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Published: February 4th 2008
Ha Long Bay
the stunning and mysterious islands in this incredible bay - A Unesco world heritage site and our favourite place in Vietnam - truly stunning!Day 331 to Day 346 (13.11.2007 - 28.11.07)
Vietnam
For Vietnam, we had to prepare ourselves, and as it happened we had been forewarned by travellers we had met before hand of the do’s and don’ts as well as things to watch out for (scams, knickers thieves, hand bag snatchers and the general rudeness of the Vietnamese). Vietnam seemed to be one of those countries one either loves or loathes and that would depend entirely on particular experiences. Bearing in mind then the countries overwhelming sense of joyful lawlessness, their troubled past and the people’s ‘living in the moment’ spirit we were actually rather looking forward to a few weeks in the Wild West of Vietnam, particularly after spending some time in the extremely relaxing Laos!
Vietnam stretches over 1600km along the east coast of the Indochinese peninsula. The long narrow country see’s most people living along the one main highway which joins Hanoi with Hoi Chi Minh City and every town in between. It is a country of surprising dramatic landscapes with several interesting geological features, but with low environmental consciousness, that compounded with rapid industrialisation, deforestation, dramatic increase in motorbike usage and severe pollution
Pet Food
in the markets in Hanoi, we saw many seeming Pet Shops, only these shops sold pets for humans to eat....not exactly nice to see! means that the future of Vietnam’s environment is unfortunately seriously threatened.
Vietnam is a nation of determined optimists who have weathered war upon war, survived colonialism, a closed society and Communist rule and have come out alive and kicking, moving on from yesterday and not worrying about tomorrow. With their entire history to back them up, the Vietnamese have a national identity that they take passionate pride in. Having defended their sovereignty as a nation from the Chinese to the French, the Vietnamese have a collective strength and sense of self that keeps Vietnam bouncing back. They are joyful, intense people, quick on the mark to make a deal and have an intact culture so strong that it is enviable. Though some travellers are rerouting their plans from tsunami-affected neighbouring countries, Vietnam has as yet had a slow growth in tourism, with most people avoiding the region altogether.
The ‘Vientiane to Hanoi’ Bus Journey
Despite all we had heard and read about this famously bad journey, we had simply no choice but to follow the backpackers before us who had experienced this “nightmare” of a journey, as time was short, the airfare was 11 times
Vietnamese Food.....noodles
the staple diet is not rice but noodles here in Vietnam, here in a corner-side Hanoi locals restaurant we had the cheapest bestest noodles we had in our whole time in Vietnam more expensive and the other border crossings were either closed or much too far away. Having survived the terrible local bus ride from Hauy Xai to Luang Prabang in Laos - we thought we could handle anything! Thankfully despite being long, it was actually not to too bad, perhaps the sheer number of foreigners doing this route has improved conditions recently although we have since heard much more unfortunate experiences. We were treated to blaring Loa musical talents on the onboard TV for the whole 24hours bus ride, bad smells, bags of grain sliding up and down the aisles with every turn, dodgy sparking electrics and red overhead lighting and of course the all-too- frequent pointless stops. Aside from the two and a half tedious stop off at the border, where seemingly incompetent Vietnamese officials raided the bus, obviously suspecting drug smuggling or something of the like, either that or they just liked showing us we were in Vietnam now and they liked to make things difficult, just like getting a visa was - yet they are suspicious by nature after all that’s happened to them!! However after a frustratingly long wait in the 6am frosty foggy morning cold we
Haipong harbour
awaiting departure from this ridiculously crowded harbour for our tour around Halong Bay, we had time to take in some Vietnamese sun!! had made it to Vietnam! And boy did we know it...much unlike the peaceful, calm and almost sleepy winding mountain roads in Laos, the noise, chaos, motorbikes and horn beeping of Vietnam’s one and only highway certainly woke us up to the fact that we were indeed in completely different country now!
