Ha Long and Sapa Splendors

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Trip Start Aug 31, 2008 Previous
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  Sapa, Vietnam
Saturday, September 13, 2008

What a past few days!

We started on Monday taking a mini bus on a two hour drive to Ha Long Bay.  Very beautiful drive with random colonial villages.  Our tour only had one other couple on it so we basically had the run of the junk (tour boat) to ourselves.  we had a great lunch and set sail amoung the limestone islands that just pop here and there straight out of the sea.  We visited the "Amazing" cave which was pretty amazing.  We then toured to a pearl farm and went for a swim amoung the jelly fish...which stalked our Aussie friend and one gave him a whack. We set anchor amoung the many other boats and had dinner.  Next day went to a nice beach.  Nadz was lazy so I took my new 60-something friend on a hike to the top of the island for some amazing views.  We then returned to the each to have a swimming race.  I beat the 60 year old. whoop whoop!!! of the confidence I gained.  Had lunch back in town then returned to Hanoi

Ha Long junk boats

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That same night we jumped on a night train to Sapa.  We shared a cabin with two nice Brit girls and actually had a decent sleep.  Caught the bus way up the mountain and arrived to absolutely amazing views in Sapa.  The town is over run by H'Mong hill tribe women who have designed quite the selling scheme.  They put on there friendly face and follow you around asking questions such as , "where you from?" "how old are you?" "you have brother sister?" "you have boyfriend?" then finally "you buy from me?".  This was constant. Like having an entourage of Oprah's interviewing you.  They would wait outside our hotel.  Quite the experience, but very nice women.  That afternoon our H'mong travel guide Be, toured us down to a traditional village called Cat Cat.  We saw how they made most of the items they sold in town by hand.  Pretty amazing.  Went down to some waterfalls as well.  Nadia choose to take a motto back up, but as most of you now me and my issues with mottos, I made the hike back up:)  That night we met up with our Brit girls Katie and Helen, two Dutch girls Tilly and Monica, and our lone Harvard grad friend Alan.  We went for a good dinner at Mimosa.  Attempted to drink a bottle of local wine...really something between a really sweet sherry and fruit juice...

After a perfect sleep I went on another trek with Be while Nadia relaxed at the hotel

Ha Long Bay

.  She took me down to her own village plus two more.  It was such a beautiful day and hike was awesome.  Got quite muddy but it was worth it.  Returned to town later that night and Alan Nadz and I splurged on an amazing Italian restaurant called Delta.  The pasta was homemade and it rivaled any pasta I had in Italy....Sapa, Vietnam who knew :)

Next day Nadz and I just cruised the town went for an excellent lunch at a cafe run by disadvantaged youth.  We then returned to our hotel to check out...met up with 3 Vancouver boys who had just made a trip to the hospital due to a motto incident (I told you!!).  We then boarded our bus back down to the train station.  Train ride back was not nearly as good as the first.  Our cabin only had one little sleeping Vietnamese woman, which we thought we lucked out on, until her drunk boyfriend showed up.  Ha... still wasn't as bad as our new friends from Seattle who some how ended up with 3 extra hammered Vietnamese men in their cabin.  Ahhh  trains, always entertaining. AC bailed on us in the middle of the night, making for a scorching hot few hours, until they made up with it by cranking the AC to make for a freezing few hours.  So we rolled into Hanoi at 5:30 am bagged, sticky, sick (me with a cold) and nothing to do until things started to open.  Had a good buffet breakfast at a major ex-pat community tower.  Now we are just cruising Hanoi waiting for our next night train to Hoi An (keep your fingers crossed for us!)

My view from the top in Ha Long

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So far we find Vietnam a beautiful place with only some major annoyances (obviously the beeping and people seem to only mock the way I laugh and say no thank you, not Nadia) but overall always entertaining and everyone is friendly!  I am going to start a tally to keep for the rest of the trip...

Times I've lost Nadia: 0 (!knock on wood)
Things we've seen to ensure I will not eat meat in SE Asia: 1 (can't even bring myself to explain)
Times we've been had: 2 (mini bus and stupid banana lady sucking us in with a photo op then charging us $5 for bananas)
Most people we've seen on a motto: 4 (3 adults one child)
Most random thing on a motto: two guys one holding a very large fish tank, with water in it, and fish! One guy with a large door.
Gross bugs: 1 (our little bed friend at the Lucky Eden)
Train rides from hell: 1

Down south we go!

Post your own travel photos for friends and family More Pictures

Whats for lunch???	Beautiful Sapa (Our hotel room view!)	Town of Sapa	Chatting with the H'mong ladies
Cat Cat Village	Cat Cat kids	H'mong woman and her babe	Cat Cat Falls (Sapa)
Nads loves the train! ha	Train ride from hell...

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