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Published: October 4th 2006
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The International Spacehopper Display Team
This photo makes Emma laugh every time she sees it. Never, never, never get your Hanoi train ticket from the smiling lady who has the travel concession in the Vietnamese passport control building. True to her word, the minibus with the screaming banshee did pick us up from the hotel (our earlier telephone call may have helped in this) and she did meet us at the station with some train tickets. However, not until we boarded the train two and a half hours later, did we find out that our soft sleeper tickets where in fact hard sleeper tickets. We don't mind hard sleeper but when you pay extra for soft sleeper you want soft sleeper. Added to this, even though we had middle bunks, a Vetnamese family had moved in to them (mother, baby, grandmother, small child and two able bodied middle aged men) and relegated us to the top bunks. After checking our tickets again and confirming that we were booked on the middle bunks, the women just pointed at the children, indicating that they could not carry them up to the top bunk. Whilst their two male companions did not assist,so we were guilted into accepting the top bunks. As the train pulled out of the station I
was overjoyed to find out that both the mother and the young child had hacking coughs (this added to the noise of the official tannoy system that you could not turn off), Emma discretely put some cough sweets on the table in the hope that this would aid a restful night.
Emma: As you can tell, Marc did not much enjoy this journey. I on the other hand slept like a log.
The train pulled into Hanoi station at about 5am so it was still dark but the station was a hive of activity. We took a taxi to the old quarter (even though he used the meter, we were severely had on the price) and whilst I was getting the packs out of the boot, Emma was been fleeced by a woman selling rolls. All of this was not the best start in the world but as they say, it's always darkest before the dawn. They are right, because when the dawn came and we walked around the lake, the world seemed a much better place.
Having had a leisurely drink over looking the lake, went into a few camera shops, started looking for a replacement camera
and ended up buying it from the first shop we went into (it was a Cannon Power Shot S3is if your interested).
Emma said that she would like to go on a walking tour of the old quarter, so we used the one out of the bible (Lonely Planet). I acted as guide and Emma as the tourist. All the shops in any given street sell the same things so there is toy street, shoe street, grave stone street and temple street (where you can get shrines, alters, inscents and counterfeit money for burning as offerings to satisfy ghosts and ancestors). We visited the oldest temple in town and the food markets that sell all the food as fresh as can be. So much so that if it breaths you have to kill it before you can eat it. It was a hot day so we made a lot of stops in bars and cafes to cool down and refresh ourselves and finished the tour at the Roman Catholic cathederal (which could do with lick of paint). So with the tour at an end, I waited patiently for my tip (it never came) and we headed back to our
hotel.
Next day it was off to see Uncle Ho to decide for ourselves if he is real or just wax (I think wax) and then on to the quiet Temple of Literature, followed by the Fine Arts Museum. The Museum had a great temporary display of Australian moden ceramics, as well as a comprehensive collection of contemporary Vietnamese painting and pottery, the pieces from around the 40's & 50's caught Emma's eye in particular. The ride back to the hotel on the cycle rickshaw was a real thrill a minute, heading into on coming traffic with gay abandon at every junction but we did make it back in one piece.
In the evening it was off to the theatre for a bit of culture .......... well water puppets. This type of show originated in the countryside and was performed by local puppeteers in the flooded paddy fields during the wet season. We both enjoyed the ten or so short scenes and Emma thought that Jenny (having studied puppets for her masters), might have particularly like it. On the way back that evening, we decided that we would go to Halong Bay for a couple of days. We
stopped off at the Tamarind restaurant for supper and went to the Handspan booking office at the back and booked a trip for the next day. We then went across the road and booked our train tickets to Hue. After which we wentback to the hotel, packed and had an early night, to be back at the Tamerine by 8am the next day.
In the morning we arrived bright eyed and bushey tailed for our new adventure. A very nice coach picked us up and took us to Halong Bay and we arrived about lunch time. We boarded our boat eight person boat (the Lagoon Explorer) which transpired to be ourselves and six very friendly Australians. We put our luggage in our rooms, then went back on deck for lunch, where we introduced ourselves. Veronica and Sue who had been friends since school, (Veronica the elegant dedicated parent and Sue the adventurous jet setter), John and Denice on their first international holiday for a long time and Coby and Nadia a mother and daughter on a jolly. Whilst we were eating our lavish lunch and sipping our cocktails, the boat sailed through the striking karsts to a floating village,
where even the school is a boat.
After lunch which we all went for a paddle in kyeacks into a cave that opened out into a quiet lagoon and then on to an island with a small sandy beach. We got back to our boat just as the sun was starting to set, so we dried off and arrived on deck just in time for cocktails and dinner. Another wonderful meal, with great company and after a few more drinks, we were all ready to turn in, as tomorrow started at 8am again.
After breakfast it was off to the Hang Sung Sot cave, with its huge caverns and every other rock formation supposedly looking like somthing that you can't quite see even if you squinted. Then back to the boat to sail back to port, to have one last feast with our brilliant shipmates.
The boat trip was over far far to soon and it was with a heavy heart that we got back on the coach and went back to Hanoi to get out first experience of a soft sleeper (second time lucky).
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Gez
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Good to Hear and See From You
Good to hear that you are both OK - Work is so stressful at the moment that I have been turning to your blog entries as a way to get away - far far away, from it all for the time it tkes me to read your entry - I would highly recommend it as a stress buster. I might need my glasses' checked but I Could See Trees !! Keep Well, Happy and Safe Love from Gez and family