Auberge Dang Trung Hotel Sapa

... views over the valleys and mountains around us. By this time it was 7.30 and we were both very tired (not much chance to sleep on the train, journey very bumpy) so we got our heads down until lunchtime. When we got up we went for lunch and then booked ourselves on a trek for the next 2 days.

With not a lot else on for the afternoon we decided to hire a couple of motorbikes and go for a ride. We first headed up the mountain to the Tram Ton Pass, which is the ...

... VNese. In primary school, they only learn VNese; in middle school, they learn English. Some kids never make it to middle school and learn English from the tourists. Middle school is in Sapa and to go further, the kids have to move to Hanoi and most families don't have the means to send their children that far.

When we got to the village of Lao Chau to see how typical Hmong villagers live, Pierre got accosted by a little girl of about 8 or 9, trying to ...

... ve left home. The tradition here is that maybe 5 or six dishes are prepared and everyone takes a little of everything, eating with chopsticks of course! we had so much food and we didn't finsih any of the dishes. Soon after dinner she produced rice wine, made locally! sure we had to have a drop, she wasn't too pleased when we pulled out after 4 shots i think she wanted us to keep going all night!! We watched a bit of rubbish vietnamese telly and then headed ...

... straight out of a mountain town in Switzerland or Colorado.



It wasn’t until the next morning that I finally felt healthy enough to do some real exploring. I got up around 8 and decided to walk down the hill towards Cat Cat village, cut West and just walk until I found a back way up to Sapa. I stopped by a bakery to grab some breads for lunch and a 12 oz bottle of water. The clerk pointed the way to Cat Cat and off I went. I wondered around some back streets ...

... of beauty ect but our trip was nightmare but did end up drink with another boat in the evening which was cool and just spent the rest of night drinking with the french chick Florie (who i am traveling with at the moment). Anyway got back to Hanoi and Aussie lads still there and few others so Friday was more beers and ended up in Irish bar where meet another french chick who was pretty hot!! did a lot of ground work that night. Woke up ...

... train to Sapa-the bus worked out to be a bit cheaper and took you all the way to Sapa as opposed to the train that stopped in a town just outside Sapa (and then had to take a minivan). That said, the bus ended up making many late night stops and a several hour stop in the same town the train ended in so sleep-wise it would have been better to take the train.

Once we booked all our tickets we decided to skip running around Hanoi like crazy ...

... the day!
We ate with the family... what a great experience this day had been, to spend the afternoon with a Hmong family, in their home.... without any other tourists or guides.... (evening - again, a few beers in the Hmong sisters bar)

Day 3 in Sapa... we went to Mai's house for an experience similar to the previous day's.... Mai also lives pretty far out of town... the last bit on the bikes was an experience - a thin muddy track... Mai's mother has remarried and ...