Halong bay / Cat Ba Island

After arriving in Hanoi in the morning we managed to get ourselves onto a local bus headed for Halong town.  Our accommodation was fantastic, two huge beds, spotlessly clean and a hairdryer! I couldn't wait to blow dry my hair for the first time in months.  

We had a bit of a wander around Halong town but it really is just a bit of a ghost town.   we made plans to go to Cat Ba Island from there the next day and then went out for dinner.  While out for dinner, the old lady running the place kept trying to get us to sit with some Vietnamese guys.  She told us that since is was Tët, they would like to celebrate with us.  Despite the offer of free beer and the assurance from the lady that these were nice boys, we declined.  We took a taxi to a night market, hoping to find some warm clothes for our trip to Sapa but, unfortunately, there was nothing much worth buying there.

The next day we made the trip to Cat Ba Island.  The ferry ride only took one short hour and we were gifted with some of the most beautiful scenery in the world as we sailed through Halong Bay.  The hour long bus drive from the pier to Cat Ba town was not so pleasant.  The bus was crammed to the gunnels with everyone who didn't have their own mode of transport.  Ah well, swings and roundabouts.

We went for a beautiful dinner at a place called Green Mango on the waterfront and then booked some things to do while in Cat Ba.  

The following morning we were collected at our accomodation for our kayaking boat trip.  The weather was unfortunately a bit dreich, or miserable for all you non-scots.  We were taken through Halong bay, which is just crazy stunning - even when the weather is pants, to where we would do our kayaking. The kayaks were tandems and so I ended up sharing with a guy from Liverpool.  We were only allowed one hour to explore the caves and area around where we were.  The guy with me was the laziest person on the planet, I ended up doing the majority of the paddling while he just sat back and looked pretty.  Maybe he thought I couldn't notice since he was sitting in the back.  After kayaking, we were given a lovely lunch on board the boat and then taken to where we could go swimming or jump from the roof of the boat.  The three of us were already shivering and so decided just to stay put.  Some crazy people, or drunk people, were going for it though.  As much as they tried to convince us that it "wasn't that cold", their blue lips and chittering were giving the game away.  The last stop was monkey island where we were dropped at the beach and given a short time to hopefully catch a glimpse of the cheeky residents.  

We had hot showers, dinner and two(!) hot chocolates at our own accomodation that night was we were too cold from our day on the water to venture any further.  

We spent the next day hiking in the National park.  There was one French/Canadian lady who was falling behind right from the off-start and by the time we were at the bits where we were needing to do a lot of scrambling, she was miles behind.  It wasn't a particularly difficult trek, about 10km through the hills and then a further 5km on the flat, but I really enjoyed it.  I think it was because some of the trek was scrambling which is much more fun than just walking.  We stopped after 10km to have lunch in a small village and the food provided was much much better than most of the stuff I've eaten at restaurants in Vietnam. 

Every time that we stopped for a break, and by that I mean, wait for French/Canadian to catch up, our guide was checking us all for leeches.  We had put on insect repellant in the morning which is supposed to be good for leeches, this meant that we only found one between us during the whole trek.  Kay was the unlucky host to the leech but we found it quick enough that it wasn't too difficult to remove.  

We went for dinner and a cocktail that night and also booked our bus back to Hanoi for the following morning.  I had found a hairdressers in Hanoi which had amazing reviews and so was looking forward to getting my mop coloured and cut.  The multicoloured look wasn't really doing it for me.  

Hoi An & Dong Hoi

We were dropped in Da Nang in the morning and from there had to make our own way to Hoi An. Thankfully, there was a local bus leaving from across the bus station. We, along with every other westerner that had been dumped there, hopped on the bus and settled ourself in for the ride. Once we got to Hoi An, Beryl asked one of the tuk tuk drivers that were pestering us to use their phone.  She called the hotel and they kindly came and collected us from the bus station.  We had read in reviews that there was a pool which was one of the reasons we decided to go with that place but when we saw it we knew instantly that we wouldn't be using it. It was right in the middle of the reception area and the water was freezing cold. We had booked into a dorm room, but what they gave us was a private room with two double beds for the four of us, lovely surprise! 

