VIETNAM - Dalat, Nha Trang, Hanoi, Halong Bay and Sapa.

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WEEK 4

After leaving the luxury of the 5* New World Hotel we found out that our bus to Mui Ne had been cancelled and therefore had to choose whether to get a later bus or write it off.. So after much deliberation (arguing) and the fact that the tour agent managed to get us a bus to Dalat that was leaving in 15mins we decided to go straight to Dalat.

DALAT

So we left the hustle and bustle of Saigon for a 7/8 hour bus journey to the mountains. Knowing that we had only had 8days until our visa ran out so we stayed in Dalat for a very brief night and half a day where we did a (mini) tour of the city but had to cut it short to catch the bus to Nha Trang! Great palce and a nice contrast to the Mekong Delta. It was only 3 or so hours so not to bad and the road down the mountain valleys was stunning.

NHA TRANG

We arrived in Nha Trang in the evening and managed to find a hotel (after many failed attempts) practically on the beach with a sea view for $15! BARGAIN!!! We lounged on the beach for a few hours then hired a bike and took ourselves around the city, seeing the largest sleeping Buddah in Vietnam (we think, well thats what the guy who showed us said but then he did rip us off saying he was a monk at the temple and made us give him a 'donation'!!) and saw some ruins of Cham era towers.

The next day we had booked a boat trip, we weren't expecting too much, just some tours around the islands surrounding Nha Trang and some snorkelling. Fortunately we were very pleasantly surprised when we got off the mini bus taking us to the port to be put on a boat with all young traveller types (not the all Vietnamese crowd on our bus!) The Funky Monkey Party Boat!! What an excellent day! We had amassive feast and the tour man was hilarious.. him, the boat captain, and some other deck hands put on a live band show! Bloody Brilliant!!! Gareth even got up to do the hakka (the kiwi rugby thing) and they transformed the benches on board to a dancefloor for us to boogie on. Then came Happy Hour! We had a special creation - a 'Floating Bar' (you gotta see the pics to get it!) basically the captain man has this ring with little buoys and sits in the centre (in the sea) handing out rice pineapple wine while we surround him floating along in life rings! TOO COOL!!! Gareth then proceeded to challenge the Aussie boys to dive from the top of the boat into the life rings! By the end they were doing synchronised diving, 4 at a time! Gareth kicked ass!

That night it was off on the sleeper bus up to Hoi An - 11 hours... joy... Gareth had a pleasant experience, even managed to fit in the bed, but unfortunately the bed i was in was a continous 20 degree angle and therefore slipped down all the time and didnt get much sleep at all! Typical! So, on arriving in Hoi An (where we had originally planned to stay for a few hours then catch a bus up to Hue later on that day) we decided we were too pressed for time and as there was more to see in Hue we went straight there so we could take in some sights that day.

HUE

we checked into a cheapish but nice hotel and rented ourselves some transport to go around the city. We had a mooch around the Citadel which was not worth the 55,000 dong (£1.50) to be honest. there was a lot of work going on and we didn't have a guide as they were all taking a nap when we arrived so we didnt really understand what we were looking at.

This bit has been continued by Gareth.

After about an hour we jumped back on the bike and went searching for various other places which didn't even exist and got ourselves pretty lost. Funny to say the least, until it started to piss down. So decided in true British manner to try and head back and get a KFC followed by a beer. NICE.

Following morning jumped back on the bike and headed out to some of the big tombs in the area. Very nice to look at but was amazed to find out that most, if not all, of what we were looking at was only 200 years old. Looked more around 1000 years old. Anyway later that day headed back to jump on the over night 12 hour sleeper bus up to Hanoi.

Picked up and was the last peeps to get on so choice of beds was very limited. Chose the biggest i could find and Li jumped in the one next to me. Then the driver started doing the whole wavy hand thing (which means NO or F OFF, not sure yet) so us not understanding why he was doing this just ignored him. Two minutes later we were told we had to move due to reservations (load of bolloxs). So i had to jump in to the smallest bed on the bus. Remember the beds are designed for 4ft Vietnamese people and not 6ft4" Brits. I tried to explain that i could not fit and was in pain but they didn't care and just laughed. As you can imagine i was not to happy. Little bastards to say the least. After 12 hours of pain we were at Hanoi.

