Ha Noi - Wed 5/05 - Fri 7/05; Sun 9/05 - Sun 15/05 ; Fri 21/05 - Fri 28/05

Hanoi...Hanoi is a claustrophobically crazy place. The city itself has narrow streets teeming with traffic, horns honking continuously and a great grey cloud that hangs above the buildings which seemingly never lifts. The Vietnamese capital has an 'Old Quarter' which is where most tourists spend their time and is probably the most interesting part of the city. Hanoi, surprisingly, has a large number of lakes and the main lake in the heart of the city has a nice pagoda and temple that has obviously been there for a very long time. Hanoi was founded about one thousand years ago and has undergone various name changes over the centuries.
We were fortunate enough to be staying with Kate's friends, Matt, Lindy, John and Caz in a cool three story house about a ten minute scooter ride from the old quarter. It was really nice to stay in a house again with familiar things like a refridgerator and tv, and a room to sleep in where you can walk out of it and still be in the actual house. After staying in hotels and guest-houses for so long we have both missed having simple household comforts that we all normally take for granted. The guys even had a super cute mini schnauser named 'Poco' and it was especially nice to see a well cared for dog again rather than the usual bedraggled, scary-looking ones we see on the streets. As we spent some time in Hanoi before and after we travelled up to Sapa we were able to stay in Hanoi for almost two weeks in total.

The city has alot of history but it is extremely dirty and grimy, but lets face it, most large cities in this region are. The most disconcerting thing, other than the traffic, about Hanoi was the cloud of smog and dust that hovered above the city. I think some people must go most of their lives without ever seeing many really nice, sunny, clear days here. As we drove back to Hanoi from Ha Long bay it was a nice blue sky afternoon, until we reached the edge of Hanoi and then the cloud just descended and it was back to the gloom. While we were in Hanoi we tried to do some touristy things but alot of time was spent just hanging out with friends, going out for lunches and dinners and sorting out our visas to stay in Vietnam.

One touristy thing we did see was the 'Temple of Literature' which was the first University set up in Hanoi around a thousand years ago. The Mandarins set this up and it lasted for centuries with many famous Vietnamese scholars attending it over the years. It made for an intersting walk through the old buildings (which looked remarkably similar to the average Buddhist temple) but after about half an hour it was time to move on.

On our last day we visited the Mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, the father of Vietnam as we know it today. This was actually pretty cool and it involved standing in an enormous line of people on a very muggy day for about an hour. Literally thousands of people were in line and it amazed us both to think this was just another day at the Mausoleum. It shows how highly regarded the former president is by his countrymen (and women) as there were people of every age waiting patiently for their chance to get a glimpse of this long dead fellow. When our turn came to file past the glass case containing the waxy remains of 'Uncle Ho', as he is affectionately known, immaculately dressed but stern faced guards ushered us around the body in an orderly but efficient manner. All in all we must have been in the inner sanctum for about 15 seconds but the glow of the lights over the body and the freezing air conditioning made this just about the right amount of time to be in there. Ho Chi Minh looked just like he did in the old propaganda videos we had observed whilst standing in line, even his wispy beard was intact, but as he wasn't put on display until around fifteen years after his death we were both left wondering whether it was really him or just a waxy impersonator.

Another place we found in Hanoi that was especially pleasing was the 'Kangaroo Cafe'. Owned by a bloke from Sydney this place saved my life on more than one occasion. On the whole I have been a little less than besotted by Vietnamese food and I have been on the lookout for food from home as much as possible. The Kangaroo Cafe is without a doubt the best western food we have encountered on our entire trip let alone Vietnam. They had Fish'n'Chips! Real Fish'n'Chips, not a poor imitation! You may snigger, but after four months on the road with no Fish'n'Chips I was in heaven! All of the food they served was hearty huge and very reasonable. God bless this place, it was just what I needed and not a rice dish in sight!