Hoi An is one of the prettiest places we've been to. It's so picturesque. There is a lovely river running through the small town and lanterns hanging everywhere. After having some breakfast we went for a walk down the the river and across the bridge. 

We went for lunch at Madam Banh Mi's sandwich place.  She is world renouned for making the best Vietnamese banh mis.  They really were quite delicious and cheap too! While we were walking around the town some ladies carrying baskets of fruit on their shoulders stopped and asked if we wanted to take their picture.  Once we had taken their picture they then asked if we wanted to try on their hats and to try carrying the fruit, we duly did.  This was then followed by them asking if we would like to buy some fruit.  Of course we would, these ladies have been so kind, why not, let's get some bananas we thought.  $6!! Six dollars she wanted for 5 tiny little bananas! We were well and truly duped.  We bought them, and then ended up not eating the ridiculously expensive bananas.

We went for dinner with a girl Beryl had previously met and some people from her hostel.  There was 11 of us in total, we went to a wee restaurant that we had seen that day while walking around.  The food was mediocre at best and the local beer, although very very cheap, tasted watered down.  After dinner we went to a bar called Tiger Tiger where they kindly set up some tables for us across the road so that we could sit outside and watch the fireworks when they came.  The fireworks were amazing! They set off so many at the same time and the display went on for about half an hour! They were so close that my neck was getting so sore looking at them by the end.  We stayed out until the early hours of the morning celebrating our second new year. 

We had a bit of a lazy day.  We went back to Madam Banh Mi's for lunch which was delicious again, and after spending quite some time trying to book a bus out of Hoi An, we finally spoke to someone sensible in Tourist Information who told us that the couple of days after Tët would be cheap on the train in the direction we wanted to go in.  Unfortunately this meant making a trip to Da Nang the following day to get tickets from the train station.  We had a very mediocre dinner at a street food place.  It was very very busy and so we thought it must be good but,unfortunately not, the food was bland and not particularly cheap either.  Not sure what the appeal is there.  We went for some beautiful cocktails at a restaurant overlooking the river.  I opted for a white wine sangria which was one of the nicest cocktails I've ever had, just delicious.  

The next morning we got up early and caught the local bus to Da Nang so we could book our train to Dong Hoi.  The station had been shut over Tët and so it was ridiculously busy when we were there,  but we finally managed to get our really cheap tickets and headed back to Hoi An for lunch.  Kay, Jess and Beryl decided to hire some bicycles and tour around Hoi An for a while, I wasn't feeling very well and so decided to just stay at home and nap for the rest of the day.  It wasn't long before beryl was back in the room though as it turns out, whoever coined the phrase 'it's like riding a bike' has clearly never met beryl.  We decided to take a walk to the beach instead.  It wasn't meant to be that far away but ended up taking us about an hour to walk.

We went to what they were calling a food court for dinner.  Spoke to a French family who advised us to have some savoury pancakes which were amazing! We shared one between us and then since it was so delicious we ordered lots more food. Went to an ice-cream parlour, which had 57 different flavours, for dessert.  I think my favourite flavour was Cointreau or maybe mint....they were all pretty good in all fairness.  

We woke early the next morning to pack and check out of our accommodation. We wanted to go to a restaurant we'd read about but they had been shut over Tët and so we tried one last time to see if they were open but, alas, it was not to be unfortunately. Back to madam Bahn Mi's to get some sandwiches before getting our taxi to Da Nang.  It was only myself, Kay and Jess getting the train to Dong Hoi.  Beryl had decided to rent a bike and driver to take her to Hue and she was going to meet us in Dong Hoi the following morning.  

