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Published: October 30th 2009
Sitting on a rocking train on a 16 hour train ride to Hoi An, I thought it would be a good time to catch up to catch up on the blogging... We have left Hanoi sadly and are heading towards a typhoon in Hoi An... we were told today that it has been downgraded to a tropical storm and due to hit on the 1st Nov.. fingers crossed it stays small!!
Soooo I left the last blog where we were having a rest before heading out again with our new found friends: Ria, Josh and Matt... they were due at our hotel at around 8pm and at 830pm we went downstairs to wait unsure if they would still be coming as we were all so wiped by the end of our tour earlier.. about 2 minutes after sitting down they rocked up and we ordered dinner... We ordered cocktails and all couldnt believe how strong they were... two drinks later we were suddenly feeling very tipsy.. we had the whole restaurant to ourselves and by the time our dinner came out it was close to 10pm and we were becoming a little rowdy.. McKay, myself and Matt ordered a Sapa
Rooms Speciality hotpot and I had sold it to McKay thinking it was similar to a rice hotpot in the Vietnamese restaurants back home... little did I know it was one of those hotpots that is like a soup that cooks on a hotplate on your table that you add everything to and it cooks in front of you in the broth.. little did I also know that McKay has an adversion to hotpots having had one too many bad experiences while living in Korea! What followed was hilarious with McKay pouting and declaring she HATED HER DINNER... A few drinks later (including a round of shaken vodka on the rocks which Ria poured after the staff let her behind the bar!) and we were all fired up ready to hit the town (bear in mind 99.99% of the town has already shut down!)...
McKay and I convinced Khang from our guesthouse to let us stay out past our curfew of 11.30pm and told us he would wait up to let us in when we were ready to 'come home'... Off we all headed to try find something open... we were lucky to eventually find one small bar open
- Mountain View and the night progressively became messy.. someone thought it would be a good idea to buy a Sheesha so we were smoking apple and cherry flavoured tobacco.. which at one point we found it really funny to blow smoke in each others face and take photos!! A round of cocktails for 5 people was costing 200,000 dong (less than $15) and we were drinking flaming shots and evil blue cocktails...
At about 3am Khang from our hotel turned up and had a drink with us... apparently he waited until almost midnight for us (did he really think we would be home THAT early?!) and then he left his phone number on the front door for us to call... he then went for drinks with mates and when we hadnt phoned by 3am he came looking for us! We stumbled back through the hotel door around 3.45am and collapsed into bed... We had plans to go on a trek the next morning at 10am but I knew in my drunken haze that it probably wasnt going to be even a remote possibility!
Hangover Hell.. Will I ever learn?!
9am came the next morning
and I woke up having had a strong dose of berocca and gastrolyte the night before... I was hopeful that my new hangover cure taught to me in Brisbane by Narelle would work but it wasnt to be... we were meant to be out of the room at 10am and I was wrecked.. McKay wasnt 100% but she was much better than me... 2 hours and 3 vomits later we stumbled out of the room, managed to make it downstairs for breakfast... Pete, who owns the hotel had told us there was a chill out room on the 4th floor where we could hang out for the day if we werent up for the trek.. I managed to eat a toasted sandwich then I almost crawled up the stairs collaping on a couch and passing out for the afternoon....
We woke up around 3pm and were due to leave for the ngiht train at 6pm so we decided to head out for one last walk around Sapa and get a good feed. We ate some "homemade" pasta which wasnt really homemade but still hit the spot, had a last little wander and sadly went back to the hotel to
get the bus... As we drove off in the bus we looked back to Pete, Khang and the rest of the staff standing at the front door waving goodbye... We both had pouts on our face and were sad to be leaving.. we both LOVED Sapa, our hotel and our new friends...
And on that note, I have to make mention of our wonderful hotel "Sapa Rooms Boutique Hotel" - they really deserve a special mention... Pete and his staff were all so wonderful and the hotel really was a beautiful home away from home... Pete is an Aussie ex-pat who really has hit the mark... He has many wonderul community projects running and pours alot of money back into the community... If you are going to Sapa you have to stay here... it is an amazing place.. we loved our room and it really felt like home...
