Greetings From Vietnam!
Hey all!
Well, where to begin? This place is crazy!!! Got so much to say so I may as well start from the beginning...
Arrived in Hanoi on Tuesday night 2nd May, and got picked up from the airport by my friend Dan who works here. After a 12 hour flight we were pretty knackered, so a night in drinking booze was on the cards. Didn't get too drunk, as I needed to conserve energy for the next day. And boy did I need it!
Woke up the next day and went for a wander around town. Dan lives in a little alley way just outside the main 'centre' of Hanoi. The place is crazy. There are pretty much NO road rules - the bigger the vehicle, the more priority you have on the road. Most of the traffic is made up of motor bikes (more like mopeds really), and crossing the road is a case of walking straight ahead at a constant speed and them swerving in front and behind you. Daunting at first, but it's all good now. Except when I've been drinking. Which hasen't been too often considering the price of booze - some places have 500ml Tiger beer for just over $1 AU, while other places have happy hours where you can drink about 4 vodka red-bulls and 6 beers and get a pack of smokes for about $10!! This place could easily be the death of me...!!
Anyway, we got lost on our first walk around town, as the map we had didn't have any side streets or anything on it, which are rampant around town. We finally worked out where we were and walked to Dan's work to have lunch with him and his office. We went to some street 'restaurant' where I had my first taste of what I like to call mystery meats... No dog yet though - I'm certain of that. I think...
After lunch we went to the Old Quarter, which is streets of markets (we caught a cab and it got pulled over and extorted by the police on the way which was a trip!) Everything is so cheap here, it makes me realise how much we're being ripped off in Australia! But I geuss it needs to be cheap here, as the average wage is bugger all!
After running around the markets at the Old quarter for a while we stopped in a bar overlooking a semi major intersection and laughed at the traffic. The general rule is to keep right and give way to bigger vehicles, but it's really absolute chaos. The funny thing is that it seems to work!! I guess cos everyone's on bikes rather than cars - if they all drove cars it would be gridlock 24-7.
After a few beers (which you can buy a litre at a time for about $2 - in actual fact it was the size of a 2 litre milk carton!), we went to this place called Hyway 4 where we had some interesting rice wine. We had 5 snakes (2 cobras and 3 other snakes fermenting in the bottle), black bee (black bees suprisingly!) and I think ghekko and starfish (I think - things were starting to get hazy at this point... ;) ). We ate some frogs legs and some eel, and some other weird stuff I think - like I said, it was all getting hazy around now.
After this, Dan took us to a place he drinks at called the Spotted Cow - it's an ex-pat place full of westerners. It was ok, but me and Jen didn't feel like drinking with a bunch of drunken westerners (we can do that at home!! ;) ). I don't remember what time we left there - Dan left just before us and rode home on his bike (you can ride around as pissed as you like here, with no license or helmet) and Jen and I caught a taxi. We were almost home but I thought we just passed his street so we got tout of the cab. After realising we weren't there yet, we got into another cab and then things got weird...
All of a sudden as we were driving down a street, these guys on bikes blocked the road in front of us. The driver looked really scared as he started to reverse out of there, which filled us full of confidence! Then we bagan a high speed chase throughout the streets of Hanoi with about 4 guys on bikes following us. We figured that they wanted to rob us, so we were pretty stressed. Like I said, the streets of Hanoi are crazy at the best of times, but even more so when you are drunk off your head and in a high speed chase being followed by screaming guys on motor bikes! After about 4 minutes screaming through the city with the driver fantically trying to call backup on his radio, he pulled over to let us out - he knew he couldn't get away. I grabbed Jen and we legged it down the road. After about 50 meters we looked back and saw them dragging the cabbie from the car and giving him the hiding of a lifetime. I've seen a few beatings in my time, and this one was bad.