As our days were spent hanging with friends or doing mundane chores like organising visas, travel plans and train tickets there is not much else to report about Hanoi. Is it my favourite city in Asia? Hell no. Is it worth a visit? If you're in the neighbourhood then yeah I suppose so. There is a lot of cool stuff near Hanoi, like Sapa and Ha Long bay, but the city itself is just a bit too grey and claustrophobic for me. Having said that I want to say a special thanks to Matt, Lindy, John and Caz for letting us stay and putting up with us. There is nothing worse when you're going about your normal daily working routine than having a couple of layabouts on holiday to come home to. Thanks guys, you made our stay in Hanoi well worthwhile.

Our plan from Hanoi was to trek all the way back down to Saigon again (about 1200km's) and stop in at some of the places we had missed on our way up the country the first time. As buses and trains average about 50km's an hour here (I'm not joking, they really are sloooow!) 1200km's works out to be quite a hike. By this stage we had been in Vietnam for over a month and we were beginning to wonder how we had managed to stay here so long. Vietnam has the best of things to offer travellers in this region but it also can be extremely wearisome as we were about to find out on our trip back down south. But more about that next time. 'Til then.



Tim and I riding around Ha Noi.

Temple in the middle of the lake beside the old quarter.

The lake near the old quarter was fluro green.

A street in the old quarter.

Tim and Jake found one skate spot in Ha Noi. This is Tim showing one of the young guys how to do a trick.

Temple of Literature - these are tomb stones of professors. The Vietnamese go around touching the turtles head. I assume it gives them good luck.

Me at the Temple of Literature. This was a big drum that was on show and it still worked.

Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum. You can't quite see in this photo but there is a large line proceeding all the way to the entrance.

A guard at the mausoleum.

Our favourite restaurant - the Kangaroo Cafe. This was once bangers and mash but I have eaten it all!! Yummy.

This is Tim and his fish and chips!

The locals where these ponchos whenever it rains. It doesn't quite keep you all dry but it is better than not having one.

A man asleep on top of his motorbike.


Poco, the dog.

Bac Ha - Fri 21/05 - Sun 23/05

Bac Ha…The second shorter stop on our mountain region tour after Sapa, Bac Ha is a much less visited destination than our first stop. The town only has about a half a dozen options for accommodation but as we had been given the number of a local guy who runs a home stay we didn’t have to stay in one of the crumby hotels right in the centre of the town. ‘Sa’s Place’ is a home stay run by a guy named Sa and his wife. It’s about two km’s from the town and I thoroughly recommend staying here if you’re ever in Bac Ha. First of all it’s only $5 per person per night and his wife is the most amazing cook. Sa also has a seemingly never ending supply of corn whiskey that gets served up gratis with lunch and dinner and most of the night as well. He also makes his own plum wine and it tastes a lot better than the corn whiskey, let me tell ya. Sa also has a six year old boy who delighted in being read English story books by Kate and was a pretty damn likeable little guy. Sa grows plums, raises about 70 chickens, 4 dogs, 4 cats and a whole other menagerie of animals on his small farm and it is a peaceful respite from the towns where trucks and buses honk their incredibly loud horns unceasingly.

The main reason people come to Bac Ha is the Sunday market where the otherwise sleepy mountain town comes to life and is transformed into a bustling marketplace where all manner of goods and animals can be purchased. It also attracts the colourful flower H’mong people in droves and in their elaborately adorned clothing they make for a pretty unique and special sight. The flower H’mong people walk a very long way to the market along steep mountain roads in order to sell their wares and we saw people leading up to a dozen horses tied to one another and all manner of other livestock like pigs and buffaloes to be sold. The livestock market was a real highlight and I learned that if you need to buy a pig you can purchase him in a sack and then tie him to the back of your motorbike using a special wooden frame, no problem. The water buffalo are tied by their noses to a large rock or stone on the ground as the potential buyer and seller haggle over a fair price. The water buffalo can also be ridden like a horse if you’re not too large and we often saw young children in particular travelling this way.

