, Gillian was the Pied Piper: women following, shouting “ok-ok, 150! / ok-ok, 160!” (The price would sometimes mysteriously rise). Gillian bought one in the end, but that didn’t stop the others from advertising: because Gillian had one, it meant she liked them and so must want more…?

That evening we caught the sleeper back to Ha Noi, sharing a cabin with a Vietnamese couple who were on honeymoon.

Never did find the boulders or the rattan bridge.

scary lady in boiler suit with children

Less than a week has gone by in Vietnam and it feels like years since I arrived. I fell off the plane in Ha Noi early in the morning on Saturday, got my visa and caught the bus like a pro to the hostel. All good, except the hostel had overbooked, but I was not to be rattled by a small thing like having nowhere to sleep, so found another MUCH better one – like a 4* hotel, for $6! Woo-hoo! (it makes a big difference to have a nice place to come back to in the evenings)

Met up with a guy I met on the plane, Graydon, had lunch (snails) and carried on wandering, soaking up Ha Noi . We stopped by on the side of the road for a spot of (in?)famous Vietnamese beer, “Bai Hoi” (broke the bank: it was 11p/pint), and got some of the locals to teach me Vietnamese – lots of “hee hee”, but I think that was them giggling, rather than pronunciation.

That evening back in the hostel I was accosted by 2 English guys on their way to dinner… in Snake Village. The idea is that you choose your serpent, and the restaurant cooks it for you in 10 different ways; all quite nice really, except that before you tuck into the 1st dish everyone is given a shot of the bile and a shot of the blood. YUKYUKYUK. I passed on the beating heart and generously offered it to the guy next to me (it beats for 15 mins after it has been removed).

The next day I met up with Graydon and a couple of his mates for some more Ha Noi wandering through markets (fake money, snails, roast dog, fairy wings, baths, 59″ plasma TVs…). After some more beer (burp) I hit the West End, well a water puppet show depicting typical river-side scenes: children playing, ducks mating, dragons eating children, men being beheaded… the usual. A lot of splashing about and crashing, clanging music.

Next day was Ha Long Bay day. Hooray! Lying on a boat in the sun for 3 days! After the 4.5 hour bus journey there we were told that there might be a small storm on the way, but we could still go out for a couple of hours and then back to Ha Noi in the evening… for $60. Ha! I took the option to postpone and go another day. Back at the hostel (10 hours after I left) I found out that there had been a huge typhoon and 2 tourists had died in HLB the day before, and hundreds of people had died in the Philippines the day before that. (Also awful earthquake in Indonesia and tsunami in Samoa – a bad week for SE Asia)

Also staying in my room was a girl called Gillian and we stomped all over Ha Noi together (found out that Ho Chi Min’s body is in Russia for “maintenance”; got shooed by the Vietnamese police; sold some books; did market things; drank more beer (burp); saw a man squeezing “pigeon juice” – blood – over his noodles).

In the evening I managed to convince Gillian to come along with me to Sapa, a rural town in the north, for a couple of days, and so we hopped on a sleeper train up to Lao Cia…

tasty...