A couple of hours into our train journey, we felt a thud and then the train came to a stop.  All the Vietnamese passengers were up looking out the windows.  Eventually the nosiness took over and Kay got up to look also.  I'm glad I stayed put because what she saw, was a man being pull out from under our carriage.  The train was about ten carriages long and we were third from the end so the poor man had been ran over by 7 carriages.  The Vietnamese didn't seem very fazed by the whole thing, I don't know I'd this is maybe a regular occurrence or what.  All the westeners, by comparison, seemed pretty shell shocked.  It wasn't long before the train was moving again though and we arrived in Dong Hoi around 9pm. We got a taxi to our accommodation and once we'd checked in, had some dinner and treated ourselves to a nice cocktail after our traumatic journey.  We spoke to the nice, if somewhat stressed, lady running the place about our options for seeing the caves the next morning.  She told us we could either book a tour, around $50 each, or hire bikes and do it ourselves.  She seemed to think it would cost roughly the same to do it ourselves but were only going to take 2 bikes between the four of us and so it was working out quite a bit cheaper, that and it would be more fun on bikes.

Beryl arrived in Dong Hoi at some ridiculous hour of the morning and slept on a couch at our hostel.  We had breakfast and waited for our bikes to arrive but our scatterbrained hostess had forgotten to book our bikes the night before and so all that was left were semi-automatics.  None of us had ridden bikes with gears and so we were panicking a bit in the morning but the guy gave us a quick lesson around the block and off we set to see the longest and largest caves the world.  I drove for about 20 miles and then switched with Kay for a bit as my hands were getting a bit sore.  Once we arrived at the place where you get the boat into the longest cave we met some German guys who asked if we would like to share the cost of a boat with them. The boat took us down the river and then into the cave. It was really cool, they let us off inside the cave so that we could have a walk around.  We then walked out of the cave and met the boat so they could take us back up the river to where we started.  After having some lunch we realised that because of the bike fiasco in the morning along with the first cave taking longer than we thought to do, we now didn't have time to see paradise cave too.  It was ok though, we really enjoyed our day out on the bikes anyway.  

Our accomodation in Dong Hoi had the potential to be really good but they were so short staffed with it being Tët, that the service was appalling.  We waited well over an hour for our dinner to arrive and we were starting to get a bit tetchy as our night bus to Hanoi was due to arrive any minute.

Thankfully, our dinner did eventually arrive and so did our bus to Hanoi.

Nha Trang

We left HCMC on our first 'sleeper' bus along with Jess, one of the girls I had met on my Chu Chi tunnels tour. The sleeper buses in Vietnam are in no way as luxurious as the buses in Thailand, but they do have beds, kind of. You have a seat/pod which lies almost all the way back but they are built for short Vietnamese people and so if you are any taller than me (5"5) you will not be able to lie flat. I'm very fortunate, in that, I can generally sleep anywhere and so I did manage to get some sleep, waking up every few hours in order to reposition myself. Thankfully, we've now done so many of these buses that I am almost at pro at sleeping on them. 

We arrived quite early and Jess had read that we should be dropped off not far from our accommodation, so we set off in search of the place. When we finally found it, it wasn't far, but with heavy rucksacks, it felt far, but we had managed to book ourselves into two different hostels. They have two, close by to each other, but they were nice enough to allow us to change our booking so that the three of us could stay together. Having not had the best sleep in the world, we decided to spend the day on the beach. 

Our friend Rosie from home had recently moved to Vietnam and was currently sunning herself in Nha Trang. Myself, Kay and Rosie met up for drinks that night which was lovely. We can't manage to organise ourselves to see each other when we are both in Scotland but, put us on the other side of the world and somehow it works out! 

The next day, Kay, Jess and I went to a thermal spa. They had mineral mud baths where we caked ourselves in mud and then dried off in the sun. This was followed by a vigorous shower and then some time in the hot springs. The perfect place to spend a hangover and Valentine's Day. 

That night we went to an ice bar with the other girl in our 4-bed dorm room. As I'm sure you can imagine, it was freezing! Minus 10 degrees Celsius! We were given gloves, scarf, huge jacket and Uggs before we went in. The whole place was made of ice including the glasses. We only stayed long enough to have one drink and take some pictures, our noses would have fallen off if we stayed much longer! We had a few drinks at another bar after to warm up. 

