Ok guys, here’s an ultra quick note just to let everyone know where I am and what I’m up to since the disasters in Japan last month.

So to put everyone at ease who have been asking if I’m Ok, YES, I’m healthy and I just set up here in a Couch Surfer Hosts’ place in Hanoi, Vietnam. I’m right in the Old Quarter and I’ll be here for about a week before moving on, eventually making it down to Saigon in about a month. And if you didn’t know before, this is the trip that I’ve been planning for a while, taking about three months to do the full circle of South East Asia with a small backpack, an open mind and some good footgear.

It’s been a tumultuous time this past month, but I have everything to be thankful for, being healthy, getting to say goodbye to the country I fell deeply in love with and to see and thank most of the people I became super close with during the past year and a half in Japan. I ended my contract about a month early with my company, with no hard feelings either way thankfully, and after hastily sending a few bags home and clearing my apartment, hopped on a plane and now I find myself here, next to this incredible ‘chicken legs on a stick’ food place (i wouldn’t say restaurant) with nothing but opportunities and adventures in front of me for 90 days.

There’s so much to tell you, including my trip last month to Australia and Bali, which changed my life and showed me what it’s like to really plunge into a new culture, and so much more of course. Of course the whole crisis with the massive earthquakes and nuclear reaction leaks affected the whole country and was, if not disastrous for most people, an eye-opening event that will have lasting effects for a long time to come. Talking about the Japanese’s reaction to the entire ordeal is a story in itself, and getting to see the resiliency and stoicism from an entire nation was astounding. I see a lot of people changing their thoughts and behaviors in a really positive way, and there’s been so much help shown to the country that it brings hope that we are really becoming a world that is coming together peacefully.

So I’m taking that attitude on the road and seeing what kind of goodness I can get into around the world! I’ll check in soon with a bunch of pictures and updates from the past month once I get settled in and find a second to take my eyes away from the outside stimuli!

Gotta quickly say a super thanks to The Ryan family in Sydney for having Rob and I stay there and have such a great time in your country, including that delicious “Roo’ steak! Then I cant forget my man, Dave in Brisbane for a fantastic trip to Byron Bay. Shout out to Corinna and Josephine, Ada and Sara in Ubud, Bali, and all my amazing friends and co-workers in Nihon! Samishiiiiii!!

Check in soon and remember you don’t need to wait for an earthquake to shake-up your life!!

Our first day in Hanoi was a bit more challenging than HCMC. We are just here for one night before heading out onto Hao Long bay and after we got downtown to the hotel we tried to go find some lunch. Turns out that all maps are not created equal; and the ones we had (especially where the hotel was located) ere not so good making navigation a bit of a challenge. IN the old quarter of Hanoi the street names change every block as well and we found ourselves at a quarter with 5 streets of which only 3 appeared on the map, and on the map they did not intersect. The waitress where we stopped for lunch didn’t help much when she placed us about 2 blocks away from where we really were.

Eventually we got orientated and managed to find our way around the old quarter for a walk down to the lake. Hanoi is really quite beautiful and when it is cleaned up and restored (when, not if) it truly will be a very beautiful city. Traffic here is really quite something though, even compared to other huge cities we have been to in asia and other parts of the world. The sheer number of scooters on the road plus the lack of any traffic signals except at the largest intersections, large numbers of pedestrians and no or blocked sidewalks all conspire to make is a pretty exciting place to walk around.

We are leaving early the next morning so we took the one quick walk and hit the hay for the night.

This particular nightmare takes place on the night train from Ha Noi to Hue.

I get to the train station in Ha Noi an hour before the train is due. A train pulls in just as I arrive. But where is it going? I can’t quite figure it out so I just give my ticket to the conductor and he lets me on. Must be right then.

My ticket has number 22 on it (my birthday number and also today’s date!) but the rooms are numbered from one to six. Eventually I work out that it’s actually my bed number that’s 22 and I have to look into the rooms (as the room number is not printed on the ticket) to find out exactly where bed 22 is hiding.

I open the door of the cabin and find my bed. It’s a six bed cabin and mine is in the middle which, given the choice, I would have gone with anyway. The top bunks are practically touching the ceiling and everyone sits on the bottom bunks. Middle bunk is safest, the biggest drama is the person on the bunk above stepping on your foot on the way up/down.

A Vietnamese man walks in, nods and throws his stuff onto the other middle bunk.

Within about a minute of being on board, the very loud Vietnamese music begins. It blasts not only from both speakers within my cabin but also from the speakers just outside. I find two Americans outside my door seeking protection from their speakers as apparently, I’m lucky to be in the place where the speakers are the quietest.

Then two very tattooed, pierced up Swedish girls enter and take top bunks. They’re actually really nice and look just as perplexed as I do when it all kicks off later in the journey.

I get into my bunk after peeling off an array of long black hairs from my sheet and begin to read my book.

Beep. Beep beep. Beep beep beep beep beep. What is that? Ah got it. It’s the Vietnamese guy texting. He hasn’t figured out how to turn the sound off and I don’t think the noise bothers him too much.

After texting for around five minutes, he has quite the number of phone calls to make. And he is no exception to the volume of the Vietnamese. Who are even louder when they are on the phone.

Okay, so this isn’t actually too bad. There are only four of us in here.

And then the train stops.

An old woman walks in and shoves her bags under the table. Then two more women with a child each make their way in.

How many people are there? Right now, I’m counting seven adults and two children in my six bed cabin.

Then the old woman left. So six adults and two children. It’s getting a little claustrophobic in here. At least the door is open.

BANG. Door slams shut. And stays shut.

The man gets up, leaves and returns with hot foot that smells uncannily like my dog’s food and shuts the door behind him. Wow, six adults, two children, one dog food (no partridge in a pear tree (yet)) and it’s smelling just great.

He eats his food and texts with the beeps for about half an hour and then I can see him slowly drifting off to sleep. Ahhhh no more beeping. But wait, he’s snoring. I don’t know which is worse.

Then one of the children (the one who is about two years old) starts screaming, not in a crying way, more like an excited, high pitched, shrill kind of way and the Vietnamese man is awake again. And this time, decides to play a very, very repetitive driving game on his phone. On, of course, full volume so that he can hear it above the screaming child. I really want to grab it and throw it out of the window. The phone that is, not the child.

The baby is now singing and I think ‘I can probably sleep through this, being champion sleeper and all’ but then the coughing begins. The other child is a little sick and doesn’t seem to be able to stop coughing. Eventually though, he falls asleep and for reasons beyond me, his mother wakes him up and continues to wake him up every time he falls asleep for the next two hours.

The man has finally stopped playing on his phone and has drifted back off into a peaceful, snore-filled sleep. And the snores are getting louder. And it is getting so unbelievably hot in here. I may kill someone.

The baby’s singing has become quite loud. The singing turns into screeching and the screeching turns into screaming and then comes the crying. Well at least she’s woken up everyone in the cabin who was asleep. I was getting a little jealous of them.

Oh. What is that smell? Smells like smoke! It is smoke. Whilst it is no smoking in the cabins, it is perfectly fine to smoke just outside the cabin allowing the smoke to drift back into the room. Wonderful.

The baby sings for about two hours more and then, finally, falls to sleep. And so do I.

I wake up around 5.30am because of the heat in the room. I’m burning up! Need air.

So I stand outside (outside in the corridor) with the smokers. Not exactly the kind of air I was after but the window is open and I stick my head out. As I do so, a plastic bag and other plastic debris comes flying passed my face. Huh?

Then the conductors walk down the isle picking up rubbish from the floor and chucking it straight out the window. All sorts of plastic and polystyrene fly out and then it strikes me just how many piles of rubbish there are along the tracks, in the countryside, all the way to Hue.