Hanoi
Capital of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Hanoi is a frenzy of old and modern, shabby and sophisticated. The city is coolly romantic and is a blend of French colonial flair and vintage Vietnam. The labyrinthine of cobbled and crowded little streets wind through and around the city creating an bustling and alive cultural centre overflowing with cyclists, motorbikes, women balancing fruit on their shoulders and a magnitude of smells so diverse it’s almost too much at times.
Hanoi is a colourful, smelly, overcrowded, polluted, and totally mad city - where cyclists and motorbikes fill the streets and the windy, tiny, long, narrow, cobbled streets cause you to be constantly confused but always pleasantly surprised by what you come across....it is truly crazy but we liked it a lot, at least for a few days! One day however, Kate was naively upset
Ha Long Bay
just a 3hr drive from Hanoi, lies a bay of more than 3000 limestone islands. Pirate-type ships sails around and inbetween them, a journey like something set back in time! - in the market we saw an old lady take a cat out of the cage where there were probably 10 more, and put it in a bag and then knot the bag up, give it to the man and take the money - Christian told me that was that mans dinner tonight and to get used to it quick as around the corner were literally hundreds of cages stuffed with dogs/cats/bunnies/tortoises/rats/birds and so many things more - this is a sight that has probably shocked me the most so far in the trip - animals as food that we think of as pets! We spent a few days wandering around, getting lost and eating noodles and vegetables on the street corners of Hanoi, wandering around the huge indoor/outdoor 4 floor markets which sold everything you would and would not want to buy, and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island
A Unesco World Heritage Site and one of Vietnam’s natural wonders, Ha Long Bay, with more than 3000 islands rising from the clear emerald waters of the Gulf of Tonkin was definitely one of our favourite places. The vegetation covered islands, are
Sunset Cat Ba Island, Ha Long Bay
we stayed in the ghost town on Cat Ba island, the only inhabited island in Ha Long Bay, the sunset was beautiful, but the town was nothing special dotted with innumerable grottos and are wonderful when cruised around by boat for the day, feeling like something from a pirate tale.
The weather in central and southern Vietnam was pretty bad at this time in our trip, and so we chose to stay on the biggest of the 3000 islands for a few days where the sun was shining and it was really rather nice. As the only populated island in Ha Long bay, Cat Ba town itself, where most of the 7000 islanders live was a bit of a ghost town that had possibly seen better days though we doubt this as tourism is just picking up here. The government controlled tourism resulted in numerous similar sea front hotels and restaurants all with identical rooms and menu’s, not surprising then that the average traveller spends only one night here. With the great weather, cloudless clear blue skies where we watched the sun go down each night from our balcony - the biggest reddest sun that you could imagine Vietnam to have. We were pleasantly surprised too that there were 3 pretty good white sand beaches on the island as we thought our beach days were over on this
Cat Co 2!
beach 2 on Cat Ba island, we found this beach and we were delighted as we thought we'd seen the beach for the last time in Thailand, it was great! trip, so we found ourselves relaxing for a few days on the beach and walking the boardwalk around the limestone cliff-face walls around the island. We decided against hiring a motorbike to explore the islands numerous grottos, lakes, waterfalls and spectacular limestone hills due to our lack of motoring experience and the hospital being a 3 hour boat ride back to mainland, and instead wandered around on foot. There were many house-boats to admire as they colourfully lit up the little harbour with their on-site restaurants and fish-farms below - life on the island seemed to have chosen to steer clear of the chaos and pollution of mainland.
We celebrated Kate’s (23rd) birthday here too, in an exclusive 5* resort with its own private bay, which we discovered one afternoon whilst exploring the island by foot - it was truly paradise here even with the unfortunate cloud cover by now, and honestly we hardly believed we were in Vietnam! One day we spontaneously decided to swim the 400m or so out from the beach to one of the many islands, which after an exhausting swim was a tricky climb up the razor-blade sharp limestone rock that rose up out
Our little island!
this island is special to us, we swam out the 400m or so and climbed up the spikey rocks...it was an incredible view!! of the sea...the view was definitely worth it and the experience incredible.