My plan had been to find the stalls selling corn hooch and sit down and have a few rounds with the boys. Once I found the section selling hooch though I realized that this was a serious whiskey selling site, not a bar, and unless I wanted to purchase a minimum of about ten litres then don’t even bother…The food area was gnarly and the locals took great delight in swilling back entrail soup and all other manner of disgusting and stomach churning delicacies. I wasn’t even going to try to get a seat at one of those tables as I know when I’m beat. Just the smell of walking through this section was enough for me and watching the locals chewing this gunk open-mouthed made me feel ill. The market itself was certainly an eye-opener, don’t even get me started on the meat section, but it was definitely a highlight and well worth taking in.

On another day of gallivanting around the countryside on our bike we took in another smaller market at a place called ‘Can Cau’. This was a place even higher up in the mountains than Bac Ha and was frequented by almost exclusively by Flower H’mong people. The scenery and the people were pretty awesome but the market was only average so we jumped on our bike and blazed on. The road up to a place called ‘Simacai’ passes within about 8 km’s of the Chinese border which you can see clearly from the high mountain road. The scenery here is definitely mind-blowing and we were both loving cruising through it on the bike, passing the hilltribe people and their live-stock on their way to and from market.

At nights we would sit with Sa and his boy as his wife kind of did the cooking and rarely joined in with us. Sa was a wealth of information about everything that he thought was wrong with the way Vietnam is run. It was nice to finally speak to a local who could tell us about what it’s really like to live here. He had some pretty interesting facts like; if you want a good job in the government then you can buy it! Nothing happens here apparently unless you pay for it. So for instance, your job as a government official might cost you $80 000 AUD, but with all the good bribes you’re going to be getting you might make this money back in six months or so. A policeman can make a lot of money by stopping truck drivers and the like and demanding money in exchange for not arresting them. The average government employee wage here is about $150 AUD per month and yet these officials can all afford cars and live in relative luxury by extorting money from the public. This, as Sa explained, is how the country is run. If you can’t pay for a service then you will never receive it, that goes for housing, healthcare, education etc. If you pay some money then you will go straight to the front of the queue. Crazy! I don’t know how this is supposed to reconcile with the official communist status of Vietnam and how everyone is supposed to get an equal share but there you go. Sa regaled us with plenty of examples of how corrupt the government and officials are and it makes you despair when you think of the plight of the overwhelming majority of poor people in this country. Staying with Sa turned out to be an education in itself and it was nice to learn a little about one of the countries we have visited rather than just the usual tourist fare. All too soon it was time to board the overnight train back to Hanoi. A place we had been previously and the capital of communist Vietnam. Hanoi is an ancient city full of history and one of the most interesting ‘old quarters’ of any city in the world. But more about that next time. ‘Til then.

The countryside around Bac Ha.





Xe's House (pronounced Sa's)

Xe's son and me.

Xe's son making monster faces.


The cute kitten. His name was called Snow in Vietnamese. The cats are liked in the country as they eat all the rats.

Xe's house.

The plough that are pulled behind the buffaloes.

Another sort of plough which is also pulled behind the buffalo but is used (I think) to flatten the dirt so that the terrace is even and water is dispersed evenly within the rice terrace. Brett - I can explain this more when I talk to you or mum sometime. The other things are brooms.

Can Cau Market
Below are some colourful pictures of the people at Con Cou market. The colourly dressed minority girls are called Flower H'Mong.



Can Cau market with the mountains in the background.


The horse market. This was situated above the market.

Tim and the motorbike. After the long ride on the motorbike on the dusty ride we decided to invest in face masks to stop us breathing in the dust. Tim got a piece of leopard skin material and I got a material surgical masks (which all the locals wear).

The countryside around Can Cau. This was more impressive that the scenery around Sapa.

Bac Ha Market

The eating area of the market.

Tim getting his first shave and now he gets a barber to shave him.

A horse with the handmade saddle.

Two buffalo fighting.

Buffalo with the view of the Bac Ha market in the background.

Buffalo up close!

Buffalo market. The buffalo are very quiet beasts however they are tied to the rocks.

Flower H'Mong girls again.

Flower H'Mong girls.

Pig packed tightly on the back of the motorbike! Poor piggy!

Millions of baby ducks!

Ploughs being sold at the market. Brett I thought you would like this. These are used on the back of the buffalo to plough the rice terraces.

