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Published: August 19th 2006
We've just returned from a trip into the north-west mountains near the town of Sa Pa. We took the night train, which was actually quite comfortable since we booked far enough ahead to get sleepers. The vistas are absolutely unbelievable up there, and its another Vietnamese place where its best to sit at the back of the bus so you can't see what's going on in front (prevents heart attacks). Here's our little song about Sa Pa:
Rice and corn,
Corn and rice,
It's everywhere you look,
And it looks so nice!
The mountains surrounding the town are just covered in rice terraces, and where its too steep for even that, there's corn. We couldn't believe that you can actually grow corn on such steep slopes, and how hard people work to carry it to the road on baskets on their backs wearing little plastic slip-on sandals.
Our trip totalled about 30 km of hiking, ranging from walking along a semi-paved road to scrambling down a muddy stream bed on a huge incline during the rain and sinking in up to our ankles. It was great fun! We spent both nights in villages in homestays, sleeping on the
floor with the family. The first village, because it was closer to town, was a bit disappointing. I guess the rice fields are pretty much taking care of themselves at this point, so many of the women have turned to their secondary job of selling things to tourists. We didn't spend more than 2 minutes alone at any time in that village, and the women would stay with us for 20 minutes at a time. Whew! Very tiring at times, because you feel very guilty about not buying anything, and on edge because someone is walking inches behind you waiting for you to stop talking so she can show you another handicraft. There were also lots of tourists in on day hikes, so it doesn't seem much like an authentic experience. The scenery was amazing though, see the pictures attached...
The weather was VERY hot, and going uphill was pretty frickin onerous at times (especially for Brian after the night of drinking rice alcohol with the guide and the host father!). The first day we got to our lunch break and were in the process of collapsing, when we saw a bunch of 70 year old ladies tramping up
the hill behind us! Then we felt like wimps. We also had the luck to be there the night that an aid worker from Hanoi was in to teach some local children about health and how to interact positively with all the tourists (eg. telling them what is and is not appropriate), so Brian and I got to sit in and help out with the english, which was great.
Our second day was the longest, with about 18 km up from the river valley to the road, then back down the valley to the river again. The last bit was hugely fun, because we were trying to outrun the rain. We had about 3 km left, with a vertical distance down of 400 m, so it was quite steep, and parts of it would literally have been impossible to stand up on once it started to get wet. It was real adventure stuff. The village was very picturesque, and we swam in a mountain stream with a waterfall, ate great food, and learned a lot from the host (through our guide/translator).
There's a lot of poverty in this region of Vietnam, and it was amazing to see the
Local girls
They're watching white people eat lunch - this is what a road stop looks like, pretty different from Wendy's!difference between the town and the villages, and even between the villages near the road and those farther away from tourists and the market. Lots of the children had big swollen bellies, and most of the young ones didn't wear pants (neither did the chickens, they all had plucked butts!). The villages are inhabited by various ethnic minorities, with very distinct traditions, and amazing colourful local clothing. They've just built a road within the last year or so that connects the villages to Sa Pa, which has reduced the time to get to the market from 3 days to 1 hour by motorbike. However, there are tons of washouts everywhere which makes it very treacherous.
Long story short: BEAUTIFUL, but very sad at times.
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