One of the women in my cabin comes out with a big bag of rubbish and out the window it goes. Poor Vietnam.

Then a man with a trolley full of food comes hurtling down towards me and the woman with the kid. I let her into the cabin first seeing as she has a baby in her arms and all but the man with the trolley is in such a rush to get where ever it is he’s going that, quite forcefully, he pushes me into the cabin and has enough time to turn to me and says ‘hot café?’ I don’t think so.

I jump back onto my bed and the conductor, with a real sense of urgency runs into the room and shouts ‘HUE?’

‘Yes, yes I’m getting off at Hue.’

‘Okay. COME OUT.’

So I start to gather all of my belongings and he’s back.

‘HUE. COME OUT.’

Yeah, alright. Give me a sec to get my backpack on.

I was the first person off the train and had to stand outside with the man from guest house waiting for the rest of the guests to get off the train. It was ten minutes before the train left so why I had to disembark quite so quickly, I will never know

I think leaving that train has been one of the happiest moments of my whole life. I reached my hotel, sat down on my bed and was out like a light.

There were free noodles and bread rolls available or you could pay for hot food. Being time conscious I ordered bacon and eggs to slide into a bread roll incase our ride turned up early…hopeful as ever. We were picked up just after nine in an already packed bus for our transfer to Halong bay. Sadly the last seats were towards the back of the bus and we both knew that this would mean a certain amount of time being airborne as we traveled over the bumps in the road.

Sure enough as we began our four hour journey we were shaken up and down cocktail style. Thankfully I managed to drift off to sleep after a while in the normal awkward upright position to which I had become accustomed. We reached the halfway point and pulled in behind two other buses both packed with tourists and headed to Halong bay. The halfway point was a huge warehouse style building containing lots of local merchandise from wooden sculptures to silk dressing gowns. My first thought was of how I would have referred to this as a “friends store” in India and smiled to myself. We set off again after what seemed like five minutes break, back into our uncomfortable seats for the second leg of the journey.

At last we arrived in Halong city. It was overcast but I was excited about going out on a traditional junk boat to visit the limestone outcrops in the bay. Julie had told me a lot about it while I was in India and had passionately recommended I do the three day trip. We were checked in at the harbour and passports handed over to the harbour police. Although I was reluctant to leave it behind, our guide explained that they had changed the procedure after a boat sank a couple of months ago. It was so the harbour police knew who was out in the bay if anything should happen. Our guide reassured us that only one or two boats sank a day, before seeing the horror on our faces and correcting himself apologetically. We were taken by smaller boat to our junk and it didn’t quite match up with what I’d been shown in Vientiane. The wood was worn and the varnish peeling on our sturdy look vessel. I went to the top deck to take some photos and was greeted by a pile of rubbish and scattered cigarette butts. I was a bit miffed, even more so after lunch when we began to compare how much we had each paid for the trip. Although I’d tried really hard not to get ripped off by the various operators I felt embarrassed that I’d recommended the trip to Aruna. The group of us couldn’t help but laugh about it as we drifted slowly through the mist towards ‘Surprise Cave’.

The cave was a short walk up the face of the cliff behind the masses ranks of tourists that arrived just before us. The cave was beautiful, set over three caverns each bigger and more impressive than the last. The third cave was huge and would easily have fitted two if not three football fields into it. The limestone formations inside were weird and wonderful with the many guides trying to describe what they resembled. Even though I’ve got a vivid imagination I found it tough to spot what they were pointing out. Though the one I did see was the turtles head, surrounded by money, placed there by people as a wish for long life. Once back on the boat we cruised to part of the floating village to pick up our kayaks.

We went for a paddle around some of the islands and to look at the small open water caves. They were two man kayaks and although I’d wanted to explore on my own I headed off with one of the guys we’d met on the boat. There was a limited amount of time to explore but we managed to see a fair bit of the shallow water filled caves and various shrub covered white islands before we had to head back. We were one of the last ones back before we pulled the anchor in and headed for a smaller quieter part of the bay. As the sun began to sink behind the islands through the mist we could just make out their shadowy silhouette against the horizon. The crescent moon peaked out from behind the thick cloud cover and we all agreed how nice it would have been to see the star filled sky.

We sat down to our second meal on board and were served thick chicken soup, fluffy rice, potato croquettes, cockles and stir-fried chicken with vegetables. It was all very nice but as we all agreed, just not enough as we sat there discussing what meal we had missed most whilst away traveling. Bizarrely I was craving baked sweet potato with cream cheese and steamed green beans. Yes, of all the things that i could have chosen to eat, that was my choice. The evening finished with most of us sat on the top deck swapping traveling stories and experiences from countries and places we’d visited. It was very civilised as we sat laughing at the other boats moored up next to us murdering various karaoke songs and playing guess that tune. All in all, it had been an experience.

In the morning, I just wandered around Hanoi, booked a trip to Halong for two days and night train ride to Da Nang to follow. Hanoi is pretty dirty, hazy, buzzing with scooters, and oddly French here and there. I was also blown away by the number of white people I ran into.

In the late morning, I went off to a water puppet show. A very traditional Vietnamese show performed in a waist deep pool. The puppeteers are hidden behind a curtain and there’s a traditional orchestra that accompanies the show.

After the water puppet show, went and got my Cambodian visa from their consulate. However, it took forever to find the place. Whenever I tried to get some help, the language barrier kicked in pretty hard. Everyone just pointed me to the nearest bathroom. After touring every bathroom in Hanoi, I managed to find the bathroom of the Cambodian consulate and got my visa in 20 minutes. What a joke. Walk in, give a guy who’s office has bureaucratic paper everywhere some arbitrary cathedral in hanoiamount of money that he could have just made up right on the spot and he puts a visa in your passport. I had heard from many Internet comments that you needed to get the visa beforehand if you were entering Vietnam by boat from the Mekong delta… But, it turns out you can just get it on arrival.

For lunch I got pho ba, a bowl of rice and bia hoi (beer that restaurants locally make for the day). It’s amazing how gestures and pointing can get you by.

Met up with an Australian young couple later that day who had been traveling in Cambodia and Vietnam for the past two weeks. I wandered around the city a bit more with them and they had some great stories. They gave me the number to a Vietnamese lady in Nha Trang who made some great custom made suits, but unfortunately I never went to Nha Trang. They also talked about certain kids on the Tonle Sap river in Cambodia will inter tube up to you from their water village carrying snakes. After you decide to take a picture because of how awesome that looks, they ask you to pay them a dollar. Apparently they can ask for a dollar in a number of languages. Tour guides tell you not to pay them though, because if they can make money from that all day, they won’t go to school.

The next day I got up to venture out to Halong Bay. Little did I know, it was the booze cruise of the century. When you’re on a junk ship with 90% Australians and a tour guide that’s chain smoking and drinking a beer at noon when he welcomes you, you can’t expect anything other than your liver to have a panic attack. We went kayaking around the bay, hiking through a cave and then back to the boat for the afternoon. Pretty amazing views of limestone rocks coming out of the ocean like the back of a dragon (hence ha LONG [龙] bay, long means dragon in Chinese and Vietnamese). Unfortunately, it was a bit hazy the two days I was there. Came back to the boat, had some dinner, watched some Australians drink each other under the table and called it a night.

The next day we cruised back to the shore and then to Hanoi.

I took an overnight train to Da Nang, which was delayed by five hours and got in about 3 pm. Not the nicest train in the world, and I definitely held my pack like a teddy bear throughout the night. One of my friends got his wallet and passport stolen when he was traveling around SE Asia, so I was a little paranoid.

I was rushed off to Hoi An on a bus when I got in. When I got to the bus station the man tried to tell me the bus ride cost 50,000 dong while his friend stood in front of the sign. I just got on the bus and pointed to a 10,000 dong bill after seeing the sign. He then pointed off the bus. As we were leaving, this exchange went back and forth for a while, and he secretly took 10,000 bills from the rest of the customers. He placed 50,000 in a few of their hands and made sure that I watched the transactions. Then he kind of violently suggested I get off the bus and I just gave him 50,000 dong instead. The bus violently erupted in laughter, and it was clear no one wanted to help me.

I then spent the next hour listening to a woman vomit right behind me, with virtually no leg room and my body being forced into a shrugging fetal position. The smell was grotesque and the bus driver drove like a bat out of hell, straight down the middle of the road. Some of the passengers would lean out of the doors onto the road to shoe away the mopeds that looked like a school of fish.

Finally, after we got in, I wandered around Hoi An for several hours. Hoi An is FLOODED with foreigners. The town is geared mostly towards selling kitsch, custom tailored suits and silk. The streets are really comfortable to walk around and most shops light up with a welcoming glow.

Next morning, I awoke for a 7 am tour out to My Son. The temples of My Son are ancient ruins from the Champa people. Some have survived since the 4th Century and others have fallen or need scaffolding. They’re Hindu ruins that were partially bombed during the war, because some Vietcong had gone off into there.

The ruins encompass about 2 square kilometers and are made of brick and sandstone. A mix of sugar cane and honey holds the bricks together. They’re located in a secluded valley and surrounded by the jungle filled rolling hills. The ruins were used for prayer and tombs, not for living in. They were mostly dedicated to worship Shiva and all the ruling kings of Champa people from the 4th to 14th century are buried there.

That afternoon, I got back to Da Nang via car arranged from the hotel (still pretty cheap and vomit free) and went by plane to Ho Chi Minh.

Firstly, watch out and be alert everywhere. Nowhere is off limits and in addition to pavements and pedestrian crossings, I found myself face to face with a scooter in an open shop entrance.

If you stumble across a pedestrian or ‘walking street’, be aware that it’s not just for pedestrians and scooters are also allowed to race down these often narrow streets including the street that houses the night market. So if you visit the market, whilst looking at the all the pretty things on sale, also look at the pavement around you, it will most likely have a scooter trying to make its way through the hoards of people.

One way streets are only one way for cars. Scooters may go whichever way they please.

When you’re walking on any street, look out for reversing scooters on the pavement. Whilst they may look behind them once they’re about to reach the road, they do not when they are on the pavement. and will back straight into you!

The traffic does not stop for anything. Not a crossing, not a red light. Given that most crossings or lights are at cross roads, it;s probably easier to not cross the road at either (unless it’s not at a cross road, obviously) and just cross at a safe spot where traffic is only coming from two directions rather than four.

When you’re finally ready to cross over to the other side, look, look and look again in every direction possible. And don’t discount the corners of the pavement for riding over as a shortcut for motos. Wait for a break in the traffic on your side of the road and start to cross. The traffic should (I say should, but no promises here) start to move to avoid you. I found that it helps if you can find a local to cross behind (although if they get hit, you’re getting hit too) they appear to have no fear and seem to be able to part traffic like it’s the red sea.

Lastly, hold your head high, have confidence and try to not freak out and stop in the middle of the road (you may be there for some time) say your prayers and wish yourself the best of luck.

The tourists, mostly from the United Kingdom, Australia, the United States and Canada, visited scenic and relic sites as well as enjoying special dishes and shopping in the locality.

On the afternoon of the same day, the cruise liner left Nha Trang Bay and sailed to Thailand.

Statistics from Khanh Hoa tourism sector show that in the first three months of this year, Nha Trang Bay welcomed 13,000 arrivals on 12 international cruise liners.
(Source: VNA)

Hue

In Hue we visited the Hue Imperial Palace, which was home to emperor’s from about 1800-1945. It’s like a city inside of a city…it has a huge wall around the entire area, which I seem to remember being about 1 mile x 1 mile in size. Then there is a another wall inside that one…to protect the emperor and his family.