Sapa - Sun 16/05 - Fri 21/05

Sapa… As I sit here on the third floor balcony of our hotel room overlooking the South China Sea, the rugged mountains and villages of the Sapa region seem a long way away. Due to computer and technical problems we have been unable to keep the blog as up to date as we would like. However Sapa is a place worth remembering and the scenery and landscapes up there are some of the most beautiful we have encountered so far on this trip.

It turned out to be a great time to visit Sapa as it is summer here in Vietnam and the mountains were warm and sunny during the day and refreshingly cool at night. Cool weather is not something we have had a great deal of on our trip and the crisp alpine climate turned out to be a welcome respite from the sultry humidity of Hanoi and the coast. Our plan was to hire a bike at Lao Cai which is where the train from Hanoi terminates and it’s right across a short river bridge from China. From here we would go to Sapa which is about 35km straight up the side of a very large mountain pass and this is exactly what we did. We hired a sweet bike in Lao Cai and after a few test drives, so I could get used to riding a ‘real’ motorbike for once rather than a scooter, we strapped our gear on the back and set out up the pass. It is a picturesque ride up to Sapa from Lao Cai but like most in Vietnam, it’s the sort of road where you have to keep your wits about you. Trucks and buses go hurtling up and down the pass with no regard for sticking to their own side of the road and we turned more than one corner only to come face to face with a group of horses or water buffalo meandering all over the road with no person looking after them in sight.

Sapa itself is a reasonable sized town that is a popular destination for foreign and local tourists who come here to escape the heat of the rest of Vietnam. The town has one defining feature other than its alpine location and that is the presence of the ‘minority’ or hilltribe people. There are numerous different ethnic minority groups here but most people know them as ‘H’mong’ people, but in truth only a small percentage are actually H’mong. They are different from the Vietnamese as they arrived from China a couple hundred years ago and have different cultural practices such as language and, most obviously, dress. The streets are filled with H’mong women dressed in their traditional clothing which includes flowery garments and head dress.

Although they are awesome to look at in their unique clothing they are actually extremely canny and persistent salespeople who see tourists as one of their main sources of income. Many of these women walk up to 15-20km every day to sell their supposedly handmade garments in Sapa. What this means for visitors is that groups of up to ten women and girls are waiting outside your hotel for you to walk out in order for them to then begin trying to sell you something. They are extremely persistent and will follow you wherever you happen to be going, asking you all the stock standard questions they know by rote such as, ‘where are you from?’, ‘you buy something from me?’ and they absolutely refuse to take no for an answer.

This can get a bit much as sometimes you just want to go out to the shop or get something to eat and you have literally a whole gaggle of women bombarding you with questions and pressuring you to buy something. If you say no enough times then they will try to get you to agree to buy something later, tomorrow or next week, whenever! My patience was sorely tested to say the least but Kate being the pillar of patience she is was able to ignore their constant questions and badgering with good humour and a smile, I honestly don’t know how she does it!

One of these particular ladies we met offered to take us to her village the following day to see how they live and have lunch. Her village was about a 10km walk down the valley and we agreed to go to see how the locals really live. Our guide, ‘Cho-cho’, was a bit of a character and as promised the next morning she was waiting outside our hotel to lead us on our long march. The valley itself is a photographer’s dream and Cho-cho had a reasonably good command of English so we passed the time chatting and taking in the awesome scenery.

Before we left Sapa we picked up a chicken from the market for lunch and a cabbage to wash it down with as this was our end of the bargain for her taking us to the village. The walk was pretty easy going downhill and we passed through a couple of other minority villages on the way where the locals come out and once again try to get you to buy things from them. It never ends honestly! I actually got nipped by a dog walking through one of these villages but as I haven’t developed rabies yet I’m assuming it was a ‘clean’ dog, well, about as clean as the dogs over here get!