HANOI & HA LONG BAY

WEEK 5

Checked in to a OK-ish hotel and managed to haggle (i basically told him what i was paying!) a good price of $5 per night hotel and a load of trips to Halong Bay, Sapa and a few river trips which when seeing the pics looked amazing. Went and checked a few other places which were all loads more expensive. So we decided to stay put and get ready for a weeks worth of trips.

Following morning got up early and headed out to Ha Long Bay to what we thought would be a trip of a life time!

120Km and 3 hours later (so slow) we were at the port. Loads and loads of Junk boats. Some looking lush and some looking not so lush, Low and behold the worse Junk boat in the entire fleet pulls up and we were told to board (STRIKE#1, this was just the beginning!). Trust me when i say this boat lived up to its name of JUNK boat. It was crap. Putting that to one side we headed off to an island to see some caves which were lush but we hadn't asked to see. Then off to some other caves which we had to pay for even tho this was an all inclusive package (STRIKE#2). As you can imagine when a load of people got back on the boat from seeing the second set of caves and were then asked to pay, heads started rolling!

So the boat starts up again thinking we were going to do some kayaking (as this is what we paid for) and swimming followed by a seafood BBQ and sleep on the boat. Well this was not the case. We sailed for an hour and pulled in at a port and were told we were staying at a hotel ready for a trek up a hill in the morning (STRIKE#3).

That night had dinner and met a load of cool people. ALL of which said that the trip we were having was not what they paid for either. Some of which had paid double. So trying to perk the mood up i proceeded to haggle for a large KEG of larger. Didn't think for a minute this would happen but it did. We bought a large KEG for a fiver. BARGAIN. As you can imagine there were a lot of happy faces. So we got down to lots of chatting, drinking and 2 KEGS later ended up singing 'we are the champions' in a little bar across the road. QUALITY EVENING!

Following morning and many banging heads every one except for me headed off on the trip up the hill. Liane trekked up but could didnt get to the highest peak (only the second highest) and few other people got to the top but had left there cameras at the bottom! Looked like a worth while trip as you could see the whole of the Halong Bay.

Later that afternoon we headed back to the boat for what we were told in the morning for the 'Kayaking, Swimming, and BBQ followed by Sleeping'. So just prior to leaving the hotel we all managed to buy another KEG of beer for the boat which would see us through the night.

Getting to the boat we were told that ourselves and two other guys were not allowed on (STRIKE#4) and then was shouted at by some short arse tour guide (STRIKE#5). We all stuck together, i marched on the boat regardless of what they were saying. An hour later we were still having a stand off with the tour guide, captain and boat crew. To top it off one of the crew hands tried to grab the KEG and chuck it over boards (A BIG STRIKE#6) which i quickly said ' chuck that over and you WILL follow'. So he decided to face me up and stare me out.

Not thinking we were going to win and them not willing to set sail we all decided to leave along with a few people that were allowed to stay (and some that were but didnt want to stay on a boat that treated us like that). As soon as we then got off the boat with everyone we shouted back that we had friends who worked for Lonley Planet and was going to report them. This soon changed every thing and they were begging for us to get back on. Sticking to our guns we said no and demanded a hotel and food etc.. Tour guide said we would have to pay (STRIKE#7) so i grabbed his phone and let rip on his boss which soon backed down and gave us every thing we wanted.

Later that evening we all headed back over to the Bia Hoi (fresh beer) for some further 2 KEGS and met up with a loads of people from the night before. Total nightmare trip and probably the worst organised trip we have ever been on but in saying that we have met some wonderful peeps and made some good friends.

