Hanoi & halong bay

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Happy holidays to all of you

If you are receiving a blog for the first time from me - Welcome!

Currently I am back in Hanoi trying to get caught up with my photos (as well as my blogs). Hopefully I will be back on the road tomorrow (Christmas day) heading south and eventually to Cambodia, then maybe back to thailand and after that I am really not sure.

Time is just flying by. I can't believe that New Years is just around the corner and that i have been in Vietnam for a month. And why I have been here for a month I don't.

i took a bus from muang khau, Laos to Dien bien phu in Vietnam. if you don't have a Vietnam visa, you can't get one at the border so don't try this border crossing. well actually if you don't have a Vietnamese visa you can't get it at any border crossing. The bus, i believe a 20 passenger or so bus was jammed pack with people, rice and oranges. the last two rows of the bus was loaded with about 3 tons of oranges. there were 5 foreigners on the bus and we had the "last row" we sat on top of rice bags and some of the people had to put their feet on top of rice bags. The locals were just as crammed in there as we were. great the system just crashed an i lost a lot so i will keep it short. the next day we took a very crowded and dusty bus to son la where we spent the night and then took a bus the next day to hanoi. One thing about bus travel in northern Vietnam - the women, not all of them get motion sickness. they are throwing up into bags and out the windows. usually when the bus come to a stop you will see them lean out the window and you know. be careful when passing a stopped bus or you may get a little dirty. i passed a stopped bus on my recent motorcycle trip and luckily the woman who leaned out the window to throw up missed us!

Some observations of Vietnam (well Hanoi, halong by and the northern part anyway) and these are just observations. The people are very profit/money motivated. Everywhere you turn someone is trying to sell you something and I don't mean just the street vendors or annoying moto-taxi guys. You constantly hear buy from me, hey Mr. buy from me. The women walking around the streets carrying a ton of things will always come up to you with a smile and ask you to buy something. you say no and they will leave with a smile on their face - bless them. If they aren't trying to sell you something they are still trying to get your money, be it a taxi with a "fast meter" or "school girls" pretending to be collecting money for the red -cross. If they can't do it this way then they will just make something happen.

(by the way, If you get tired of reading check out some of the 57 photos that i have in this blog)

on my recent motorcycle trip the bike was leaking a little oil and i wanted to make sure that it didn't "run out" of oil so i took it to a little "shop" in a village and my guide asked the guy to check the oil (i didn't have tools) and what does the guy do? he changes the oil and charges me an inflated price. I asked my guide to tell the guy that i wasn't going to pay for it since i didn't ask for it and she got afraid because she is a minority (h'mong) and most Vietnamese treat them with very little respect. Ie yelling at them, pushing them out of the way ... she was afraid to tell the guy and so i had to pay him. This is just a typical daily example

In sapa if you walk into a little shop they will start to grab things off the wall and say buy from me. Without asking the price they will of course throw out a very high price. You tell them politely no thank you (especially since you didn't ask to see it in the first place) and then they will grab your arm and say, "ok how much you pay?". In Hanoi, like many places in the world you need to find out what the "local" price is otherwise you will be overpaying by a lot. Yesterday i went into a shop where i had bought a bag of M&Ms before and I asked the price and the guy told me a price about 20% higher (i know this isn't a very inflated price, it's just an example) than i paid the previous time. No worries this is common, i grabbed the bag and showed him the price (one of the few places that used price tags) and he kept trying to charge me the higher price and not the one that was marked on the bag. All this is probably a result of tourism/capitalism.

hotels, if you come to Hanoi the first thing they will ask you is where are you going from here. Here's a tip, don't tell them. If you do, they will tell you to buy the "tour" from them and everyday they will ask you to buy from them(which is ok) and if you don't here is what will likely happen. They will tell you to leave the hotel the next day (i talked to a few people not staying a my hotel who had this happened to them), or they won't let you leave your luggage with them, or if you tell them you are coming back they will say they are full or charge you a higher rate. Yes I know that this happens in other parts of the world, I am not complaining, as i said just making observations.