Hoi An
At the time we wanted to visit this famed little town, in the district of Da Nang and surrounding areas which included Hoi An had unfortunately been experiencing terrible floods in the days prior to our visit, the Thu Bon River had exploded its banks due to terrible rains and devastated neighbouring homes and businesses, up to 160 people died in less than 2 weeks. So changing our plans, we went elsewhere for a while until the road south was open again and we could get there. The 18hour or so bus ride south from Hanoi was actually rather pleasant much to our surprise. We got onboard the brand new ‘sleeper-bus’ which despite our apprehensions turned out to be exactly what we were sold - a bus with beds, dvd player, toilet, water machine, and complete with pillows and duvets, it was a refreshing change to the rusty old, smelly death traps we had grown used to!
The little colonial streets of Hoi An were still enchanting even though they showed clear signs of flooding, with water still filling some of
Sunrise Resort, Cat Ba Island, Ha Long Bay
here's the 5* luxury resort we splashed our on for Kate's 23rd birthday...just a shame the sun didn't show its self, it was a fab place regardless though! the low-lying streets, the buildings looking mouldy and disfigured, but the Vietnamese were typically getting on with things - adopting a business as usual approach and fully flaunting their ‘hand-made-to-order-suits’ on every doorstep. As early as the 17th Century, Hoi An was known internationally as a prominent trading port. Hoi An old town is a recognised Unesco World Heritage Site, and wandering around the cobbled streets, it is easy to imagine how it looked 150 years ago. Famous for its tailoring, there are more than 300 shops to choose from, with their proud owners standing in the doorframes trying to woo you in, thankfully we had been recommended ‘Impressions tailors’ by some friends of ours and so we didn’t have to trawl around trying to choose one from another. We were delighted to get Christian a handmade three-piece perfect fit suit for £40, a bargain and display of expert tailoring!! Aside from shopping in the central market, wandering around the antique shops, we ate very well in the multitude of restaurants and coffee shops and simply admired the charm of this little town.
It was unfortunate for us, that it being rainy season, the south-central coast of Vietnam had
The resort again!
view from the beach, this was at sunrise, so no one else was up yet!! been taking a battering from repeated cyclones for the past few weeks and so the areas between Hoi An, Nha Trang and Saigon were not very enticing - heavy rain, sea weed filled beaches and debris filled towns meant we got back on the sleeper-bus some 28 hours further south to the capitals rival, Ho Chi Minh City.
Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)
HCMC (previously known as Saigon) is a nonstop, continuous sound-track city of movement, noise and smells with a river of chaotic traffic that only ebbs in the early hours. It is a 24-hour centre of pilgrims seeking fortune and livelihood that does not rest for anything and seems to be a more modern metropolis than its rival, Hanoi. Arriving early evening one Saturday, after a long long time on the bus, we were met with a busier-than-usual city, with all the hotels claiming no vacancies, so with our multitude of bags in hand, the group of us that needed a room set about the laborious task of fighting off touts and not getting wildly ripped off - not exactly easy. Some hours later and in the days that followed we sampled the cuisines
Bday morning!
bright and early, we got some champers in, the only kind we could buy here was more than 2yrs out of date, and red! it did have bubbles thankfully! of the countless restaurants, bars and coffee houses in the chaotic back to back streets of district 1, downtown HCMC.
Cu Chi Tunnels
The tunnel network at Cu Chi, became legendary for its role in facilitating the Viet Cong in their control of a large rural area in the 1960’s. Just 30km from Saigon, the tunnels are a must-see for anyone wanting to better appreciate the history and struggles that the Vietnamese have faced. The tunnel system, that reached from Saigon to the Cambodian border, was more than 200km in length at Cu Chi alone.
