Advertisement
Published: September 27th 2007
Edit Blog Post
We were supposed to spend these past 3 days on a boat exploring the famous karsts (limstone formations that jut out of the sea) of Halong Bay, however, our plans were changed by a tropical storm. All tours to the bay had to be cancelled. Instead we headed a couple hours south to the tiny town of Tam Coc. Situated in some of the most stunning scenery we have seen yet, Tam Coc has karsts of its own, but here they jut out of verdant rice paddies instead of water. We started our visit of Tam Coc by taking a row boat paddled by some locals down a river which ran through three underground caves (Tam Coc means three caves). It reminded Ashlee of a scene from Pirates of the Caribean. Unfortunately, we weren't the only ones with the idea of going to Tam Coc instead of Halong Bay. The river was a bit crowded with other tourists but it didn't detract from the experience much.
Our guides spoke very little English but when they found out we were from Canada they quickly switched to French. That may be the only thing Vietnamese know about Canada - we speak English
and French, oh, and that it is cold too! We stumbled through a few sentences in French in which we established that Ashlee worked in a Cafe, or liked coffee, or that they liked coffee, or that we wanted coffee, or at least we said coffee quite a bit. We were quite excited about this chance to use our very limited French, piecing together questions from our combined vocabulary as best we could. We were quite proud at figuring out how to ask if there were any bats in the caves, but we soon figured out that their French was only slightly better than their English and so chauve sourie (sp?) was completely beyond our topics for the day. I thought better than to extend the conversation to my two favourite french topics: confiture and castor.
As we passed by and under the karsts we noticed little white animals clamboring around on the cliff face, they were in fact mountain goats. Quite similar in appearance to those we have in Canada. As we noticed on our menu that evening, they are also a specialty of the region. We decided against eating goat since it seemed a little weird but
I am sure they would have been quite tasty. One thing about the Vietnamese that we have noticed throughout our travels is how agile they are with their feet. Probably the best example we have seen was in the way that the people of Tam Coc rowed their boats. They would switch between rowing with their arms and their legs as they got tired of one or the other.
We spent the night in Tam Coc, where we stayed in a hotel with a view right over the river, definitely our nicest view from a hotel window yet. Most of our other hotel windows have looked out at the brick wall of the next building that was obviously constructed after the window was installed. We spent the evening sitting on the terrace drinking local bia (beer in Vietnamese), playing cards, and reading our books. Quite relaxing. Interestingly, quite a few of the beers in Vietnam are made under the supervision of the Danish, I'm not really sure what that means or why they need to be supervised but this might be where Calsberg got its Elephant mascot. The next morning we slept in until 10, a rare occurence in
this country where it seems everything starts at 6 or 7 AM. (Ashlee: hard to believe that Patrick can wake up so early, I know!) We woke up to a town almost completely transformed from the day before when it felt like we were in Vietnam's most popular tourist destination. By this time Tam Coc had been forgotten since apparently Halong Bay had been reopened. We then spent the rest of our morning peddaling around the country side on our way to Bich Dong pagoda a few Km away. On our way there I was obliged to give a ride to a teenage boy who thought it would be fun to jump on the pannier rack of my bike. It was a bit unnerving at first since I had no idea of his intentions but he jumped off after a few meters so I guess it was just a stunt to impress his friends and to see my reaction. It is amazing how the Vietnamese use bikes as a mode of transportation, often you see one person peddaling with another person (or two) on the pannier rack of the bike. They are always impressing us with their creativeness!
The
amazing thing about Bich Dong Pagoda is that it is built on the cliff face of one of these karsts. It is a series of three pagodas at different heights which are connected by a treacherous set of stairs cut into the cliff as well as winding through caves. Looking up at the karst you would never believe it was possible to walk up it, but is really the connections of caves that make it possible. As you climb up, it is like it is raining since water runs off the cliffs and cave roofs above keeping you cool, as well as ensuring that the steps are sufficiently slippery. As we entered one of the caves, I couldnt help but think of the hall of the dead in Lord of the Rings (sorry for all the cheezy movie references). I think both of us agree that Tam Coc and especially Bich Dong were our favourite destinations of the trip so far. It was really nice to get away from the main tourist trail and see some sights on our own. In our whole time in Bich Dong we only saw 2 other tourists!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.087s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 12; qc: 61; dbt: 0.0555s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb