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4: Vietnam 18 March 2005
Hi Everyone..
We left Dalat for Nha Trang, which is meant to have amazing diving but
it was the wrong time of year. We went on a boat trip to all of the
surrounding islands instead, but when we tried snorkling it was cold and
the visibility was terrible. Lucky we didn't pay to dive instead. It was
getting a bit cold so we went to the mineral spa, where we had baths in
mud and hot mineral water that they pumped straight out of the ground.
We took a night bus to Hoi An which was terrifying.. the drivers in
Vietnam are even worse than in Thailand and we kept waking up when the
bus slammed on the brakes after trying to overtake and realising it was
about to have a head on collision.
It didn't get any warmer in Hoi An but it was quite nice to get away
from the heat for a bit. It's a Unesco World Heritage site so a group of
old buildings are preserved, like temples and old houses, so we went
into some of those. There were tailors everywhere - the LonelyPlanet is
2 years old and said that at the time of printing there were about 200
tailors in the small town, and now there must be at least double that. I
had some clothes made and they were sooo cheap, plus they only took a
few hours. I should have had more made because just before we left we
bought another bag to fit all of our shopping in, so I would have had
space to pack them!
We took another bus to Hue where it was properly cold and I had to
buy a winter jacket. We went to see a tomb, a temple and the old
citadel. It was wet and miserable so we tried booking a night bus to
Hanoi for that night but it was fully booked, so we had to stay another
day. Luckily, it was one of the only rooms we stayed in that had a tv so
we watched a few bad films on HBO, played cards, read and ate to kill
time. At 6 we took the night bus and got into Hanoi at 8 the next
morning. After finding somewhere to stay and sleeping for a few hours we
walked around the Old Quarter, a lake in the middle of the city, a
temple on the lake, and a cathedral.
The next morning we went to Halong Bay on a 2 day boat trip. We
weren't going to go because of the bad weather but then we heard that it
was nice in the mist as well. It was amazing.. there are 2000 limestone
islands there, most of them really small but some big enough to go onto.
We saw some caves,and then stopped at a beach where we climbed to the
top of the hill to see an amazing view of the islands from there. We
spent the night on the boat, anchored in the middle of nowhere all on
our own until 2 other boats turned
up a bit later. The people working on the boat brought out karaoke and
when no one was interested, they made up a card game where the loser had
to sing a song of their choice. People chose things like Jungle Bells
and Happy Birthday... I sang Cotton Eye Joe but could only remember the
first line so got off lightly!
We were told that we had to be awake for breakfast at 7.30, but were
woken up several times during the night by rats in the cabins. At 6 the
generator started up right underneath my bed, and at 6.30 the cook stuck
his head through the window to say that breakfast was ready. No one was
very impressed, and to make it worse when we got to the dining room
there was no food... we sat and waited an hour and a half until we'd
picked up the people who had spent the night in a hotel. It was worth it
though, the whole trip I mean, not the getting up early. It would
probably be even more amazing in summer, but in the mist it was
beautiful.
Next we did a trip to Sapa, north of Hanoi, where lots of hill tribes
live. We took a night train to Lau Cai, then a bus up to Sapa where we
started the trek. In the afternoon we got to the Giay hill tribe and
spent the night with a family there. They cooked dinner for us, and made
a huge stack of pancakes for breakfast. We walked through the rice
paddies andbamboo forests for another day and then took an old army
truck back to Sapa to catch the night train back to Hanoi.
In our last few days in Hanoi we went to the Perfume Pagoda (a temple
on a hill than you have to get to by a rowing boat), a Russian circus,
and then rented a DVD player for $2 a day and watched most of the fake
DVDs we'd bought.
On the 15th we flew back to Bangkok and had a few days there - went to
some temples, had another fitting for our suits and my dress, and did
some shopping. We got to Ayuthaya (the old capital of Thailand) this
morning, and rented bikes so that we could see most of the ruins.
Tomorrow morning we're taking a train to Sukothai, where there are more
ruins, and then I think we'll be all templed out. More soon!
Love Emily xxx
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