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Published: April 18th 2008
Setting sun in Sapa
Looking back over the valley towards SapaIn the last blog I mentioned how the Vietnamese are the most pushy, money sucking people I’ve met (Darren’s edit: We’re having a great time, I promise!). It hasn’t changed since we’ve gotten out of Hanoi. It is unbelievable how quickly they will try to rip you off, and after you have paid for a service you constantly have to watch out to make sure that they hold up their end of the deal. It really detracts from the natural beauty of the place. While bargaining is a part of the culture in Southeast Asia, the Thais, Cambodians and Laotians weren’t deceptive about it; they follow through on their deals. Here, people are willing to do anything for a few extra dong (the Vietnamese currency). And, in Sapa, most of the people trying to get your dong are women. They will try to get as much dong from you as they can; and they will stop at no length to get your dong, and the more dong, the better. The women here love dong, they just can’t get enough of it. The women here are only after your dong. Okay, enough fun with that.
Anyway… back to our trip: Cat
Cat Ba harbor
It was a perfect day for some black and white photos. Ba Island provided a great place to relax and be lazy. The weather was overcast and drizzly each day, so we didn’t do much exploring of the island. Each day we took a short walk around the city, or out to the beaches. In the summer, I am sure that the island is full of tourists catching rays on the beautiful beaches that are only a five-minute walk from the city. The cliffs separating the three beaches provide a fantastic view of the surrounding cliffs and islands just off shore. And, the bay walk along the city provides an excellent view of the small wooden Vietnamese fishing vessels in the harbor on the other side of the ridge from the beaches. It is quite the picturesque little town. The only qualm we had was the consistency of power outages. We were averaging three or so a day. (In Sapa we only have one a day, from five to eight each evening. And once in a while they throw in a bonus outage at night.) At this point in the trip we are kind of used to the outages, and have made a habit of carrying our flashlights/headlamps at night.
A sea of red with yellow stars
All the boats fly the Vietnamese flag and park really close together. On our third day we decided to head back to Hanoi to catch the night train up to Sapa. Of course, this was the only day of our Halong Bay trip that the sun decided to shine. It was nice being able to see Halong Bay with plenty of sunlight, even if we weren’t able to enjoy the beaches of Cat Ba in the sun. Anyway, we made it back to Hanoi and had a whirlwind three hours in the city getting train tickets, Darren picking up a package of books our parents sent along for us, and me picking up my ukulele at the travel agency that I forgot on the bus. We made it to the train station just in time to get on the train before it departed for the ten-hour ride north to Lao Cai where we took a mini-bus up the hill to Sapa.
We got in and wandered around looking for a hotel. We ended up finding the nicest hotel of the trip thus far (for those that might be headed this way it is at the Mountain View Hotel). The room was big, clean, great beds and, as the name suggests, we
had an amazing view of the mountains and the valley. We sat around most mornings just using hanging out looking out over the valley. It is much easier to feel like you accomplished something, even when you really did nothing in particular, when you are looking out at a beautiful view than when you are in a windowless room. (Sorry to all my friends at work in their windowless offices!)
Anyway, Sapa is a great city. The valley is simply fantastic, with rice patty terraces covering the bottom quarter of the mountains, clouds drifting in and out along the top third of the mountains, and ridges jutting in and out of the valley as far as you can see. The temperature remains pretty cool, hitting the low eighties in the middle of the day and the mid sixties at night. We are extremely appreciative of this; as we were leaving Vientiene the other week we realized that we could the days below ninety on one hand.
We decided that we didn’t want to do any overnight trekking, as we had done so much in Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. And, after doing the group tour of Halong Bay, we
decided that the group thing wasn’t for us either. We bought a map of the area that has a lot of trails on it and have just been going at it ourselves. While we are missing out on some great off the beaten track adventures, as I am sure it is pretty easy to find amazing out the way villages just a few dozen kilometers out of town, we have done pretty well just walking a little ways and turning down random paths and walking through random rice patties. The farmers don’t mind, and their kids love you. However, as I found out the hard way, their dogs do not appreciate it. I had two different occasions where dogs came after me. The first dog was two steps away from getting a size ten in the face. The second time I was surrounded by three dogs, each time one would come at me I would act like I was about to hit it, it would turn, and the other two would get brave and come at my back. I held them off until their owner came running down the hill and got them away. After that I decided to head
back to the road. Hey, I love dogs, but if is between me getting rabies and them getting a broken jaw, I don’t mind pulling a Jack Black. “That’s the way I roll.”
One of the peaks, Fansipan, is the highest peak in Indochina. It is kind of a dubious accomplishment though; it is like saying it is the highest peak in the Midwest. I keep seeing these claims everywhere: Mt. Kinabalu in Borneo, Malaysia claims to be the highest mountain in South East Asia, except for those on the island of Papua. The mountains in Papua are the highest in Asia, except for those little hills called the Himalayas. At least those are some reasonable things to claim though, I’ve been having a blast with the signs claiming to be “exactly the place you have been looking for” and those that say they have “the best burgers in Vietnam.” The funniest by far though was the sign saying they had the “second best pizza in Chang Mai.” WTF? Why would you claim that you have the second best? The city isn’t that big, I would just go looking for the sign that says they have the best pizza.
I mean, what kind of claim is that? Really. I also like messing with people at the restaurants next door to those places. They come out and ask you to come in and eat at their restaurant. I always point to the place with the sign that claims to have the best x, and ask why I shouldn’t go there. They typically say that people just know that theirs is really the best, that they don’t need a sign. Well I didn’t know, so obviously not. Anyway, if the play along, they earn my respect and I’ll end up eating at their restaurant. Simple pleasures, right? Okay, rant over.
Oh, and I couldn’t explain Sapa without talking about the Hmong people in the town trying to sell tourists every little trinket they possibly can. The Hmong women come to town from their villages in the countryside, wearing their traditional black garments that have extremely colorful embroidery, with their homemade goods to sell the tourists. They are pretty tenacious, and some tourists get frustrated by it. Some are dumb enough to buy something just so the women will leave them alone. But it is ridiculous, because that is just reinforcing
Sunny day in Halong Bay!
Finally got to see some sun in Halong Bay as we were riding out the behavior. Stupid, illogical people frustrate me. Anyway, the Hmong are a lot of fun to talk to, they speak English extremely well (better than most of the Vietnamese), and have beautiful smiles.
The other night Darren and I were walking to dinner, and D got offered opium by an older Hmong lady that was probably in her early seventies. (Darren’s edit: It turns out I’m attractive to people in two categories: Minority Vietnamese drug-dealing grandmothers, and Laotian transsexual prostitutes.) We thought that was a bit crazy, and an extremely sad reflection on the travelers that have come here previously; the woman was just filling the market’s desire. It has been something I’ve noticed as we have traveled around Southeast Asia. A lot of the backpackers traveling see their trip as an opportunity to smoke a lot of pot, as they aren’t working back home, and try opium, as it is frequently smoked in the villages. They don’t think of the consequences their habits have on the young local children who look up to westerners due to their affluence. They don’t think of how a bunch of drug hungry white skinned young people make the West look in the
Rice terraces
Clamoring around the farms in Sapa Valley, I hiked along plenty of these guys eyes of the locals. Sorry, I’ll get off my soap box, but as I said earlier, stupid people that don’t think of the consequences of their behavior annoy me.
Anyway, we are having a great time, despite some of the drawbacks of the Vietnamese. Hope everyone is doing well wherever you are!
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Brian Kany
non-member comment
Hey Guys, That was another great post Kyle. I’m so impressed with the effort you’re putting into this trip. Take care and keep it up. Cousin Brian