Upon arriving in Ha Noi we were firstly surprised by just how cold it was having come from Laos. The next thing which struck us was the incredible similarities to China; not in a good way. Pretty much the whole time we were in Ha Noi we tried to not be in Ha Noi. It is just a city with relatively little to offer and it seems very dirty and manic. This twined with everyone trying to get you to book a tour with them or buy something led us to think that we might not like the whole of Vietnam. Luckily for us we are not the sort of people to just get back on a plane out of Vietnam and boy are we glad we didn't as we would've missed some amazing places, people and experiences.
Ha Long Bay
Prior to getting into Ha Noi we had already booked a 2 day and 1 night tour online (judging from our other tours booked in country this was definitely the best decision). The
day after arriving we were picked up at our hotel and transit 4 hours to the dock where our boat awaited us. When we got into the shuttle to the boat from the dock we were
wondering which boat was going to be ours as there were lots of both amazing and almost sunken boats. When we were informed that we wouldn't be on the boat we booked but another
one I was sure of the worst. When we reached the boat I had my reservations since the outside wasn't the best (or by any means the worst). As we entered the boat and headed up
into the restaurant I was surprised by just how nice the boat was. It seemed much nicer than the price we had paid. Next we were given our rooms. I was certain that this is where
half the group (who i assumed had paid more) would get the nice rooms and we would be in with the crew. Again I was pleasantly surprised to find nicer rooms on the boat then we
had had on land for the entire year so far.
Later that day we went to see the surprise cave and were then given the choice of either Kayaking or climbing atop of HiTop hill. We choose the later as this was something we had
heard was not to be missed and the time given for Kayaking would not have allowed one to sufficiently explore. It was also only around 15 celsius in the bay; not that this factored
into the decision at all :)
That evening we had free to socialise and they crew showed the Top Gear Vietnam Special after we had spent some time watching the sunset over the bay from the top deck. Of course
none of us complained that a beer was the same price as a coke.
The next morning we had a very early start in order to head into a cave which almost formed a lagoon inside it. We were told on our way in that we had got up 30 minutes earlier than
every other boat in the bay in order to be ahead of the morning rush. Boy were we glad we had as it was very very peaceful and on the way out we bumped into over 50 tourists clambering
into boats in order to head into the cave. After this we had a cooking class where we learned to make spring rolls before heading back to the bay through fantastic scenery and fishing
villages.
It is worth noting that while the drinks on the boat where extortionate the amount of food given was so much that we were all nearly twice as heavy when we got off as when we got on.
The next day after arriving back in Ha Noi from Ha Long Bay we decided that we wanted to get out of Ha Noi again before our sleeper train that night. After much deliberation
we decided that Tam Coc & Hoa Lu would the best place.
After what can only be described as a terrible journey we arrived at our destination. Thankfully the river paddle boat trip floating through the rice terraces and the bicycling
through the local villages and rice terraces made for an enjoyable day before we had an onslaught of a journey home with a suicidal driver who I think was not best pleased
because we were going to arrive back 30 minutes later than we were supposed to.
That night we headed down to the train station and caught our overnight train to the city of Hue. We were a little surprised by the condition of our seats on the train (we had
been unable to get a sleeper bed). We had expected nice, soft, comfortable seats instead we were greeted by seats from a 1980's coach, however we managed to get a pretty good
nights sleep and the chairs reclined very far allowing for the 14 hour journey to whiz by in a tick!
We arrived in Hue at around 11am after having spent the night on a sleeper train. We grabbed a semi dodgy taxi to our hotel before heading out to book a private car to
Hoi An via the Hai Van Pass (See top gear vietnam special). Thankfully the temperature in Hue was significantly better than that in Ha Noi; something which we'd grow
to regret on the next day.
Over a late lunch and cold drink we discovered that it was possible to do a cycling tour of all the tombs and this really appealed to us because we were absolutely feed
up with tours at this point, but still really wanted to see the tombs and pagoda's in Hue. We therefore set about planning our bicycle route to around Hue.
Our route consisted of over 30 kilometres of cycling, something I kept hidden from Kat by only telling her individual lengths. I knew I could easily manage this since I
had been doing 20km in an hour before leaving the UK. Obviously I hadn't really thought about the type of bike I was getting for 10 hours for 20 pence. Needless to say
we weren't going to breaking any records other than possibly being the slowest bike on an uphill stretch in the world or having the most useless brakes on a downhill
stretch.
That afternoon after planning our route for the next day we headed over to the imperial citadel as we knew we might not have time to do this on the next day. This eventually
turned into a 10 kilometre walk on the day before our bicycle tour of greater Hue.