Anyway back to the adventure... we get on the minibus and realise that we haven't taken our travel sickness tablets... unfortunately both of us are completely hopeless on windy roads.. luckily we were in the first row.. I was in the middle and intently
staring down the road... at one
point I tried to speak to McKay but she was like "DONT speak to me" Hehehehehe!
We arrived in Lao Cai just after 7 which was leaving it a little tight to get the train which was leaving at 7.30... all of a sudden we stop at some cafe and are told to get out here... the train station was only a 2 min walk away but we were all a little confused... we got off and then a man appoached saying that the train was broken and that we wouldnt be leaving until 9pm.... we werent happy but I messaged Ria to let them know what was happening.. we then saw the man that had told us the train was broken grab a small group of other tourists and head towards the train station... we were a little suspicious and our fears were confirmed a minute later when Ria messaged back saying that the train was in fact still leaving at 7.30... gut instinct from all my SE Asian adventures told me to run! We took off towards the train station and by this stage it was about 7.15pm....
We found the Livitrans office at the station
and demanded to get on the 7.30pm train... we thought that what we were holding were official tickets but apparently they are in fact a voucher... appears that one of the 'scams' is that you buy a voucher which your agent then cashes in on the night for actual tickets... and while we had no problems on the way to Sapa, tonight they had run out of Livitrans tickets by the time we had turned up... so rather than telling us the truth they were telling everyone the train was broken....
Surprise surprise... yet another overnight train disaster..
It took us a good 5 minutes of trying to argue with the Livitrans staff (which was a long time when the train was almost ready to leave, and consisted of them pretty much ignoring us the whole time), but they eventually gave in and we were given tickets... we raced to the train only to find we had NOT been given Livitrans tickets but Kings Express... all the feedback I got online when researching was that Kings Express were just as good but this was definitely not the case... the cabin was much smaller, it was smelly
and had the obligatory cockroach every good SE Asian train provides... On the plus side we were given 2 guys from Melbourne to share our cabin with who turned out to be nice...
Once on the train we went for a walk to find Ria and the boys... there they were in the comfort of Livitrans.. you could smell the difference immediately upon entering their carriage. It was at this stage when we compared our 'tickets' with theirs that we realised we had been slightly screwed! You live and learn though as we knew exactly what to expect when our wonderful guesthouse in Hanoi arranged our tickets for this leg of the trip and lesson is learnt with who NOT to use next time!
We woke up not long before arriving back in Hanoi completely hot, bothered and sweaty.. the aircon decided it didnt want to work and with 4 people heavy breathing through the night in a tiny prison cell the heat was stifling... tired, cranky and smelly we stumbled off the train at 4am, said sad goodbyes to Ria and Josh who were flying home that day then caught a taxi to our hotel hoping that
they would be open that early...
Arriving at the hotel we could see all the lights were off and had resigned ourselves to sitting on the doorstep for a few hours... as I approached the doorstep though I saw a male stretched out asleep on 4 dining room chairs near the reception desk! LOL.. I knocked on the glass and sure enough "Spidermaaaan" woke to sleepily stumble to the door and let us in... Thanking him I went to deposit my bags further back from reception in the dining room only to find two more staff asleep on dining room chairs pushed together to form makeshift beds.. man these Vietnamese have tough lives and are such hard workers...
We were shown to a 'temporary room' on the 6th floor where for no charge we had a large room that we could rest in, have a shower and wait for breakfast (which was also free).. Amazing place which I will talk more about at a later stage... We collapsed onto the beds, cranked up the airconditioning to freezing and chilled for a few hours... To be continued... :-)
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McKay's "Mum"
non-member comment
Re: Hangover Hell
I am 54 and I have STILL to learn, despite the fact that hangovers get more devistating and longer lasting with age! Count on having a few more as long as you continue to hang out with my Darling daughter, who is SO much FUN to party with!! Love and kisses, Girls!