I asked everyone in the group if we could just go eat a normal lunch instead of the 5-6 course spread we had been eating. Everyone was in agreement so we had our driver, who was born in Hue and visits all the time, take us to a local bun bo hue (a noodle/meat dish that I like a lot). We hit up a little cafe on a back street and the bun bo hue was the best thing I had eaten so far…:)

We got on the road and started our 3 hour drive to the next town. Along the way we took a detour to see a large Catholic shrine. The story is that about 200 years ago the Catholic religion was being banned in Vietnam and everyone went to the jungle to hide. They were sick, short of food, etc. and the Virgin Mary appeared to them and told them how to make medicine, etc. They refer to her as the “Lady of La Vang”. It was pouring down rain and pretty chilly when we were there but even so, there were around 100 people praying outside. The original church was destroyed during the war in 1972, only the front was left…so they just kind of added on to it, no money to rebuild.

Got to the hotel after dark, plus it rained all day. Went out to eat and crashed early. No internet at the hotel, tomorrow we visit some river/caves and then catch a flight to Ha Noi.

Ha Noi

Got up early, had breakfast at the hotel, the usual buffet spread. We took an hour or so drive out to the country to Ke Bang National Park. It’s a fishing village on a river and our guide, Ly, says the caves are similar to the caves at Ha Long Bay.

We got our own boat, see pics, to take up the river. There were a ton of boats there and a lot of tourists. It was about a 30 minute ride to the caves and the weather was nice. A little cloudy but it was only about 80 degrees, which was a nice change from the heat. We have to catch a flight around lunchtime, so we only toured two of the larger caves. There was a professional photographer with us on the boat and he took some good pictures of everyone but they are prints, so I can’t upload them w/o scanning them first.

The caves were cool, like what you see at Carlsbad Caverns, etc. The NVA used these caves to hide in during the war from the U.S. There were spots that had been cut out and you could see where they had meetings, etc.

After the tour we went back to town and had lunch, another multi dish affair but the restaurant was a small, mom/pop type place so it was a little more fun than the fancier places we had been eating in lately.

Got back in the van and headed to town to catch our flight. We got to the airport and it was one of the smallest I’ve ever seen…about a block wide at the most. It was actually closed when we arrived at 12:30. We had to ask the guard to open the gates for us and then it was about 15 more minutes before anyone arrived to “OPEN” the airport…:-)

Caught our flight to Ha Noi easily. The airport just had two flights coming in…one from Saigon and one from Ha Noi, then returning to those cities. The plane was a dual prop that sat about 40-50 people max. We rode a little shuttle bus out to the plane to board. When we arrived in Ha Noi, took about an hour, we took another shuttle bus to the airport. The Ha Noi airport is nice, good size and tons of visitors. Met our guide Dung and our driver, Tuan. They took us to the hotel, Hanoi Hotel, to check in. It’s a big hotel and looks like anything back home, here’s a link:

It’s kind of funny…we leave this big, newer airport and right outside the airport I see manufacturing plants for Panasonic, etc. and then right beside them are people working in rice fields and there are people driving cattle across the highway…all this right in the middle of a city of millions.

On a side note, the average property in Saigon goes for about $16k per square meter and the property in Ha Noi goes for about $20k per square meter. A square meter is about 10.7 square feet, so property in Saigon is almost $1500 per square foot and almost $1900/sq foot!!! The average shop you see in the pics about the city is worth a million dollars!!! Yes, lots of people know this and they are waiting to sell until they retire…:-)

While the hotel was new and nice, it had turned off cold that day, about 60 degrees and the mini-split in the room wouldn’t run in heat pump mode, so we had no heat. Our room was a suite, it had a living room with half bath and a bedroom with a full bath. When we went downstairs to meet our guide for supper, we spoke to the front desk and they sent up a oil filled type of heater, which at least kept the bedroom warm. They also didn’t have any internet except the pay kind. With Ha Noi being a large city, everything was more expensive so we passed on paying for the internet, hoping for a free wi-fi spot somewhere but we never went anywhere that had one.

