Motorcycles, Junks and a deserted island called Monkey

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Hanoi Vietnam

Arriving in Hanoi on the 4th Dec, we managed to find a relatively cheap hotel (after haggling and walking away a couple of times of course) and ventured out onto the streets of Hanoi to find food. The first thing that hits all tourists coming to Hanoi (and it's probably been written on various blogs about 10-gizilion times) are the motorbikes, they are EVERYWHERE, in fact, at first we found it quite tricky to walk around the old quarter because of course, pavements are not for walking on but are bike-parking, or food-stalls, or shops spilling onto the streets, or bars if you go to Beer Hoi corner (where, incidently, Beer is 3000d...12 pence a pint!!). I'd turned my back to Barney for two seconds to take some pictures of the speedy bikes and when I turned back one of the hawker ladies had given him her food scales, complete with Vietnamese hat, needless to say after i'd stopped my ridiculous giggling, we had to give her some Dong for letting me take a couple of pics...I know they're just there to catch niave tourists like us but it was worth every penny. Plus, she gave me a whole bunch of bananas and a couple of mandarins which served as breakfast for the next couple of days.


Our first full day in Hanoi was spent a.) Visiting the Museum of Ethnology which has some great exhibits of tribes in and around Vietnam plus some life-size replicas of traditional houses b.) Visiting the temple of Literature, the first university in SE Asia, founded by Confucious (which i may have spelt incorrectly) c.) ducking, weaving and dodging motorcyclists and d.) keeping Barney as far away from KFC as possible. We did get fleeced by a Xe-Om driver as well, but that was mainly because we didn't write down the price before hand. Xe-om's are motorbike taxis and ours took both myself and Barney around town for the day (and yes Dad, it was irresponsible to have three people on one bike, but we were fine!) On that note, the most people we've seen on a bike so far has been 6, three adults and three kids, but that was actually in Sihanoukville and not Vietnam.

The next day we did a lot of relaxing and wandering about town trying to find a cashpoint that would take Maestro (not an easy task), booked tickets for a water-puppetry show that evening and booked our tour to Halong Bay which was to leave the following day. The water puppetry was really interesting, it pretty much used fables and extremely simple stories set to music to explain the lives of the Vietnamese, with dragons, lions, and unicorns too! The musicians looked a little bored all the way through, but we guessed that was because they've probably performed the same songs 5 times a day, every day for years.

Halong Bay

We had a early one the next day when we set off for Halong Bay (!!) Halong bay is a collection of limestone islands (I think theres over 4000 or something crazy) just off the coast of Vietnam, 3 hours from Hanoi. I believe the Vietnamese story of their creation is that a dragon rose up out of the sea and as it thrashed it's tail around, all the islands were formed. Luckily, we didn't have that problem while we were there.

There were 15 of us in total, 5 of the older generation and 10 younger, backpacker-types like me and Barney. Out of us young-uns were Dave (Bristolian! Woo!) and Andy (from Norfolk), who were pretty seasoned travellers that me and B went on to travel with for a while after. Jade, an Australian, who I can only describe as 'Ripper!' (it sounds better if you say it in an Australian accent). Ian, a Canadian who we went on to meet up with again in Hue, Ho Chi Minh City and Sihanoukville (none of which have been planned meetings by the way, he just pops up whenever we're in need of him :o). A Spanish couple and 2 English girls.

We reached the junk and set off on our 3-day, 2-night adventure. First stop was for lunch (yum!) then a trip into the caves where we took far too many pictures that really won't do them justice, but having never been in a cave so big before, I really was fascinated. Back on the mill-pond-like water we went for a float around the islands, watching the fisherman aboard their floating jettys against the backdrop of awesome rock formations and a beautiful sunset. Before, during and after dinner we all got a little squiffy on the beer and generally got better aquainted with each other over a few games of cards. The next day, bleery-eyed and sluggish, the boat sailed us back through the limestone islands to Cat Ba Island, an Unesco world heritage site, where we said farewell to the 2 English girls and 5 others (who were ony doing a two-day trip) and set off on a hike through the forest up a mountain to the highest point on Cat Ba. At the peak was a huge metal scaffold-like-structure that you could climb to get even higher, I must admit that it looked a bit rickitty to me so I didn't climb it (ok, i'm a wus), and pretty soon there must have been near to 50 people trying to inch up its narrow staircase to a wooden platform on top that really wasn't big enough for 50!

Getting back on the boat again, our next step was Monkey Island, basically our own private beach where we were to have dinner. Rooster (our guide - he was born in the yr of the Rooster) had told us before that if we wanted to stay on the island in bungalows instead of in a hotel on the main Cat Ba island, we could do so for another $5. As we were all poor backpackers we all declined, saying that we'd rather save the money but after about half an hour on the island Rooster came back with a renewed offer "I've had a talk with the owners and they say you can stay here for free" ..."okay, we may as well take a look at the bungalows..." thinks us. They were awesome, right on the beach, (did i mention it was our own private beach?) complete with palm trees and beautiful golden sand and crystal-clear sea. After a splash in the sea and a chillax on the sand our only remaining need was to see a monkey, well, it was monkey island after all! Just then, Dave who'd walked back to his bungalow to get a towel, came back dripping wet and without towel, explaining calmly, "um, guys, there's a massive monkey sitting on the steps of our bungalow and he won't let me in".

And it was a massive monkey, it was the Daddy of the monkeys, and every time someone took a step towards him he would take one further step towards the bungalow door, the general consensus was to leave the monkey alone, "He'll come down when he's ready" Monkey:1 Humans:0. After about an hour, the monkey ran past a relaxing Jade on the beach tapping her on the leg and waking her up. She screamed (very understandably) and the monkey sat on the beach with us soaking up the rest of the afternoon rays.

We all drank an excessive amount of alcohol that night (sorry, relatives, but we did, there's just no other way to explain it) and partied lots with the locals on the island, they let us have control of the CD player for the night which was amazing as it was great to hear some of our favourite tunes instead of Vietnamese music!

The next morning was a very early one and it must be said, a still drunken / hungover one. Some, namely Andy, managed an early morning swim. Others, everyone else, barely managed to drag themselves out of bed. One, namely Jade, fell asleep again in her sleeping bag on the path. Ripper!

The next day we did our last bits of sightseeing, including a trip to Ho Chi Minh's mauseleum, he had just got back from Russia for his yearly re-embalming trip so was looking shiny and new (well, almost anyway) and we also took a trip round the ''Hanoi Hilton", a prison that served as a prison for Vietnamese during the French invasion of Vietnam and later, a prison for American POW's (including John McCain) during the America-Vietnam war.

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Comments

[Stevens]

Passengers on a nike - Pah!!!
I see your six people, and raise you a Coke fridge...! Yup, a Coke fridge, plus driver and the guy charged with balancing said fridge on the back - pure genius...!!! :-)

[Mouse and Bear]

Bike action
I raise you 6 TVs... widescreens... they are mental