We started out our ride down the banks of the river on the way to the furthest point, Minh Mang's tomb. This was a beautiful ride since it was still early morning and the sun
hadn't reached it crucifying levels. After this we headed to Tu Duc's Tomb and pagoda. Adamant we had missed the turn we wanted we headed down some hardly existing back lanes
which eventually lead us through tiny villages, local bars and onto a quarry. From here we continued up an uphill path onto what might as well have been patch of land in an
arid forest. Armed with our half fallen apart road bicycles with semi flat tyres we proceeded on before being told by a local meth addict (at least he looked like one) that
the tomb was just straight on up the track. Eventually we reached the end of the path and were greeted by a huge smooth main road with many tour buses and a silk factory.
Anybody who has down a tour in Asia will know the significance of finding a silk factory. By this point we were literally soaked through with sweat as it was about 2pm and we
had been riding in the midday heat for other an hour. Most of the foreigners on the tour buses looked at us rather strangely although some looked on in awe since they were
releasing how rubbish their tour was turning out to be :) After here with headed back to Hue centre via lots of pagodas. I had anticipated taking us on a nice detour avoiding
the worst of the traffic; however we managed to take a turn slightly too soon which meant we rode straight through the local market. The locals did however love that we were
there and constantly greeted us. Luckily for us there was only one more mistake to make and that was in us taking a wrong turn at a 45 road intersection where the traffic lights
didn't work. Thankfully our error meant we had to traverse the entire junction twice before arriving back at our hotel. At which point we both grabbed a shower to cool off before
enjoying our last evening in Hue.
We set our early in the morning for our drive to Hoi An from Hue. We didn't really know what to expect from this other than it sure beat the unscenic train ride or the bus which took the new tunnel through the mountain rather than the pass. We had a really good driver who spoke good english and drove carefully. You could also take a motorbike driver but we had too much luggage for this. On route our first stop was at the Lang Co beach this was a pleasant surprise for us as its easy for you to forget that Vietnam does in fact have beaches since this is not normally what you'd associate with Vietnam. The beaches were quite quiet other than the usual couple of touts and they were reasonably clean. After this we left in our car over the Hai Van Pass stopping for a picture at the top. This was an awesome drive and was very scenic; however I can't help but feel like it would've been even better if I had been driving a motorbike. After the pass we headed onto the marble mountain which is as rubbish as all the rest of the marble places before. Next we headed onto the Pagoda (which Kats forgotten the name of). There was the option of an elevator here but it seemed like a waste of money so we instead took the vertical staircase. Luckily there wasn't too many steps. The pagoda was nice, however the view out was mediocre. From here we headed into Hoi An along the famous beach road enjoying picturesque scenery of fishermen in the sea, tending to their nets or waxing their circular fishing boats so they don't sink.
Day 1
We were hoping to find someone to take us cheaply to "My Son" (the place not my actual son), but we were unable to find any one affordable and
we had read that the tours where not very good at all and I was still fed up off organised tours to the point where I would rebel at every
opportunity. So we decided that we might as well rent some bicycles in the mid-day heat since they were so cheap and take a ride through the
local villages on the way to An Bang Beach. On the way we saw some amazing things including water buffalo in pools to cool off to vegetable
groves and rice paddies along with interacting with many of the locals. An Bang beach was also a very nice place to relax by the sea and enjoy
a drink before our 4km ride home.
Day 2 - The Coconut Grove and Rice Paddies Route
We started very early this morning in order to avoid as much of the midday heat as was possible since we knew that we had over 20kms of riding
to do today. We also expected today to be the best day as per our knowledge.
We started by riding out of Hoi An town and into the rural villages which utilised the coconuts groves to make almost anything. Next we rode
right through the coconut groves and into the local fishing villages which were made up of almost too small to ride down alleyways and paths.
From here we headed into the shrimp farms and had a great view over Hoi An harbour. From here we stopped at a local convenience store to enjoy
a cold drink out the sun on tiny plastic chairs and top up our sun cream before we headed back out into the heat and onto Cui Dai Beach where
we spent the hottest period of the day sheltering under palm trees situated right on the beach front. It was so nice to find a beach where they
hadn't cut down all of this natural beauty. On our way back into Hoi An centre we took a short cut directly through the rice paddies on a dodgy
dirt / broken concrete path where we could see all of the locals working in the fields. They were (as always) very friendly and this made for a
very pleasant if uncomfortable ride back to our hotel.
The next morning we left on a flight to Ho Chi Minh City this was a deviation in our itinerary since we released that we really would not like
Nha Trang and as such travelling over 950kms by train seemed unnecessary.
We arrived in HCMC at around 6pm, we knew it was going to be hot here but nothing can really prepare you for the heat. WOW! We spent most of our time in HCMC doing shopping and sorting things out for our trip since we didn't really fancy the Cu Chi Tunnels in the heat and it was rather expensive for what it was. Hence the lack of photos. Thankfully vietnam makes North Face clothing and so we managed to pick up some very good jackets for around £30 each instead of the UK price tag of around £230 each.
Next off we headed via bus to Phnom Penh and onto country number 7, Cambodia.
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