Supper was at a very modern looking restaurant…it had a Japanese feel with the low seating/table arrangements but it was mostly open air. They had heaters going so the temp wasn’t bad and the restaurant was very cool looking. It was the kind of place you would see in any big city back home from Dallas to LA. The food was good but the food in the North area of Vietnam is different than the south…just like back home. Went back to the hotel and I noticed a pizza sign, so we ordered a small pepperoni pizza. It cost about $6 and was good but the pepperoni was definitely not the type of pepperoni you get back home…good but different.

Ha Long Bay

Got up early to go to Ha Long and see the sights. It’s about a 3 hour drive out to Ha Long. We stopped about halfway there at a little cafe and took a bathroom break and got a Vietnamese iced coffee and a snack.

We arrived in Ha Long early, around lunchtime. We ate at a little restaurant on the edge of Ha Long and being next to the ocean, it was primarily seafood of course. Everything was great…when its cooked hours after being caught it just tastes better…:-)

Checked in our hotel, took a couple hour break and then went on a driving tour of the city and to a restaurant to eat. It was on the far side of the bay, there’s a big bridge that goes across now but a few years ago everyone had to take a ferry across. It was a huge, beachfront restaurant. Tons of good seafood. The restaurants in Vietnam, everywhere you go, if they offer seafood all have big saltwater fish tanks with everything alive. You can pick the clams, the lobster or the fish you want and they will cook it. I know back home we have a few places that kind of do this…but over here, it’s just the norm…everyone expects it.

Got up early the next day, breakfast at the hotel…lots of Japanese tourists here…then off to catch our boat to tour the bay. We had our own boat, just us, the guide and a photographer. We toured a couple of caves then took a 2 hour ride through the bay. It was overcast that day but didn’t rain. The weather was warmer in Ha Long than Ha Noi, about 80-85 degrees.

The caves were similar to the ones in Ke Bang but these have been used by fisherman caught out in bad weather for hundreds of years. They also have a lot of ceremonies and parties out in the larger caves…like during the new year, etc.

The tour around the islands was very cool. Saw a couple of the floating fishing villages which have schools, etc. on them and the people only go to land to pick up supplies. It’s definitely one of the prettiest places I’ve ever seen and if you get a chance, it’s a must see spot.

After the tour through the bay, we headed back to shore and went to visit a local pearl manufacturing company. They show how the oysters are prepped and grown and have a big showroom selling lots of pearl jewelery. After that we went to a nice local spot and had a hot pot with fresh seafood. Everything was really good and you get a waiter assigned to your table to do the cooking. That was a first because everywhere I’ve had hot pots it’s always been a do it yourself thing.

Got up early and headed back to Ha Noi to catch our flight. We ate at a restaurant at the hotel while the guide got our bags checked and picked up our tickets. For a airport restaurant, the food was pretty good.

Our flight arrived on time and was smooth going back to Saigon. It was nice to get back to where the weather is warm!!!

It turns out Mui Ne is a renowned spot for wind-surfing and the conditions today were ideal. The sky above the sea in front of the beach was filled with kites whipping through the air, each one connected beneath to countless surfers riding and flying into the air in all directions. Pretty amazing site to see and led John & myself to inquire about prices for beginners lessons from the numerous kitesurfing schools along the beach. But time and cost were against me. Maybe I’ll get some lessons and take up the sport in New Zealand.

Our first stop on the day trip was to the ‘Fairy Spring,’ Suoi Tien, a very shallow red stream which weaves through the sand dunes which form beautiful shapes in both white and red sand, producing quite impressive gradients of shade where the 2 meet. The eroding rocks flanking the stream have been sculpted through time into impressive formations and when we walked to the end of our trek we reached a waterfall.