Me and Jen were both freaking out at this stage, but all we could do was watch. Obviously he had dome something to one of them - it was most definately personal. Locals at Dan's work think he may have hit one of them with his cab just before we got in - what great timing! But no matter what the reason , they wanted him, not us!) His mates arrived in other cabs and the guys on bikes left, then they drove the guy to the hospital. We started walking out of there and two guys on bikes offered us lifts (this is normal in Vietnam - cheaper that taxis). We really didn't know where we were at this stage, so we didn't even know if we were heading in the right direction, so we had no choice. They were cool and knew we were freaked, but they missed our street and started to go down a dark alley, and we're like "NO WAY MAN!!". So they dropped us off and we walked for the nearest hotel. This happened to be the most expensive hotel in Hanoi (at around $200 US a room per night), but we didn't have passports on us, so we couldn't get the room anyway. So after a few hours of sleeping in the lobby (we weren't sure if we were followed or anything...), they finally kicked us out, and we got a taxi to Dan's house (right around the corner!!).
So that was day 1 - welcome to Vietnam!!!!
The next couple of days in Hanoi were uneventful, but then we booked a 3 day trip to Halong Bay. That place is sensational. We went on a junk and cruised around the 2000 islands in the bay, surrounded by beautiful green waters. After exploring some caves we anchored the boat for a swim, which was well needed! The temparature here is FRIGGEN HOT! and the humidity is high, so I'm sweating out kilos by the day. Then we travelled a bit more and anchored again to sleep on the boat that night. It was so quiet and peaceful, escpecially considering how fast and loud Hanoi is! The next day we went to Cat Ba Island, which is a larger island in Halong Bay. Saw another cave and some shrimp and crab farms, then off to Monkey island for a swim. Saw a few monkeys (not as impressive as the Monkey Forrest in Bali but at least these monkeys don't rob you!) After this we had free time on Cat Ba for that evening and stayed the night there. It was really nice, and a welcome relax to the first few days here!
The next day we headed back into Hanoi, and then booked ourselves a train ticket from Hanoi to Danang. We got a hard berth for the trip and it wasn't as bad as I expected. Although after 14 hours on the train, it can get tiresome! So we got off in Danang and went straight to a hotel (after a cabbie tried to shaft us!). We got a hotel right on the beach which was a bit more expensive, but worth it - getting up in the morning and walking across the road to the ocean isn't something I've done since my Scarborough days... China Beach is just a little down from Danang beach, but we didn't end up going there. Danang was nice, but after being shafted by the cabbie (he tried to drive us to another town, and then took us to his hotel after we repeatedly told him a specific one we wanted to go to), we were followed around town by a couple of guys on motor bikes trying to take us places. Hot, sweaty and tired from the train ride and carrying our packs, we couldnt be arsed dealing with their crap. All this kind of took away from the appeal of Danang, and we decided to head to Hoi An the next day.
After waking up in Danang the next morning, we went to the beach for a swim (my tan is looking great by the way!) and was approached by another local offering motor bike tours. This guy was a lot more firendly and less demanding, so we didn't feel the need to tell him to piss off. After working out cash we were going to catch the bus to Hoi An (an hour journey), but we decided to try out this guy - why not!! And we didn't regret it! He got a buddy of his (they call themselves EasyRiders - trying to tap into the US market!!) since there were 2 of us, and we drove from Danang to Marble Mountain, then to Hoi An. Marbal mountain was damn impressive (despite the heat and the masses and masses of stairs to get up!) They are truly made of marble and there was a workshop of marble carvings that truly were incredible! All hand carved, some small some large. If only I had the $$, I'd buy some large pieces and have them shipped back!
After about an hour checking out the caves and pagodas of Marble Mountain, we left for Hoi An. They guys dropped us a a hotel of our choosing. We got a room, buffet breakfast included, with air-con, double bed, satellite TV and a pool for $12 US a night. Bargain! Hoi An is a really lovely town. It's full of westerners, so the locals all speak good english here - something we've struggled with so far (Danang was more of a Vietnamese holiday place and we were the only westerners we saw, so we stood out like dogs balls!) The food here is awsome (and cheap as always) and there is so much shopping here to do. Silk shops galore, and you can get all kinds of stuff taloir made.
We were lucky to arrive in Hoi An when we did (sort of - I'll get to this in a second...) as the Moon festival was on. They celebrate it every month on a full moon and have monks chanting in pagodas, drums and dancing dragons, as well as street floats. The street were PACKED!! I think the whole of Vietnam turned out!! But this was a problem - it was wall to wall people and they were everywhere. Try and think of about 50 people in one lift. We pushed our way down the street from one road to another, a total around 20 meters, and in that distance, Jen's wallet was lifted from my pocket! So now she has no keycard or access to any cash!! So the budget is going to be stretched now, but we can handle it. As long as mine doesn't get taken!!!! So that kind of took the fun out of the festival - it just started and we had to spend most of it calling Australia cancelling her card etc, then off to the useless local police who wouldn't even stamp our statement (too much paperwork).
We had another couple of nights in Hoi An and got some clothes tailor made - I got a 3/4 length pair of pants and a suede jacket made to measure for $40 US, and the craftmanship is supurb!! Then we got back in touch with the EasyRider guys and have just finished the 2nd day of a 5 day road trip down the Ho Chi Minh Trail. It's great, as we get to see the side of Vietnam that most tourist don't get to see, stopping in minority vilages (these people are SOOO poor!!! It's terrible!) and we've also just been to an orphanage. It's heart wrenching, but at least it's good to know that they are being taken care of, and most get adopted, which is great!
The Ho Chi Minh trail's been real interesting, and the scenery is breath taking. Been driving through the mountains for the last couple of days, stopping in local eateries for good feeds of local food. Looooooove those chillies!!
Anyway, time for me to sign off. Got to get back to the hotel to shower before dinner and beer. Mmmmmmmmmm beer...
I'll give another update soon....
K.
Well, where to begin? This place is crazy!!! Got so much to say so I may as well start from the beginning...
Arrived in Hanoi on Tuesday night 2nd May, and got picked up from the airport by my friend Dan who works here. After a 12 hour flight we were pretty knackered, so a night in drinking booze was on the cards. Didn't get too drunk, as I needed to conserve energy for the next day. And boy did I need it!
Woke up the next day and went for a wander around town. Dan lives in a little alley way just outside the main 'centre' of Hanoi. The place is crazy. There are pretty much NO road rules - the bigger the vehicle, the more priority you have on the road. Most of the traffic is made up of motor bikes (more like mopeds really), and crossing the road is a case of walking straight ahead at a constant speed and them swerving in front and behind you. Daunting at first, but it's all good now. Except when I've been drinking. Which hasen't been too often considering the price of booze - some places have 500ml Tiger beer for just over $1 AU, while other places have happy hours where you can drink about 4 vodka red-bulls and 6 beers and get a pack of smokes for about $10!! This place could easily be the death of me...!!
Anyway, we got lost on our first walk around town, as the map we had didn't have any side streets or anything on it, which are rampant around town. We finally worked out where we were and walked to Dan's work to have lunch with him and his office. We went to some street 'restaurant' where I had my first taste of what I like to call mystery meats... No dog yet though - I'm certain of that. I think...
After lunch we went to the Old Quarter, which is streets of markets (we caught a cab and it got pulled over and extorted by the police on the way which was a trip!) Everything is so cheap here, it makes me realise how much we're being ripped off in Australia! But I geuss it needs to be cheap here, as the average wage is bugger all!
After running around the markets at the Old quarter for a while we stopped in a bar overlooking a semi major intersection and laughed at the traffic. The general rule is to keep right and give way to bigger vehicles, but it's really absolute chaos. The funny thing is that it seems to work!! I guess cos everyone's on bikes rather than cars - if they all drove cars it would be gridlock 24-7.
After a few beers (which you can buy a litre at a time for about $2 - in actual fact it was the size of a 2 litre milk carton!), we went to this place called Hyway 4 where we had some interesting rice wine. We had 5 snakes (2 cobras and 3 other snakes fermenting in the bottle), black bee (black bees suprisingly!) and I think ghekko and starfish (I think - things were starting to get hazy at this point... ;) ). We ate some frogs legs and some eel, and some other weird stuff I think - like I said, it was all getting hazy around now.
After this, Dan took us to a place he drinks at called the Spotted Cow - it's an ex-pat place full of westerners. It was ok, but me and Jen didn't feel like drinking with a bunch of drunken westerners (we can do that at home!! ;) ). I don't remember what time we left there - Dan left just before us and rode home on his bike (you can ride around as pissed as you like here, with no license or helmet) and Jen and I caught a taxi. We were almost home but I thought we just passed his street so we got tout of the cab. After realising we weren't there yet, we got into another cab and then things got weird...
All of a sudden as we were driving down a street, these guys on bikes blocked the road in front of us. The driver looked really scared as he started to reverse out of there, which filled us full of confidence! Then we bagan a high speed chase throughout the streets of Hanoi with about 4 guys on bikes following us. We figured that they wanted to rob us, so we were pretty stressed. Like I said, the streets of Hanoi are crazy at the best of times, but even more so when you are drunk off your head and in a high speed chase being followed by screaming guys on motor bikes! After about 4 minutes screaming through the city with the driver fantically trying to call backup on his radio, he pulled over to let us out - he knew he couldn't get away. I grabbed Jen and we legged it down the road. After about 50 meters we looked back and saw them dragging the cabbie from the car and giving him the hiding of a lifetime. I've seen a few beatings in my time, and this one was bad.
Me and Jen were both freaking out at this stage, but all we could do was watch. Obviously he had dome something to one of them - it was most definately personal. Locals at Dan's work think he may have hit one of them with his cab just before we got in - what great timing! But no matter what the reason , they wanted him, not us!) His mates arrived in other cabs and the guys on bikes left, then they drove the guy to the hospital. We started walking out of there and two guys on bikes offered us lifts (this is normal in Vietnam - cheaper that taxis). We really didn't know where we were at this stage, so we didn't even know if we were heading in the right direction, so we had no choice. They were cool and knew we were freaked, but they missed our street and started to go down a dark alley, and we're like "NO WAY MAN!!". So they dropped us off and we walked for the nearest hotel. This happened to be the most expensive hotel in Hanoi (at around $200 US a room per night), but we didn't have passports on us, so we couldn't get the room anyway. So after a few hours of sleeping in the lobby (we weren't sure if we were followed or anything...), they finally kicked us out, and we got a taxi to Dan's house (right around the corner!!).
So that was day 1 - welcome to Vietnam!!!!
The next couple of days in Hanoi were uneventful, but then we booked a 3 day trip to Halong Bay. That place is sensational. We went on a junk and cruised around the 2000 islands in the bay, surrounded by beautiful green waters. After exploring some caves we anchored the boat for a swim, which was well needed! The temparature here is FRIGGEN HOT! and the humidity is high, so I'm sweating out kilos by the day. Then we travelled a bit more and anchored again to sleep on the boat that night. It was so quiet and peaceful, escpecially considering how fast and loud Hanoi is! The next day we went to Cat Ba Island, which is a larger island in Halong Bay. Saw another cave and some shrimp and crab farms, then off to Monkey island for a swim. Saw a few monkeys (not as impressive as the Monkey Forrest in Bali but at least these monkeys don't rob you!) After this we had free time on Cat Ba for that evening and stayed the night there. It was really nice, and a welcome relax to the first few days here!