Our guide Bihn, was an inspirational man, who wrought with guilt and regret, fought for the Americans against his own people, and had an interesting take on the war which he shared passionately with us for the whole day and definitely brought the experience to life. Before entering the reconstructed part of the tunnel system that is open to tourists, we were shown a series of videos showing footage from the war that had a strong overtone of dislike for the Americans, the overall message and highlighted part of the film being ‘ways in which we killed Americans’, with photographs
Cat Ba harbour
house boats and fishing boats line the peaceful harbour here! and trophies for people who killed record numbers of Americans, after which we were guided around the area, shown sniper holes, handmade traps ‘to kill Americans’, abandoned American tanks and weaponry, before finally we were taken into the tunnels themselves. Following closely behind our guide, who was appropriately dressed in full Viet Cong uniform, we gained an empathetic, if claustrophobic, awe for the people who lived for weeks on end underground....and we only crawled hands on knees on ground for 140m in the stuffy, dusty, pitch black tunnel, before resurfacing in the hospital bunker, that was only big enough for 3 people at one time. Later, we were taken to the open-shooting range, where for a few pounds you were encouraged to shoot away with the gun of your choice - Christian took this opportunity to fire ten bullets from a Kalashnikov - the noise was way too overbearing for spectators!!
Following the theme of Vietnam’s war history, a visit to the War Remnants Museum was mandatory to our understanding of the Vietnamese’s reactions and characteristics in present day life. Documenting the atrocities of war, the museum is unique and brutal with displays including retired artillery pieces, the tiger
Best Coffee in the world......
.....or so we think - the Vietnamese coffee drunk like this was by far the best we have drank on the trip and in general...it smelled like chockolate and tasted velvety...it was sooo good! cages used to house Viet Cong prisoners and a heartbreaking array of photographs of the victims of war - particularly highlighting the effects of the USA’s Agent Orange and the torture endured - not for the fainthearted!
Vietnamese Coffee
Undoubtedly the best coffee we have drank on this trip was here in Vietnam, their dark, strong ‘Vietnam coffee’ is really extremely good and often comes with the condensed milk that has grown on us by now - however is delicious black, and with ice on a stuffy sunny afternoon, and has a chocolate aroma with a rich smooth taste....we drank a lot of it in case you were wondering! Previously being unaware of this good coffee, it came as a nice surprise to us and we thoroughly enjoyed drinking lots and lots of it.
What was interesting to see and almost as associated with the Vietnamese as their triangular straw hats is their face-masks - safeguarding the commuters, mainly women and children from the polluted streets that are choco-blocked with motorbikes, cars and buses - one step forward into the dangers of pollution but not really effective long term, but then they are ‘living for
Hoi An Floods
this little town on the coast in the central region of Vietnam was famous for its tailor shops, just a week before we were here the area experienced terrible floods, many people died and the effects were still evident close to the river banks the moment’.
Another thing that was hard not to notice was that males had close-contact relationships - boys and men often walk around/stand around with their arm in arm or enveloping each other, whereas heterosexual displays of affection in public are not encouraged - this we have heard is similar to what happens in India where affectionateness is suppressed.
We loved Vietnam, and were constantly pleasantly surprised by just about everything from the landscapes to the Vietnamese themselves. We survived on a diet of noodle soup and fried vegetables, too afraid to try the meat alternative for fear of what that unidentifiable dish might actually contain. By this point we have both become masters of the chopsticks as cutlery was really non-existent in most places we went to.
At this point, we were trying to make the absolute most of the last 5 weeks until it would all be over and just memories, while running out of money, getting slightly fed up with noodles and rice, but still having the time of our lives. The last leg of our journey is next: China and Hong Kong.
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Linda
non-member comment
Cats should be cuddled not eaten!!
Hey. Cool pics, yeah felt a tad claustrophobic too when seeing them tunnels... Dont think i dare show them pics to mum;) Hope you guys are good, and good luck to Chris for wednesday!!! Hopefully you will make it so we will have you over here soon!! Lots of kisses and hugs to you both. xxxxx