Tam Coc Ninh Binh

This was truly a great day, only one hitch in recording the event. My bad!I have to admit to operator error. I was so keen to upload the gorgeous pics I had taken, I accidentally deleted them with a flying finger on my Ipad.

Takeaway learning from this experience is: there is NO trash can on an Ipad. Once you delete from all, they are gone …

After the disappointment of Halong Bay we treated ourselves to a day out to Tam Coc which is said to be the Halong Bay of the rice paddies. We booked the excursion through Century Hotel who, we have to say, have been fantastic - friendly, helpful and very accommodating. If we find ourselves in Hanoi in the future and need to stay somewhere …

So having once again been scammed by being shown a room for $6 then told they had no key for that room the one above is $8, does anyone know why a room up more flights of stairs is more expensive I give up understanding I'm gonna live in a bungalow give my legs a rest. Go up 5 flights its $15 you get a better nights sleep because your so exhausted …

So we decided to take a day trip from Hanoi to Tam Coc (or the Halong bay of the land as we were told on several occasions by our tour guide). On the way we stopped at Hoa Lu ancient city and pagoda and found out a little more about Vietnamese tradition. We saw the present king on a buffalo but he looked more like a local farmer. One man in our …

We paid USD20 for a day trip to Tam Coc. The fully packed and overloaded van picked us from the hotel at 8.30am and started the bumpy and uncomfortable journey from Hanoi which took 4 hours. Stopped on the way at a craft centre and also an old city. We were given lunch at Tam Coc before we took the boat ride through the rice fields towards the …

... and the scenery became increasingly beautiful and distinctly unlike the pavement and city and hawkers that often imprison tourists in Ninh Binh.  Tam Coc's boat ride is beautiful, but it also seems fabricated, like so much that is frequented by tour ...

More pics here We decided to escape from the noise and smog of Hanoi into the countryside for another day.  Tam Coc is supposed to be the "Halong Bay on Rice Paddies", and we thought this might be a nice companion tour to the Halong Bay we just ...

... Bich Dong.  Plus, riding a motorbike is always invigorating.  So we were in a great mood as we began our boat ride in Tam Coc.  It's about $6 or so, which is steep for Vietnam but cheap for most of the world.  And it's a 2- or 3-hour ...

finally found a computer fast enough to do the blog! sorry avid fans for the lack of blogs...here goes. Spent two days in Ninh Binh mainly to visit Cuc Phong National Park where tom and i walked through the jungle, 7km didnt seem like it would be hard ...

... limestone rocks ever. Numerous boats passed us with the rowers leaning back and rowing with their feet, it all looked too easy. Ninh Binh is a haven of quiet compared to Hanoi, until you sit in the internet cafe i'm in now. I'm surrounded by ...

... scenes for me to feel that I wasn't missing out too much. To compensate though, a day trip out of Hanoi to Tam Coc in Namh Binh province was in order. Often described as riverside Halong Bay, the 2-3 hour languorous paddle up the Boi river winds its ...

Got the train from Hanoi to Ninh Binh, which was quite lucky as getting to the right train platform in Hanoi involves walking straight across all the other train tracks! The train could have done with a touch of refurbishment, and a little bit of a wash, ...

... . Oh, aren't ex-smokers the bitchiest? I'll tell you, travel in Asia is enough time in Flavor Country to last me quite a while... Ninh Binh is a little off the traveler track, most people take a day tour from Hanoi. It's popular because of Tam Coc, a ...

... to take a few small tokens of our appreciation to the kids who showed us around two days earlier.  So we went to a store in Ninh Binh and grabbed some notebooks, pens, colors and candy for the 6 kids we had met.  It's the people we meet on our ...

... disappointment of missing out on Ha long Bay due to the typhoon, my friend Liz of Taunton suggested we go south the mountains of Tam Coc, which are similar to Ha long Bay without the bay! We caught a very bumpy bus south in the afternoon before checking ...