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Published: September 28th 2008
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I was extremely looking forward to exchanging city life with beautiful mountains of Sapa. I booked a four nights and three day tour with my hotel, which is probably the easiest way of seeing the sights. I had still not properly got used to the time zone change but found that my night train up to Sapa provided me with my best sleep yet! After all the hustle and bustle of getting from the train to my hotel in Sapa town (about an hour away), I was ready to trek.
My first day was just a day tour as I was sleeping at the hotel that night, and we set off about 9.30am... me, and Australian couple in their 50's and an American Couple who were my age. They were a great bunch to be with. We started our trek from the top of the mountain... meaning that we had to finish back at the top, which wasn't the way I would choose to do it! The views from above were spectacular... and with every short distance we had gone we were given a new view or angle. We walked down though a couple of villages called Cat Cat and
Xin Chai, observing the life and culture of these tiny hill tribes. We were able to enter a few of their authentic houses to view how they had been living for years (I'm not sure how long they've had an electricity supply though and now they have a television in almost every house). In one house we saw their cooking methods and the machine they use to make their clothes which were then dyed a very dark blue. These villages were very small but were accessible through the man made mountain path which cut directly though the land and is quite a sight from afar. We also witnessed the education system for this area in the form of a primary school during class time... there wasn't much to it but there seemed to be a real importance on education which was good to see. We walked a little further a came across and fairly big and beautiful waterfall... some locals were swimming in the river but we had some more hard trekking to do and moved on after a quick rest. On the way back we had almost come to the point we of pain... the uphill section! Knowing the
routes the guide take, about ten moto drivers were on the other side of this rickety bridge and ran over like lighting when they noticed us. But when we crossed the bridge it was a little more slowly as it did swing and the rails didn't even make it up to my knees... and the moto drivers were very unhappy that we all wanted to finish the trek with out own legs. After we got back and refreshed ourselves, me and the two Americans went out and explored Sapa market... a place for all the different tribes to come and sell sell sell. You could recognise the different tribes by certain aspects of their clothing, all though were extremely decorative. We ended the day in the best way possible... with a few desperately needed beers. And then I feel asleep at 8.30pm... that’s how tired I was!!
My second day was although in the same location felt completely different, firstly I was with a new group... two pairs of girls all from north England and around my age. So again we set off only this time when we were down the street a group of tribes girls... ranging from
ages 7-30 (-ish), followed us. And like in Hanoi you do get harassed by the hill tribes to buy from them... this is now one of the ways in which they now make a living. But unlike my past experiences with them, they did not ask us to "buy from me", as they would say... instead they walked with us asking questions about ourselves like out name, age, where we're from etc, and of course this led to full conversations (they spoke pretty good English and actually a lot of tribes don’t even speak Vietnamese). At the beginning of this walk I noticed how much more beautiful the scenery was... the valley in which we were felt more lush and green and was such a contrast to hill of yesterday (I'm happy I did it this way round). And also unlike yesterday this day was off road. We walked along small edges midway through hills, down rocky mountain sides, along the ride fields and across streams... up and down! It was much more exciting as I was having to use my balance and strength as not to fall and die (well hurt me badly)... good fun! And all the while
the tribe girls were with us... helping out some of the girls along the way. There were some great views along this route and my camera quickly ran out of space... which meant I needed to do some hard editing. We had lunch in a village and after this was when the hill tribes struck... buy from me?? Well they were with us for four hours or so... so I spent 15,000 dong, that’s less than one dollar so I was cool with that.
We carried on along. Walking though more villages which were larger than the ones the day before but less pretty. They were less well kept and walking down their roads was even off road... but this I liked. That night we were not returning to the hotel but instead we were sleeping at a home stay in a village. These home stays were not the true homes of the villagers but houses constructed for the reason of tourism... they were very basic though and had families living there running the place (also selling beer!). After I don't know how many hours of trekking we finally came to our place of rest... conviently situated next to
a river. We then all jumped in and enjoyed the fresh liquid coolness... and were closely followed by a water buffalo led in by a small girl. He was friendly and we all took the chance to have our photo with him (luckily one of the girls had a waterproof camera, but unfortunately she was not a good photographer and my picture was a silhouette). This was quickly followed by... yes... a beer. Along the way we picked up another follower, a young girl of 11 named Su who by herself came along with us all the way to the home stay. She was very sweet, and like the rest she didn't ask us the buy at the beginning. She came swimming with us and sat around while we reflected on out day (she wore normal clothes as well). She eventually said she had items to sell... but casually asked us if we wanted to buy anything, no hassling, nagging or pressure to be found... so sweet she was that I brought a small decorated bag from here for the good price of 50,000 dong... although I did have to haggle the price down, yes I was haggling with an
11 year old but I found out that they're the best hagglers! Then later the family prepared a nice spread of food for dinner and like I’ve heard before, dinner time in the village was accompanied by rice wine... a strong spirit like drink served in shot glasses... it went down pretty well considering the taste!
The next morning most people (i.e. girls) were feeling a little worse for wear, and what better to cure that hangover than some nice tinned mince pork... it was pretty much inedible, although the dogs liked it. We then set off and it was really a very similar day to the day before... very beautiful scenery witnessed while walking along mountains and stopping every so often at view points to rest. I enjoyed this a lot! We then came to a huge waterfall from the very top... this was a great place to rest and just take in the landscape... it had an aura of tranquility. We then descended next to the waterfall and only once I was at the bottom I noticed the true size of it... and the steep sandy path I had just climbed down. We were later collected by
minibus and driven back to the hotel it was then we all saw the length in which we walked... maybe 20-25k. And this was near enough the end of my journey and soon I would leave the cooler mountain land in exchange for the humidity below.
All in all I think I walked... well trekked as the terrain was hard at times... about 30-35k. I was tired!!
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Anthony
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Playaaa
Freal! Looking amazing man, seriously jealous! Awesome! ruv u rong time Ant x