Once we arrived at Cho-cho’s village of ‘Tevan’ we had a chance to see what life in a minority village is all about. And what it’s all about of course is rice! What else? Well, at least, rice production. There is nothing, and I mean nothing, you can tell the locals about growing rice, they know it all! The enormous valley leading down from Sapa through Cho-cho’s village and beyond is one huge rice terrace. They are so skilled at terracing hillsides here that in some places the rice paddies rise all the way to the summit of the mountains, literally. Near vertical hillsides are no match for the locals and their rice planting endeavours and almost every aspect of rice growing is done by hand. No fancy farm machinery here just a lot of well loved water buffalo, about the most basic plough you can imagine and a whole heap of elbow-grease.

Cho-cho’s family was no different and of about the ten people or so that lived in her wooden, earthen floored shack only her, her daughter and her husband had time to spare to enjoy lunch with us two. Although we didn’t have to pay for anything other than lunch in order for Cho-cho to take us to her village the ‘protocol’ is that we should also buy some of her traditional hand-made garments as a gesture of goodwill. Cho-cho’s nine year old daughter turned out to be a real hard business woman (surprise surprise!) who fleeced me like a pro. Fair dues but now my nieces all have some traditional H’mong bags on the way to them, girls if you’re reading this, I’m too cheap to pay for airmail so they should be there in a couple months!

After lunch was over and the chicken was all gone it was time to pull up stumps and begin our trek back to Sapa. The only problem with walking ten kilometers into a remote village is that you have to walk ten kilometers back! And to top it off we had walked down the valley earlier so now we had to do the ten k’s back uphill. Boo-hoo I hear you sniffle, but you should see the ‘hills’ here! Did I mention Sapa is towered over my Mt Fansipan, the tallest mountain in Vietnam?? No? Well it is, and that means our little ten k trek was going to be a bit tougher than your average Sunday arvo stroll. No matter, we did it and we refused all offers from the guys whizzing past us on motorbikes to give us a ride back to Sapa, for a small fee, and by God we made it. It was more walking than I’ve done in one day for probably, I don’t know, 20 years!! But all in all it was a great day and Cho-cho was a gracious host who taught us a lot about how locals really live here in the remote mountainous region of North Western Vietnam.


As for the rest of our time in Sapa did I mention we had a sweet bike?? Well we did and our days were spent blazing through the high mountains dodging trucks and buffaloes and taking in the spectacular scenery. On one day trip we did a loop up to a remote Chinese border post via another breath-takingly spectacular mountain pass and a buttock shattering twelve km dirt road that threatened to shake our bike to pieces and strip the tyres right off of her. We finally made it to the border crossing and on finding the barrier was up thought we’d just have a little drive down and see what we could see. As we could see a river below us with China obviously on the other side I thought no one would mind if we just cruised up and took a look. Wrong! What seemed to be a deserted border outpost turned out to be anything but, and it appears we woke the guard on duty just out of sight in his barrack. His screams and rants convinced us that maybe just sneaking a bit of a look over the border might not be such a good idea so it was time to turn around and high tail it out of there rather than risk an ‘international incident’.

We blazed up day after day on the bike and explored the main roads and back tracks of the Sapa region. This was hell fun and the Tom Tin pass was especially awesome as the temperature rises by about ten degrees once you’re away from the Sapa side and the ride down the pass is amazing. The road however was anything but amazing and about twenty km’s of slips, gravel and continuous road works made for a challenging but rewarding ride. After a week or so of these kinds of shenanigans it was time to head to another mountain town about 100km’s away for their famous Sunday market where you can drink corn hooch with the locals and buy a fine pig or water buffalo if you’re so inclined. This place sounded pretty sweet and after the tourist badgering streets of Sapa we were both looking forward to it.

Sapa had proved to be an interesting place. The local hilltribe people are aesthetically beautiful and they inhabit an extraordinary part of the world. The only drawback being the way they hassle you constantly to buy things every time you go outside, but away from the town itself this really is a special region. Bac Ha sounded like it would be more chilled but still very interesting as it is the home of the ‘Flower H’mong’ people whose traditional dress is even more colourful than the groups in Sapa. But more about that next time. ‘Til then.



View of Sapa.

View of Sapa from our hotel balcony.

Some tourists being attacked by the local minority people.

