Hanoi - Halong Bay - Sapa

(Amy) 

Following the 16.5 hour night bus, we arrived in Hanoi and made it to the Hanoi Backpackers hostel. We made sure that we were booked onto the Castaways tour for the next day, had breakfast and then set off to explore hanoi. It is SO hot here! We visited the prison museum, then walked around the lake and to the market. The market was quite an experience, with all varieties of live and dead animals for sale...

We then braved some street food- I had some pork and noodle thing, lizzie had spring rolls and Emmy had banana and vegetable soup! It was actually pretty good! In the evening we attempted to find a restaurant we had been recommended... It was closed. So instead we had more street food, where me and Liz barbequed our own- we lived to tell the tale! 

The next morning it was an early start to go on the infamous Castaways tour of Halong Bay. We had heard this is the booze cruise of the bay, so we were pretty excited! 4 hours on a bus and we were put on a boat of 20 people, which was a very very nice boat, and we were suitable impressed. 

The food was pretty lush and we spent the afternoon kayaking round the bay, jumping off the boat and swimming. The views are just incredible and unfortunately the photos don't do it justice. 

We spent the first night on the boat, tied to another Castaways boat. We had the nicer boat, but they had the better sound system so we played drinking games and had a bit of a party on their boat. 

It was another 7am start (turns out the cabin has a doorbell, which they use to wake you up) and we had breakfast and started cruising again. We swapped boats a couple of times and arrived at midday on Castaway island. This is a tiny private island, just used by this company, so it feels pretty exclusive! 

The activities were awesome, you could go rock climbing (turns out Haz is quite the monkey pro), kayaking and tubing (big inflatable thing dragged behind a speed boat)- so much fun! Later on the party got going and we had a pretty good night. One of the definate highlights for me was swimming at midnight, where you can see the bioluminescent plankton. This is definately one of the coolests things I've seen, when you move in the water it's like you're glittering! However the rain set in for the night not long after this, and turns out the roof on our beach bungalow wasn't great, so haz had to spoon me in the bottom bunk as hers was wet! 

Next morning came far too quickly, and it was a long boat and bus journey back to Hanoi :( we had a couple of hours to kill before our sleeper train, so we had a really nice dinner- our final one with Emmy! We were all really sad to see her go- Emmy we miss you!! 

Our sleeper train to Sapa was pretty luxurious and we all slept really well, and arrived feeling well rested.  Sapa is definately one of the most beautiful places we've been, everywhere is so green! You're only about 1 hour from the Chinese border, so about as far north as you can go in Vietnam. We arrived a bit late to go trekking on the first day so we dumped our stuff and wandered round the town and then walked to one of the hill tribe villages called the CatCat village. 

Lovely pig BBQ...

Waterfall in the village 

 We also got a free herbal foot soak... 

We went for dinner, cocktails and a massage in the evening- so civilised! 

The next day we set off on our 2 day trek. We visited 3 villages, and stayed at a homestay in the Ta Van village. Couldn't really ask for more beautiful surroundings. 

There was just 4 of us staying in the homestay, so we played quite a lot of cards, looked at the stars and admired (or ran away from) the massive moths and light up bugs.

We set off after yummy pancakes for breakfast and today's trekking was a bit harder with a lot more hills. One thing that was pretty weird was that you have crowds of village women and children following the group for both days... They occasionally talk to you to try and flog you bags and bracelets but otherwise just follow in silence. 

At lunch me and lizzle swam in this beautiful waterfall (pictures on her camera) and then we all hiked to the top of this one after lunch... I wish the pictures could do it justice! The tiered rice paddies are so neat and so so green, it's just stunning. 

We had one final afternoon in Sapa and are now taking the sleeper bus to Hanoi, where we will catch a flight back to Bangkok... We are now 7 weeks into our travels, it has gone so quickly, and we are just last half way. 

Sorry for the very long blog! Next stop Thailand... 

 

Hoi An- Hue

(Harriet) 

So the sleeper bus was running 4 hours late and after having been told we would meet up with it in 4 hours it was past 1am before there was any sign of this bus and our driver was at this point asleep... However once we were abord it was wonderful and we got to hoi an at the expected time. 

The first day we went to the beach for breakfast and spent some time trying to find somewhere that didn't sell only seafood. Afterwards we went straight to business getting our dresses made and ended up going to a stall in the indoor market owned by a lady who had kindly given me some ice as I had stupidly tripped up and whacked my toe! We showed them photos and drawings of what we wanted and the woman claimed 'yes I've made it before' when I showed her mine. Excited, we wandered around town and had a lovely lunch and walked over the Japanese bridge which is pretty cool although looks slightly worse for wear. 

Hoi an is a beautiful city, very yellow and bustling with beautiful shops selling food, clothing and handicrafts. We decided to find the park on our map and after having walked past what looks like a pile of rubble numerous times concluded that it no longer exists. After we went to a cultural performance which involved music and dancing and I found it highly entertaining, the highlights being a  piece where a man with face paint which reminded me of rafiki (lion king) who jumped around like a mad man, pointing at thin air and stroking his beard and unsettlingly long side burns.. The performance ended with aud lang syne in Vietnamese which puzzled us as last time I checked that was a Scottish thing! 

The next day we got up early for our cycling tour to the village which was quite interesting and I learnt a few plants including morning glory (that is the actual name) and waxy pumpkin. The guide assured us that there were in fact 1 million people living in the village, which area wise is about a quarter of my village at home...I don't think she got her digits right. Next we went in search of some ancient Japanese tombs and once we found them were underwhelmed by the crumbling stone and massive weeds/daisies. A random man appeared however and presented us with rice fresh from the paddy and lotus flowers, I was so grateful- what more could a girl want? 

