Blogs from North Central Coast, Vietnam, Asia - page 88

Sun 19th: Left Hue early to head down to Hoi An. The scenery was absolutely beautiful....lush green and heavily forested hills interspersed with rice paddies and quaint villages with traditional timber houses. At Da Nang we visited the Cham Museum which I found interesting but others found as boring as watching paint dry...full of sandstone carvings of old Hindu gods 'n' goddesses. Stopped off at Marble Mountain and climbed Water Mountain to have a squizz at the view over China Beach and also the caves which contain many Buddhas. Went for a walk on China Beach and each one of us was accompanied by one of the locals. Mine was a 12 year girl with really good Englis. However, as in the rest of Vietnam you are always wondering either "What do they want?" or "How ... read more

so i managed to get out of my league of gentlemen hotel in hanoi and managed to avoid paying my minibar fees (the guy was asleep at the front desk). after making my way down to the old quarter of hanoi, i was lumped on a bus at 7.30 am (painfull for me) and we went tootling around to find my new friends for the next 3 days. today was halong bay day and it was an awesome day. in total there were 10 of us. me, five germans, one english, one swede and two canadians. after about 3 hours we finally arrived in halong city and boarded our large junk, which was pretty damn nice, despite the occasional roach in the toilets. the day was spent travelling through the bay where rougly 3000 karsts rise ... read more

Very nearly didn't make our bus to Hue, after our huge night out in Hoi An the night before. Slept through our alarm and didn't wake up until reception was banging on our door because the bus was already outside! Hadn't packed at all, but somehow managed to stumble out of our room with all our stuff, feeling SHOCKINGLY bad, and spent most of the bus journey trying not to be sick! But randomly had our 'toilet stop' was in a gorgeous 5* hotel right by the beach, which was definitely a nice change from dirty wooden shacks in the middle of nowhere in Cambodia, where toilets consist of a sloping floor to pee on and snack stalls only sell deep fried bugs.... On our bus journey, we passed the most beautiful landscape I've seen in ... read more

Another couple of quick updates - It's been a week since I last blogged, so once again, I'm a little behind. First news is that I now have a new camera. It's got a cool optical zoom, manual and automatic modes, about 15 "scene" modes like incandescent light etc, bells, whistles and even a fold-out detachable kitchen sink. Okay, so I lied about the bells. The pictures I can take with it are much better than what I could take with my old one. Either way, you've got pictures now to prove it. The day after my unsuccessful incident-report hunt, we took a motorbike tour around the nearby demilitarised zone (or DMZ). This was the area on the border between North (Communist) Vietnam and South (Capitalist) Vietnam in the years before war broke out. The idea ... read more

We booked a direct bus from Phnom Penh all the way to Ho Chi Minh City or Saigon as it used to be called. After some absolutely monumental faffing at the border that turned a simple passport stamping into a two hour ordeal we were in Vietnam and on our way to Saigon. We were dropped in the middle of backpacker central and immediately set upon by a wall of touts, although we are pretty used to it by now and can hold a decent conversation between ourselves ignoring the talking coming from all sides, which as any of you who've been in this part of the world know is an ability you quickly learn, along with the sidestepping and polite 'no thanks' repeatedly to all manner of fruit sellers, moto drivers, hotel touts, fake book ... read more