Our walk to Ta Van village with Cho-Cho.
Walk to Ta Van village.
Two pals walking along the dirt track.

These cute group of kids asked for a dollar once I had taken the photo.

Water buffalo having a soak in the mud pool.

The rice terraces and the water buffalo.

Huts in Ta Van village. In Ta Van village there are 300 huts which house 3000 people - that is an average of 10 people per hut!

Buffalo ploughing the rice field. The man is in traditional gears which are black jacket and pants. Most of the clothes are dark coloured. If you wear white, you are considered a lazy person so no one wears white here and no wonder as it would be really hard to keep clean!!

View of the hills, huts and rice terraces.

This is the path through the Ta Van village.

Rice terraces. The farmers were preparing the fields to plant rice for the next rice season so there were very few terraces which were lush green. Growing the rice first starts with a few terraces that are packed with rice seedlings and once the seedlings are big enough then the farmers replant them in the the rest of the terraces.

Here they are getting the terraces ready for planting - they are chipping away the weeds from the terrace walls. We didn't find out the reason for this but i am sure there is one - maybe so that the weeds don't soak up all the water??

Tim and Cho-Cho. In the background you can see the mountains we had to walk down to Cho-Cho's village!

A girl we meet on the way to Ta Van village. I took a photo of her and showed her and all along she just gave me this same expression!

Lunch with Cho-Cho's family.

Tim, Cho-Cho and her daughter in front of their hut. Their hut had a hard, dirt floor with at the most three rooms. Cho-Cho's daughter was 12 years old and was on school holidays so she was in Sapa everyday trying to sell her trinkets to all the tourists. Cho-cho said that she does the 10km walk with tourists to her house at least 3 times a week. Her and a few others from her village rent a room in Sapa so that they don't have to walk back to their village every evening.

Tim and Cho-cho's daughter negotiating on the price of bags.

View from the hut onto the family's rice terraces.

Tim drinking tea. For lunch we had steamed chicken (which we bought from the markets in Sapa) and cabbage soup with rice which was kindly cooked by Cho-Cho's husband.

Our long walk back to Sapa.

A man from one of the minority villages looking over the view of the valley.

Walking along the rice terrace walls. You had to be careful not to slip into the muddy water!

Rice terraces. The green terraces are the seedlings being grown for the next crop of rice.

Ride 1: Ride to Sapa
On the 30km, 1000m rise ride from Lao Cai to Sapa we saw some impressive sites. Here are just a few!

The farmers do not use fence here so the animals always wander along the road.

Minority village hut and rice terraces.

Rice terraces.

More rice terraces.

Tim and the beasty bike. We had to make numerous stop because of course, the view but also because our bums would start to get numb!

Ride 2: Ride to no where. We rode for about 30kms which took about 3 hours as the highway was being tar sealed. We ended up going no where but we saw some pretty cool countryside.

Traffic along the highway!

Another view of some awesome mountains.

Another view of the awesome mountains and countryside.

Water fall. This was the best waterfall we have seen so far in SE Asia - very little rubbish and it actually has water in the waterfall!

Ride 3: 100km round trip from Sapa to Ban Vuoc (China border crossing) to Lao Cai (main Chinese boarder crossing) to Sapa.

A drink stop after a 12km, 1.5 hour journey along a very dusty road (which was more like a track)! It was a relief to get off the dusty track and onto the road again!!

Along the road was heaps of green fields filled with rice. We dropped maybe 1000m or so and the weather was a lot hotter compared to Sapa. Sapa on average was around 25 degrees whereas these planes were probably in the 30 degrees.

The dusty road. In our tourist map it said that this road was a main road so we assumed it would be tar sealed - it was a main road as there was a lot of traffic but far from sealed!! The locals could hoon along this road but we could only go 5kms a hour!

Another view of the road.

Tim and the view of Ban Xeo. This was the start of the dusty 9km trek. You can vaguely see the road in the back ground wrapping around the mountains just left of Tim's head.

Some fat pigs and her piglets!

Me and the beasty bike. No I did not actually ride this!