Sapa trip - Vietnam

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It was 5 am and on the train begins to move there. We woke up after having slept reasonably well and soon after we arrived at the station of Lao Cai, a city bordering China, where dozens of vans waiting for tourists to move to the small town of Sapa , which in times of French domination was a spa in the middle mountain, used to flee the stifling summer of Hanoi. The day dawns quite gray, and the fog prevents us from seeing the landscape from the van on the way that mountain top, leads Sapa. There we moved to a hotel for breakfast and give us a shower in the room of the official of the agency, which is practically flooded due to the amount of people doing the same to us. Soon we have to be changed to be our guide during the trek, a black girl from the Hmong ethnic group, which is dressed in a beautiful traditional dress, and head from the rain, accompanied by 2 Israeli girls and Luca, a likeable Italian. The trip is highly interesting despite the persistent fog, and always with us many women of the same ethnic group that the guide, putting his clothes with a bit of color to a gray day too. We are trying, and sometimes without success, selling all kinds of products, including some handmade handbags and dyed with indigo, and although his English is very basic, it is enough to ask the four things that interest them most: how we call, where we are, if you're married and how many children we have. Along the way, and with locals who come and go, we went with other groups of tourists who, like us, are to spend the night in a homestay. At about 4 pm we arrived at that place, lost in the middle of nowhere, it will be our accommodation during that night. We find ourselves in front of a wooden building with two floors to describe what happened, so that everyone draw their conclusions on the ground floor, we found a kind of salon, with an irregular ground floor, which also include dormitories of the family, separated by curtains. At his side, the kitchen with a fire between the stones, but no fireplace. At the top, it will be our room, a warehouse with sacks of rice, and floors, mattresses covered with mosquito nets. On the outside, a bit of cement in the entrance and the rest, countryside, in this case embarrado, and at the rear, a booth with a hole, which like in the far west, as the quarter - bathroom. The faces of the Israelis are all a poem, and the lapidary phrase of Rosi is that if your father finds out he has paid for sleeping in that hovel, did not speak to him again in his life, I can only agree smiling. From there, we try to spend the rest of the evening as best as possible, and I think we made it. At about 5 begin to dinner the men, more numerous than usual, because they have several relatives to assist in building a new home-lack them, I say to my himself, and two hours later we do together to Women, children and the younger brother, who becomes the protagonist of the evening to be the only one who spoke a little English, and strive to get drunk (and drunk) with a rice liquor frankly disgusting (as we miss least one pomace fresh herbs). The dinner, albeit basic, is quite abundant and at the end entonamos a song and we see a good time during the noisy Karaoke, apparatus not only star of the house, but the neighborhood. Despite the fact that we are enjoying the evening, it's damn cold and we go to bed to try to come into heat. The air Slips everywhere, but the bed clothes and the use of thick blankets makes durmiéramos fairly well, although I had to lift in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, and it was all a show down stairs with the flashlight for descorrer, not without difficulty, the heavy wooden door, and go abroad in the midst of darkness and fog (I remembered Jack Nicholson in The Glow). Of course I did not get to the hole to make a pee.

Saturday
Rosi and I are the first to wake up in the hut. Ordered backpacks, and washing our face a little in the trunk of an empty timber full of water, which as a sink, next to the kitchen. We take a seat on the porch (total, makes just as cold inside than outside) and begin to reach the first black Hmongs, some already know and are watching for a while, while the guide prepares us for some pancakes that fill mode crepe, banana and honey. After breakfast, and accompanied by the endless women, the march began. The fog is even thicker and the ground is embarrado and very slippery. A couple of trips made to put their feet in the water, while the native help women to cross the most dangerous places, composing a picture at least curious. Circulated by narrow paths between huge tracts of bamboo and it is not difficult to imagine the difficulty of the Americans in their fight against the North Vietnamese. The scenery, when we made do with the haze, is precious and after walking about 3 hours, we arrived at Garito where we're going to eat. Quite cold, but despite everything, the tables are on the outside and the guide prepares a Pho with eggs, capable of resurrecting a dead man, and then climb to a van that will take us where we will make hotel night. We are a well-earned hot shower, and although the room is pretty good, no heating, so we wrap it in the mullidos quilts from the beds to warm. We decided not to allow ourselves to fall into the arms of Morpheus and visit the so-called love of Sapa market (not yet know the reason for the curious name) and leave the hotel between a London fog that covers everything, I can not see more than 2 meters-to, in a few minutes to reach the market in which racing with
the mood. It's early but in view of the icy atmosphere, we decided to go back to the hotel to prepare for the suitcase (it's the umpteenth time that he does Rosi), dine, relax, and go to bed. The dinner is quite good and the restaurant, very nice, with a background music that is not the usual raucous karaoke. When we are running out, we realize that there are 2 guys Spaniards Internet consulting and lively just chatting with these two recent graduates in journalism, which for a couple of months have come Cambodia (where he took advantage to do a story on anti-personnel landmines, which left inheritance as the genocidal Pol Pot), and Vietnam by bicycle. We're going to sleep. Tomorrow we visit the most important market in the area, located in the town of Bac-Ha.

Visit Bac ha market
The weather continues like: fog and cold, so we harbor as much as possible with what little we have and before leaving the room, left in the garbage a couple of pounds of dirty clothes and go up to the van with other tourists to towards Bac -Ha. The road is full of potholes, and we like hurling balls for 2 hours to reach the market that presents a great animation, what's more interesting is in the same dress that dress women of different ethnicities in the area (Hmong, Phu, Zay, Black Hmong ...) and producing a colorful spectacular 27. Roam the same and just buy anything, because the products are similar to those of the Sapa market we visited yesterday, here it is interesting to see people and that is what we do. After the meal, take us to visit a village of Homong but it's true? Tourists? and we do not like too much. Back in Lao Cai-(city hit by confrontation Sino-Vietnamese in 1979) and, before leaving the station, we come to see the bridge that makes border between China and Vietnam, which at that time not passes too many people. We collect your luggage, and when we carried out (because it is a putada arrive at Hanoi at 5 in the morning), plus we have the impression that we have changed the type of train. We ask for explanations, but we do not either case, so we got to our wagon, which will travel accompanied by Antonio, a retired American of Italian origin who lives in Saigon, and who travels accompanied by a Vietnamese lady, says he has traveled for more than 50 countries from all continents and conversation, a mixture of English and Castilian, is stretched over a couple of hours.

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