The next day we headed back into Hanoi, and then booked ourselves a train ticket from Hanoi to Danang. We got a hard berth for the trip and it wasn't as bad as I expected. Although after 14 hours on the train, it can get tiresome! So we got off in Danang and went straight to a hotel (after a cabbie tried to shaft us!). We got a hotel right on the beach which was a bit more expensive, but worth it - getting up in the morning and walking across the road to the ocean isn't something I've done since my Scarborough days... China Beach is just a little down from Danang beach, but we didn't end up going there. Danang was nice, but after being shafted by the cabbie (he tried to drive us to another town, and then took us to his hotel after we repeatedly told him a specific one we wanted to go to), we were followed around town by a couple of guys on motor bikes trying to take us places. Hot, sweaty and tired from the train ride and carrying our packs, we couldnt be arsed dealing with their crap. All this kind of took away from the appeal of Danang, and we decided to head to Hoi An the next day.
After waking up in Danang the next morning, we went to the beach for a swim (my tan is looking great by the way!) and was approached by another local offering motor bike tours. This guy was a lot more firendly and less demanding, so we didn't feel the need to tell him to piss off. After working out cash we were going to catch the bus to Hoi An (an hour journey), but we decided to try out this guy - why not!! And we didn't regret it! He got a buddy of his (they call themselves EasyRiders - trying to tap into the US market!!) since there were 2 of us, and we drove from Danang to Marble Mountain, then to Hoi An. Marbal mountain was damn impressive (despite the heat and the masses and masses of stairs to get up!) They are truly made of marble and there was a workshop of marble carvings that truly were incredible! All hand carved, some small some large. If only I had the $$, I'd buy some large pieces and have them shipped back!
After about an hour checking out the caves and pagodas of Marble Mountain, we left for Hoi An. They guys dropped us a a hotel of our choosing. We got a room, buffet breakfast included, with air-con, double bed, satellite TV and a pool for $12 US a night. Bargain! Hoi An is a really lovely town. It's full of westerners, so the locals all speak good english here - something we've struggled with so far (Danang was more of a Vietnamese holiday place and we were the only westerners we saw, so we stood out like dogs balls!) The food here is awsome (and cheap as always) and there is so much shopping here to do. Silk shops galore, and you can get all kinds of stuff taloir made.
We were lucky to arrive in Hoi An when we did (sort of - I'll get to this in a second...) as the Moon festival was on. They celebrate it every month on a full moon and have monks chanting in pagodas, drums and dancing dragons, as well as street floats. The street were PACKED!! I think the whole of Vietnam turned out!! But this was a problem - it was wall to wall people and they were everywhere. Try and think of about 50 people in one lift. We pushed our way down the street from one road to another, a total around 20 meters, and in that distance, Jen's wallet was lifted from my pocket! So now she has no keycard or access to any cash!! So the budget is going to be stretched now, but we can handle it. As long as mine doesn't get taken!!!! So that kind of took the fun out of the festival - it just started and we had to spend most of it calling Australia cancelling her card etc, then off to the useless local police who wouldn't even stamp our statement (too much paperwork).
We had another couple of nights in Hoi An and got some clothes tailor made - I got a 3/4 length pair of pants and a suede jacket made to measure for $40 US, and the craftmanship is supurb!! Then we got back in touch with the EasyRider guys and have just finished the 2nd day of a 5 day road trip down the Ho Chi Minh Trail. It's great, as we get to see the side of Vietnam that most tourist don't get to see, stopping in minority vilages (these people are SOOO poor!!! It's terrible!) and we've also just been to an orphanage. It's heart wrenching, but at least it's good to know that they are being taken care of, and most get adopted, which is great!
The Ho Chi Minh trail's been real interesting, and the scenery is breath taking. Been driving through the mountains for the last couple of days, stopping in local eateries for good feeds of local food. Looooooove those chillies!!
Anyway, time for me to sign off. Got to get back to the hotel to shower before dinner and beer. Mmmmmmmmmm beer...
I'll give another update soon....
K.