Not far into the trek we ce across an ostrich riding paddock where we payed a few kids $2 each to mount a pretty erratic looking ostrich and ride him a quick Lap of the enclosure. Weird.

Our jeep then took us to the White sand dunes which formed pretty beautiful, pure, curvaceous ever-changing lines and gradients in the landscape under a light blue sky and blazing sun.
We were able to borrow a few sleighs from other tourists and slide down the steep dunes which was a good laugh.

Next we stopped at a red sandstone canyon where the easily eroded rocks had been carved into them hundreds of names, do we added ours.

On the way to the last stop of the day, the Red sand dunes, we watched a spectacular fiery red sunset so by the time we got to the red dunes, we were only left with a short walk up a hill to look into the darkness.

By the time we got back to the hotel we were famished and dehydrated so we set out to find a good beachside restaurant. We found the ideal spot a couple of hundred metres down the line, where we were able to get some food, a few cold ‘Saigon’ beers, and some good Armagh craic right up against the crashing surf of the South China Sea.

So taxi to Danang airport to get my Jetstar Pacific flight to Hanoi.
The flight wasnt much more than an hour and I slept like a baby, probably due to the rubbish sleep last night on the bus. But once down in Hanoi airport I sat in a cafe and read up on my lonely planet book to find out what the craic is with the place.

Glad I did it there because I was subsequently able to avoid being scammed by the taxi drivers who congregate outside the hotel and will whisk you away to a hotel that has the same name as the hotel you ask them to bring you to, but is in fact a pretend, fly-by-night hotel with the same name, where they’ll agree a price for a room and at the end charge much more…!?! There seems to be no lengths that these scammers will not go to!
So I opted for the safer $2 bus to the city instead!

The bus dropped me off in the old town where I had to heave my luggage around for quite a bit before finding the area where I had decided to position myself for the night.

I found a great little hotel near the Hoen Kiem Lake called the ‘Lakeview Hotel’ where I got a room that’s actually too big for $15, and with the smiliest, friendliest lady manager you could imagine. I was able to get what seems like a good deal for my Ha Long Bay trip for Sunday and Monday from her too. $37, a lot less than the $75 I nearly paid for the same trip around the corner.

Left stuff in room and explored the Old Quarters of Hanoi for the evening. Each of the 36 streets has a different name relating to the trade that used to be sold there. For example the road called ‘Hang is where they traded cloth, ‘Hang Da’ where they traded Leather, ‘Hang Huong’ for incense etc!
Very bustling and lively streets overflowing with produce and craftwares and anything else you can think of.

I then headed to the famous Water Puppets theatre. My mate Colly had been there last year. Before I started my travels he’d shown me some photos of his adventures. Photos of Buddhist temples, ancient ruins at Angkor Wat, motorbike trekking pics etc. But when he got to a pic of the ‘Water Puppets’ I remember asking him “what the hell is that??”
He explained it’s weirdness to me so now i was here i had to check it out for myself.

The Water Puppet theatre is basically a form if theatre that developed as an art and form of entertainment amongst the workers in the paddy fields who had to work in the murky knee to waist high water of the rice paddies.
The stage set evokes the grandeur of a Buddhist temple and the stage is muddied water upon which the wooden crafted puppets are able to walk, dance and splash upon, all to the sounds of a traditional Vietnamese group playing ancient near forgotten tunes on authentic traditional instruments. Controlled from below by puppeteers by long rods and cables the puppets are able to tell the story of the peasants and their life in The Paddy fields, working, playing, praying etc. My favourite was the coconut gathering scene, based on an famous old Vietnamese folk painting. Interesting and fun evening out is also particularly good for little kids, even 31 year old ones like me.

Finished up the night with some lemongrass chicken, rice and a couple of local beers in a cafe overlooking the Hoan Kiem lake.

Got back to hostel to find out about the Tsunami in Japan which happened earlier today which. Watching the news and it’s hard to believe. A lot of unusual natural disasters this year so far. And it’s only March. All sounds very devastating.