We went back to the tailors and to be honest were both disappointed with what we were presented however were willing to give them the benefit of the doubt as they assured us they could change them to what we wanted. We then headed back to the hostel for a beautiful swim in the pool before heading out again for the night! We had a fun evening and met some interesting people at the why not? Bar. 

For our final day we went back to the tailors I was over the moon with my dress and Amy liked hers more however is still not convinced (I think it's gorgeous though). We then went back for a swim and booking session before we split up and I went to meet my friend from home whilst the others went on a cooking course which I hear was great and I can testify that the food was delicious! During this however a monsoon struck and the street became a river for about an hour! 

In the evening we wandered around, the town is lit up by lanterns and we witnessed some local games which involved smashing pots blindfolded and also bingo which seemed to be sung and involved flags when you scored a row or something... Bit hard to follow. 

Today however was incredible as we did our easy rider experience to hue. We hit the road early and went first to the marble mountain which had pagodas and caves galore, plus plenty of marble. When then went through the mountain pass (the bit they did on top gear) and the views were just breathtaking. The colours were so vibrant and it just went on and on and on. We also stumbled upon a wedding shoot which was pretty cool! We then went to the elephant waterfall (no elephants) and a fishing village before arriving at the bus station. The whole day the views were stunning, the guides were lovely and it felt so fun to be travelling Vietnam the way the locals do! I loved it and was really sad for it to be over. I think we will all remember this part of the journey the most as it was incredible. 

Ho Chi Minh City - Da Lat - Nha Trang

(Amy) We spent Sunday trying to find a way to get off Phu Quoc island, but apparently every boat off the island was full, so instead we managed to get a cheap flight off the next morning. That day was also pretty wet but we managed to find our way to a cool waterfall before having our first intentionally western dinner... We were craving pizza! We watched the first half of the World Cup final at 2am in a bar, before the storm got so bad that the signal went and we had a long walk home in the rain. 

So after very little sleep we headed off for our early flight to Ho Chi Minh City. The hostel we wanted to stay in was full so we ended up in this nice hotel with the loveliest young Vietnamese lady running it. She sorted us out with maps and plan for the day. First stop was the nearby market- this was crazily busy in typical HCMC fashion! We were swarmed on as soon as we set food in the food section so had lunch here. I has 'pho' which is Vietnamese noodle soup, and haz had the 'best fried noodles' she's ever had! 

Next stop was the war remnants museum. Some of this was pretty difficult viewing, particularly all the stuff about the entire village massacres and agent orange bombs from the Americans. It's pretty shocking that so many of the countries we are visiting have such a horrific recent past. 

We were feeling pretty knackered by this point so had a nap before exploring the backpacker part of district 1. 

The next day we went on a trip to the Cu Chi tunnels. The Viet Cong dug over 200km of tunnels under the ground around HCMC... Pretty impressive considering they were all basically dug with a small shovel. They were pretty tiny too so that the 'large' Americans couldn't fit down. 

After this it was time to go to the airport to meet lizzie!! We introduced her to the whirlwind of HCMC and went to a few bars and had dinner, and booked a sleeper bus for the next day. 

The next day we set off to try and see the palace, but got there to find it was closed for lunch... And so was the cathedral. So we found a cafe and went back at 1 when it opened. It looked pretty unimpressive from the outside but the inside was quite interesting, with a lot of the communication equipment from the war still being there. 

Next we made our way on the public bus to Chinatown, and this is definately the 'real' HCMC as we saw very few, if any, tourists. 

We eventually managed to find this tiny kitchen restaurant that the hostel recommended, and a there was no proper English menu, so it was basically point and pick! I had some very weird but quite nice bean dumpling thing. Pudding was very very weird- some weird brown jelly thing and more dumplings! 

Before the night bus we got a foot massage to pass the time...

That evening we got the night bus to Da Lat, which was the first transport we've had that arrived earlier than scheduled at 6am! Luckily we were staying in the most lovely hostel and the lady running it let us into the dorm for a few more hours sleep. When we got up again we set off with a map to the Crazy House. This was the weirdest house and hotel ever, and we had fun exploring it. 

We then went to the most unimpressive palace I've ever seen, the less said about that the better. Next we went on a cable car across the valley to a temple. Da Lat is up in the highlands at about 1500m, and so much colder than we were used to! We needed jumpers for the first time in nearly 6 weeks. 

That evening we had dinner in the hostel, cooked by the family that run it. 5 dishes to choose from for $2! All of which were very nice... Apart from the 'dessert' of green bean soup. 

The next day we went canyoning, which was insane! Involved various abseils down dry cliffs and through waterfalls, natural water slides, and cliff jumping. So much fun, though we were pretty chilly by the end! All the photos are on another girl from our groups camera, so we're really hoping she sends them to us. 

It was Dooves last night so we all went out for dinner and also bought some snacks for the bus journey to Nha Trang from this massive bakery. 

The next day we said goodbye to Doove and set off on the 4hr journey to Nha Trang. The bus driver was a bit of a nutjob and the roads were very windy so there were a lot of chundering people, not the most pleasant of journeys! Anyway we met up with Emmy and Katy (my friends from school) and had a few hours on the beach, and then went out for a really nice meal. We then headed out to the bars for some cheap cocktails and buckets....

Pretty early 7am start but it was well worth it for the snorkelling trip. We saw loads and had a really good day, although we are all now really sunburnt- not used to the sun!

In the afternoon we had a quick visit to the mud bath spa, which was pretty weird but a fun experience... And quite soothing on the sun burn! Now we are on the night bus to Hoi An and will probably be there for a few days :)