We decided the next day to move to another hostel as we felt that ours was a bit on the small side. We decided between us on a hostel but when we arrived we had inadvertently booked ourselves into the only hostel smaller than our own. There was floor space for only two people in the room at a time, we had to go in in shifts. Our friend Beryl was arriving in Nha Trang that day, she had gone to Dalat for a couple of days while we were in Nha Trang. The four of us had a lazy day which consisted of, sunbathing, eating tiny burgers for dinner, then proceeding to eat a second dinner with dessert and then walking around the town to see all the lovely Tët decorations.  

The next day was spent on a 'booze cruise'.  The booze was severely lacking but we did get to spend some time at some nice islands and beaches. Jess, Beryl and I went snorkelling off one of the beaches while Kay went to do a scuba dive. She had been looking at some places in Nha Trang to do another dive and when they offered one on the booze cruise, for a scarily low price, she jumped at the chance.  When, finally, happy hour arrived, we were able to jump off the top of the boat into the water where there was a floating bar awaiting us. Jess very aptly described this as 'Mediocre Twenty Minutes' rather than 'Happy Hour'. It was still lots of fun jumping from the top deck of the boat. 

Once we had checked out the next morning, myself and Kay went to the beach so we could do some sunbathing while writing our postcards.  We walked back to the accommodation so that we could make a plan for the rest of our time in Vietnam and we hadn't been there long when Beryl arrived to pick up her bikini. She had been into one of the fancy hotels at the beach to use their toilet and she noticed that they had a pool on the ground level that no one was using. She was sure that the hotel was too big for the staff to know who stayed there and who didn't so, we grabbed our bikinis too and headed to the hotel with our best 'we belong here' faces at the ready.  She was right, no one batted an eyelid when we used their pool for an hour or so. 

Another sleeper bus, another destination...Hoi An, here we come! 

Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)

After leaving Cambodia nice and early, we made it through the border without any dramas, and arrived in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) around lunch time.  We decided to book something to do for the next day and then go and see a nice park which was close by to our accommodation. The traffic in HCMC is absolutely mental! Cars have a 300% tax on them so everyone drives a scooter or motorbike.  With a population and size equivalent to London, but no underground, you can imagine the chaos.  The drivers just ignore the traffic lights and so what you have to do is, hold your hand out in a 'stop' motion, make eye contact, walk slowly and they'll just drive around you.  An unnerving experience the first few times to say the least, but we soon got used to it - a bit.

When we arrived at the park we were told that they were just shutting up for the day and that we were therefore not allowed in.  It was only early afternoon by this point but I could see that they were setting up for something inside.  With Tët (Vietnamese New Years) being just around the corner I figured it was probably something to do with that.  Avoiding crossing the road as much as possible, we made our way back to our accommodation, stopping in at a few shops on the way.  

The next morning we were booked in to do a tour of the Chu Chi tunnels. This was the underground network used by the north Vietnamese during the Vietnam war.  Kay, unfortunately, wasn't feeling very well that morning and so I went on the trip alone.  I met three lovely girls on the bus and ended up spending the day with them.  The trip was very informative and I learnt a lot about the Vietnam war that I didn't know before.  This wasn't difficult since I knew hee-haw before.  Our first stop before the tunnels had been a lacquer-wear factory where we got to see all the lovely lacquer things for sale in Vietnam being made.  It was interesting to see that they often use egg shell for the designs.  Once at the tunnels we were shown the hidden entrances which were tiny.  We were allowed to get in and have our picture taken, which we all duly did, apart from one lady, she was a bit on the larger side and when she asked if she could have a turn, an employee seemed to appear from no where and shout "no, no lady! Not for you!". I did feel a bit sorry for her but, he was right, there was no way on this planet she was going to fit in.  These holes were designed for tiny Vietnamese, not overweight westeners.  We were shown some of the booby traps that they had set for the Americans.  These were pretty awful, but I'm sure very effective.  Even with all the tourist stuff, the place was quite densely forested and it was quite easy to imagine how the opposition, especially those not from Vietnam, must have felt.  Not knowing if you next step would be your last.