Following day we headed back over to Hanoi, and some of the boat group came with us to our hotel, for some relaxation and a further KEG drinking for one of the girls bithdays. This is when the VIET'SCAM' KEG revolution started as loads of travellers took a liking to the idea! Then followed by a shisha bar. It was really great to have such a great gang of people with us, really made the north on nam sooo much better

SAPA

The Danish guys we had met on the boat (Anders and Martin) even joined us to go up to Sapa, so the following day we got ready for the next trip. Leaving Hanoi we jumped on the over night train (yet again not what we have paid for!) to Sapa which is 30Km from the China boarder. Even though the train was not what we had wanted we made the best of a bad situation, played cards and got drunk!
Got there around 6am and at 9am headed out for a walk through the villages. People there are nice and friendly and nothing like the rest of Nam. Hired a few bikes and went off roading in the valley looking for waterfalls and a place to see the sunset.

cont by Liane (again)

We spent that night in the Sapa Summit hotel, with a great view over the mountains and valleys etc. I had a wonderful, much needed, good nights sleep (after being kept up on the train by the boys playing cards and drinking!!) Gareth although, didnt have a great night and was feeling under the weather (code name for hangover) and so didnt want to join us for the 11km trek planned for that day (surprise surprise)
The trek was easy though, mostly downhill, and we even walked off the paths through the paddy fields, which was really cool. We were followed all the way by some of the local tribeswomen, very beautiful and sweet ladies (but in the end they just want you to 'buy from me' but you dont mind buying cuz they put in the effort..!!) We had lunch in a village in a cafe type place on stilts over the river.. again very cool. We carried on a little bit further and were then picked up on the road to be taken back to the hotel to have dinner then get the train back to Hanoi, and we even had the good train this time too, BIG difference!!

Sapa is definately a place worth visiting, makes a great change to the rest of Vietnam, the air is cooler, the people are nicer. We were sad to have to go as we didnt feel like we spent enough time there, but time is pressing and we wanted to get back to Hanoi for the Full Moon festival (which should be a bigger party than what they have in Sapa)

The Full Moon Festival did not fail.. there was lots of dragon dancing in the street and loads of people letting off giant paper lanterns, it was like and Asian Glastonbury!
We then went to a club called Solace that was floating on the Red River.. Too cool for words. Hardly any westerners, we were lucky that our Danish boys had heard and been before or we would've never known of it. Unfortunately for our single Danish boys there were a lot of 'Lady-Boys' who were trying it on, and they couldnt really tell the difference and made me check before proceeding..!! Men..!
Unfortunately coming back from the club both Gareth and Martin got robbed (on totally separate occasions but by the same gang of older women!) Martin managed to get his credit cards back and Gareth only had a little bit of cash stolen, about $12, so could've been a lot worse, But all this further fuelled our fire and our need to leave Vietnam..

So we'll be leaving for Laos later today.. Will update with the next batch of stories soon...

Conclusion of Viet'SCAM'

Vietnam is well worth seeing as it has some wonderfull sights and places. However this country lets itself down time and time again by its own people as they do not care about anyone but themselves and are constantly trying to rip you off or steal at every chance.

Its a real shame as they could do so much better if they just looked after the tourists a little more. Its also crazy as it was only a few years back that the goverment policy was to try and scam tourists. This has now changed yet many of its people (Mainly in the North) still stick to this sad policy.

To any other travelers reading this we advise you to NOT use the following companies;
CAMEL TOURS
CAMEL TRAVEL
A-Z QUEEN TRAVEL (Hanoi)
SINH CAFE (THE FAKE ONE!!!! HANOI)

Use these companies;
TNK (HCMC)
VIETNAM TOURS (NhaTrang)

Watch out tho as in Vietnam there is no law to stop people opening up another company with the same name and logo. So as you can imagine there are loads and loads of copy companies offering wonderfull packages yet they have nothing to back them up. Refunds are highly unlikely to impossible. We have tried several times and all they off is a $1 or 2 if you are lucky. Also when booking tours they are likely to tell you and show you one thing yet when you turn up its something completely different. This is common as we were told by many people, many times all using different companies.

Overall tho a great trip but glad to be leaving to Loas.

Keep watching for the next update.

More pics on the way!

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