Then there is the opposite of trying to get your money. You will walk into a shop and the people just look at you, so you go up to them and they won't help you. It isn't just me, I have heard this from other travelers. Even in the train or bus stations they will do this. I once tried to buy a train ticket for the 9pm train from lau cai to hanoi and they told me it was full. I asked if the entire train was full and they said yes. but they had a sleeper on the 8 pm train which arrives at 4am in hanoi which i didn't want to do. i said thanks and walked away and then came back and i was going to get a ticket on the 8pm train but now the woman asks me if i wanted 9pm. I'm thinking to myself, "you just told me it was full, what happened?" and this wasn't because of a problem in communication, we both understood each other perfectly.

The feeling that you get from the Vietnamese in Northern Vietnam is that all they want is your money. ok, no worries, not good not bad, just is. With the minority people it is a little different and I will be covering this subject in a different blog with a lot of photos. Speaking of blogs I will be getting another one out in a few days on my trip to halong bay.

The scenery in northern Vietnam is stunning and there are i believe over 54 minority groups living here and most of them live a "traditional" life. I wish I had more time to visit some of the other minority groups that I wasn't able to meet on this trip. Not sure if they want to meet me though.

ok, i decided to put Halong bay into this blog. I did a 3 day, 2 night trip to halong bay a few weeks back. halong bay is one of the most visited areas in vientam and for good reasons - it is stunning. for those travelers out there i booked the tour through my hotel (sports hotel on hang bac street) and they booked it with open tours. price $45. all went well and smooth. the first night we (14 people) slept on the boat (nice boat) did some kayaking and visited a cave. the next day we went to cat ba (island) and stayed in a 3 star hotel, did a little hike and visited monkey island. the food was good and i believe we had some type of seafood with our meals. the guide was great so i would definitely recommend a tour with open tour to halong bay. speaking of sports hotel, the staff is very nice and well trained. the owners have done a very good job creating a nice place to stay. there is wireless internet throughout the hotel, hot water, cable tv and comfortable rooms including breakfast start at $16 or so a night.

i almost forgot to mention the "fast food" places : as of today there are no McDonalds in Vietnam, but there are plenty of thit cho and thit meo food stalls which serve up tasty, well if you remember your dick and jane books, it would be "Spot" and "Puff". hmm thit MEO


One bright note, some of you know that I wasn't very happy with my 24-105L lens. Well that has changed because now I know how to "use it" and it is taking some sharp photos now! Now if i can only learn how to take a good photo I will be set!

To all of you that celebrate it - Merry Christmas


David ,

F O T O S B Y D A V I D . C O M

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Photos

woman
I JUST HAD TO TAKE HER PHOTO

MONKEY ISLAND
CAREFUL, THESE GUYS WILL ATTACK YOU

Comments

[Leslie]

merry christmas
Hey Yogi, Hope all is well, travel safe and I hope you come this was sometime soon, cuz we all need a Muck fix. Merry Christmas, Les

[annie from olympia, WA]

Good pics
Good shots. Stay safe and well. Have a great holiday out there. Stop in the NW before you head to the MW. cheers, annie

[Pete]

Still on the road
Hey Dave, Still very much enjoying your blogs! As always the photos are stunning. I'm planning to visit Vietnam after i'm finished in Australia so i'm keeping your blogs as a mini reference guide for later! Keep it coming dude!

[Mark white]

Nice blog, Dave, with some memorable photos of our Halong Bay Tour. I visited a "Monkey Island" near Nha Trang and found it to be an experience I could have done without. The persistence of Vietnam vendors seemed pretty much the same in the north and in the south, but more so in the big cities. I prefer to get around on foot to view things which the cyclo-drivers had a hard time understanding when I declined their offer for a ride. I blew my top at a couple of them in Saigon and then later felt bad when I realized they were just trying to make a living. Still, one has to "steel" themselves against these merchants of commmerce. Overall, I found the Vietnamese to be the friendliest and most helpful of any SE Asian country, although they as a rule are all very hospitable. Good luck with your travels. BTW, Anna was a great tour guide, wasn't she? And she spoke such excellent English.