Then came the fun bit! They have widened one of the tunnels by 50% to allow us 'large' westeners to experience crawling through.  Even with it being widened, they were still very small and very claustrophobic.  The tunnels around HCMC go on for around 75 miles, but we only went about twenty metres or so before the heat got the better of us and we surfaced for some fresh air.  I had read in a review on tripadvisor where the reviewer had said the highlight of their day had been when "a big fat American got stuck in the tunnel" and they all had to back out.  I kinda secretly wanted this to happen again while I was there.  

When back in HCMC, thankfully, Kay was feeling much better and so we decided to quickly go to the war memorial museum.  It wasn't something I thought i would be hugely interested in and so thought the hour we had would be enough.  What a mistake, there was so much to see and read there that we could have easily spent a few hours there.  The museum is very one sided and concentrated mostly on all the horrific things that the American / South Vietnamese troops did during the war.  It was quite upsetting to read some of the things, especially the effects that Agent Orange has had on the Vietnamese people since the war. This was one of the herbicide and defoliants used during the war, the chemical is still causing human mutations.  The U.S have only just recently agreed to partially fund the clean up needed after using this chemical, this came after decades of court proceedings.  This was not just a war crime and a crime against humanity, but also a crime against nature.  

That night, myself and Kay travelled to the other side of the city to get a 'chippy' from JJ's fish and chip shop.  When we finally found the place down some maze of an alleyway we were greeted by an English man who told us that they now only did take aways and had no where for us to sit.  We ordered our chips and went for a short walk to see a obscenely lit up church close by.  There were statues of angles with lit up halos.  We ventured back and collected our chips and rode back to our accommodation to enjoy them. Must say, they were definitely worth the trip! 

The next morning myself, Kay and two of the girls I'd met the day before all went on a day trip to the Mekong River.  Yes, this is the same river I spoke about in Cambodia. This river starts in China, and runs through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and finally ends in Vietnam.  We had a wonderful guide that day who gave us loads of advise for travelling in Vietnam.  The told us how to cross the road, closing your eyes and just walking is his method apparently, he also told us to make sure and take care of our belonging too as drive-by muggings are common, even more so since it was the run up to Tët.

Our first stop that morning was a typical cafe in suburban Vietnam.  Lots and lots of hammocks and not a table in site - heaven! The reason for this, he explained, is that many people do long journeys on their motorbikes and because they are quite uncomfortable, they need to stop every couple of hour or so.  This is where the hammock cafes come in, they can have a quick snooze and a coffee and set of again.

We then went to a pagoda which wasn't very impressive on the inside but they did have some huge Buddha statues outside.  One laughing Buddha and one standing.  We took a boat to Turtle island for some lunch before stopping at a coconut candy factory where we got to see them make the candies and also got to taste them while they were still lovely, hot and fresh.  While we were at the factory our guide produced a huge snake from a cage and we all had a shot at holding it.  It was much much heavier than it looked!

It was there that we got onto small long boats, in fours, and went on a short trip down the Mekong river, in the obligatory rice hats of course.  Our tour ended with us having some honey tea, fruit and getting to listen to some awful traditional Vietnamese music. A fantastic day out and all for only about $7! Bargain! 

That night Kay took the plunge and bought a rucksack to replace her enormous bag which now had a hole in it.  We didn't have time after dinner to go through all her belonging and throw stuff out so the empty bag came along with us on our first proper sleeper bus to Nha Trang.  We had slept on night buses while being away but these ones in Vietnam actually have beds! Not the comfiest beds on the planet I must say but I huge improvement on the upright seats we'd slept on previously. Next stop, Nha Trang for some beach time and to hopefully catch up with our long lost friend Rosie!