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Mud!
Hiking in wet season means you carry about a stone of muck on each shoe, for extra resistance training!Hanoi isn't really the most appealing of cities - it's really big, traffic is absolutely chaotic with moto-cyclos jetting all over the place, no pedestrian crossings (just a get out and hope for the best attitude!), and in wet season, grey and dreary. With this in mind, we organised activities outside the city as soon as possible!
And so we hit off to Sa Pa for a 3day hiking trek in the very north of Vietnam....and the day started well with a fight between 2 taxi drivers vying for business outside the cafe as we had breakfast. With fists and heads flying (at one stage, one taxi driver pulled out an iron bar from under his seat to attack the other one!) the crowd (including one policeman under no rush to break up the melee) ooohed and aaaahed before the men were pulled apart and the fun ended.
As it was June, wet season ensured the lush green scenery in Sa Pa really impressed... although the miles of muck that had to be navigated (sometimes on your backside.. as Thomas found out!) ensured that you had to keep your wits about you! Our wanderings took us through many hillside
Mobile Hairdressers
Barbers just set up shop in the street, nailing kit to a tree and clipping away oldschool style! tribes.. Hmong (very similar to the Karen villages in Northern Thailand), Red Dao and others included.
Next stop: Ha Long Bay, which is another UNESCO heritage site, full of limestone karst landscape (a little like Yangshuo in China, except on water) and despite paying for the cheap tour, we got upgraded to the swanky one due to lack of numbers. Met two lads from Meath wandering aimlessly in the GAA jerseys, and so settled in for our cruise through the bay, with a few token stops for limestone caves (no Ailwee cave that's for sure!) and swimming. Of course it was AFTER we got out of the water that we noticed the used nappy floating in the bay..lovely!
Unfortunately missed out on seeing our hat-trick of embalmed Communist leaders, as Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum was closed on both days that we were in the city, but I'm sure I'll not lose any sleep over it!
Finally getting out of Hanoi, we booked our bus trip to Hoi An, the home of fine tailoring in Vietnam. Nothing much was done here, just took it easy relaxing by pool in nice hotel in between fittings for tailor-made suits and
Moto GP
..having missed the real thing in Shanghai, the bedlam in Hanoi almost made up for it! shirts... and after the gruelling bus journey we endured from Hanoi, it was fully deserved.
The bus we were treated to had seats with plastic vinyl seats, that made sure you were sweating buckets all night, and had thoughtfully included a dodgy air-con system that insisted on leaking on us for the whole 18hours. Thankfully one of the English girls behind me helped me to patch up the leak as best we could, after she informed us that we had most likely caught Legionnaires disease at this stage from the stagnant water.
In Hoi An, tried a few tailors, but had the most fun with Mr. Xe, who was a tiny, VERY crazy, Vietnamese man with a piercing psychotic laugh, and like to smack you a little (not quite like what I imagine Joey's tailor would be like in Friends.. but not far off!) but genuine and funny, so great entertainment with him.
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Gareth
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...
Hiyas!!! So when you buy extra stuff on your travels, is there room to carry it? The place looks incredible. I am sitting in an Office on Dames Street wishing I was not so I have to say jealousy is creeping in. Remember if travelling gets to you and your all tired and fed up, just think, I could be getting up and walking to work every day doing the same dull boring job day in, day out. Once again, fair play to ye for getting up and going. Have you seen any World Cup Thomas :). Dublin hockeyed Laois in the GAA so now we are deemed challengers despite being written off after our unconvincing Longford win!!