It was tough to leave Hoi An so quickly. It had become a very restful city...the weather was predictable...each day around 1:00 pm, it would rain like Hell for awhile then stop. It was a way to tell time so you didn't have to carry your watch. But as comes with travel, the time to move on was at hand. It was surprisingly easy...taxi to DaNang then fly down the coast to Nha Trang and a whole new area and mentality. The flight down the coast was routine and uneventful until the approach to the city when turbulence seemed a little [View Full Entry]

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The few things that I managed to do in Hué made me very sorry that I had not planned a longer stay than the few hours I had. I think it is easliy worth a stay of four or five days including the surrounding area. The people seemed very friendly and easy going..more than willing to help you, if you needed it. I was moving on though..and Hoi An was a reasonable destination. After boarding a very comfortable, air-conditioned bus we left by almost the same route as in and then hit the highway. Again, the scenery conspired to keep me [View Full Entry]

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After a night bus ride with the secretive and seedy driver and his attendant to Hué, we were literally dumped off at a small hotel across from the local travel agent taking care of the Hanoi/Hué leg and arranging the transfers to Hoi An, I was so tired from lack of sleep, all I wanted to do was sleep on the sidewalk in front of the agency. There was however, a local with a motorbike who apparently had plans for me. He kept talking to me about the sights in Hué and while I did want to do things to help [View Full Entry]

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The day after the day-trip to Hoa Lu and Tam Coc, the typhoon finally arrived in Hanoi. Not a big blustery wind that picked up houses and dropped them on witches an such...but just rain...LOTS of Rain. It would come literally without warning. You could be walking down the street and one drop..then two...then a million times a million drops. The vendors that sold plastic coverings and coats sales immediately went through the roof. I bought one and still have it though I haven't had to use it since...a nice souvenir. What to do in a typhoon-created monsoon..well...sit around and watch...be [View Full Entry]

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A typhoon was bearing down on the north coast of Vietnam but was hanging in the China Sea, gaining strength. It was the break we needed for a quick day trip to two sites..one was called Hoa Lu, a small temple complex with Buddhist backgrounds and still in use as a worship centre. The age of complex somehow escaped my ears. The drive there was in an absolutely packed minibus with an air-conditioning system that must have been turned off to add to the already diminished horsepower of the vehicle. This did not keep the driver from forcing his way out [View Full Entry]

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So...after wandering a bit on my first night, I discovered that Hanoi was not the lawless, bag-snatching Hell hole I had been led to believe. Though the hawkers were a bit of a pain in their tenaciousness to sell you a hat or a fan or a multitude of other relatively simple and limited use items, no one tried to rob me or take my shoulder bag or steer me down a blind, dark alley to mug me. In fact, most of them smiled and said ' hello ' and offered mototaxis and things...but not once did I feel threatened one [View Full Entry]

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The morning of July 8th was a little sad and somewhat mixed with apprehension. I was led to believe that Vietnam was a relatively lawless place where I would wear my daypack on my chest and hug it closely...then run for the hotel as the sunset. I was soothed by the comfort of the bus ride from Nanning to the border at Pingxiang and some great conversation with a Laotian ex-pat and his wife from Belgium. The scenery was beautiful and soft on the eyes with many forested towers and large ponds which I assumed are fish farms. The scene at [View Full Entry]

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After my brief day trip to Beihai on the Gulf of Tonkin, I bussed back to Nanning and grabbed a taxi into the city. The drivers at the bus depot are not so picky and greedy as those at the airport and it was easy to find one that didn't mind the casual drive into the ' old city ' on the metered rate. As we drove through the new section, I remembered my drive in the previous night and my mind went back to Chongqing and the lights on the buildings. It was such a wonderful sight to see the [View Full Entry]

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As I move on from Chongqing to Nanning, I recall what I said of Chengdu...that it absorbed me and excepted me regardless of my place of origin and my language. Chongqing was not so kind...I had to try to become one of it's sons....I ordered seafood dumplings ( being a ' seafood/fish only/vegetarian ' type of an eater ) and I repeated at least five times ... " seafood.." reply.. ' yes ' ... " seafood.. " ' yes ' ... yet in my very first taste, there was the distinct taste, smell and texture of pork. After years and years [View Full Entry]

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My last full day in Chongqing was filled by a tour to Baoding Shan at Dazu, about 100km west of Chongqing. When I first signed up for the tour through a friend, I had envisioned a comfortable bus with reclining seats and full windows with bottled water...afterall, the cost was not minimal. Well, the cost may not have been minimal but the tour bus was. Taken by a minibus to a lesser minibus seemed somewhat redundant and I was a bit embarrassed when I started to board the bus I have described above. Much to my chagrin, I was packed into [View Full Entry]

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