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We arrived in Ninh Binh after a short bus trip from Hanoi, we were met by staff from the hotel by motorbike, Stu had his backpack on his back, but my driver took it off me and slung it over the handle bars and we were off, great fun!
The next day we hired 2 bikes with drivers and they took us to Tam Coc (Ngo Dong River, 9km from Ninh Binh) to see the caves and stunning scenery. We thought it would be very much like Yangshou in China and Halong Bay in Vietnam but this took our breathe away it was just amazing, with the huge rocks formations, paddle fields and little back roads, it was a really hot day, we went through small villages, seeing what goes on but our first stop was 480 steps up to a great viewing point, there was a good view of where we will be going later on the row boats.
The boat trip was really nice, very quiet, just small boats going up and down and it took around 2hrs, it was a mother and daughter taking us around, the men or women rowing would use their feet to
row so they can lie back and relax at work, just the thought of that gives me cramp in my toes.
There were 3 caves we went through, 1st cave was 127m long called Hang Ca, 2nd 70m Long called Hang Giua and 3rd 40m long called Hang Cuoi.
I was a soft touch and bought a nice hand embroided table cloth, Stu got the price down from $USD15 to $11USD, bargain!
The next day we hired our bikes with drivers again and went to the National Park called Cuc Phuong for a 2hr hike in the jungle and saw the oldest tree, cave and lots of bugs, luckly we met a really nice Scottish couple called Ruth and Scott and she was just like me, screaming and running when we saw anything move. We went to a small Primate Rescue Centre and saw some Gibbons, Langur and their babies. On the way back we drove through back roads to villages and we stopped off at a cave, they gave us a torch and off we went, we were the only ones there, it was great!
Our last day we again our on the bikes to
a local floating village, it was a 2 hr boat trip up the river and there was no other tourists about so we had a massive boat to ourselves all for 2 pounds, we were taken to a point where we could get off and walk to a cave, but after we walked there was realised we did the cave the day before but it was to have a walk with no one else around in the sunshine.
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