Well, now I vaguely remember why I had to stop spending time on this blog...because I'm too much of a perfectionist that it takes me WAY too long to get the text and photos aligned in just the right position.
But, here is another version of our adventure in Vietnam written by a fellow traveler in our GAP Adventure group that gives a different description of the trials, experiences, and excitement that we shared together. Enjoy!!
January 2009
Two weeks in Vietnam grew into an adventure most exotic and chaotic. We had sublime, inspiring, and even death-defying experiences. We transported ourselves in several unique ways around the Vietnamese landscapes: hiking on foot, by train, junk boat, horse-drawn carriage, canoe, kayak, cyclo-rickshaw, motorcycle, bicycle, overnight train, airplane, bus, and taxi. Our intrepid local guide, Dat, meticulously orchestrated everything. The group was composed of an eclectic and excellent squad of voyagers who, through dire circumstances, would become bonded and intimately reliant on each other for friendship, guidance, and support. We were 2 Germans, one Austrian, 5 Americans, 2 Danes, 3 Canadians, and 1 Vietnamese. All brave.
We arrived in the north on January 4th in a maze called Hanoi. On the first day in the city, we were lost after stumbling only a block – amid frenzied honking horns, bikes, scooters, and Vietnamese people laden with baskets and bins full of fruits and merchandise. Our senses overloaded, we could never remember the syllables that made up the street names, even within seconds of reading them on the map – yet it was not long before the tiny streets and alleyways captured our hearts. The architecture was French colonial, and we passed rows and rows of tall skinny buildings in brilliant colors, each with diminutive porches and columns. We walked everywhere, amid the dizzying discord, smog from diesel fuel and pollution, and smoke, since 68% of Vietnamese men smoke (2% of females smoke).
The labyrinthine streets were inconceivably busy and crazy to navigate, running diagonally, narrowing into lanes, and morphing into populous markets with produce and wares piled high in the streets and on top of people riding motorcycles and bikes. More than a few times we were nearly run over by the locals carrying their ubiquitous goods, along with bikes, cars, motorcycles, scooters, rickshaws, dogs, and an anomalous Mercedes Benz 4x4. Picture the women (small and slight) with conical hats, balancing a pole over their powerful backs with two huge baskets piled with goods hanging from the ropes attached. They unabashedly negotiated their way around the teeming motorbikes, bikes, and cars, while we (carrying nothing but our sunglasses) were frozen in their wake.
So we had to learn to cross the street. It was a judicious lesson in observation. First a couple of rules: don’t run and don’t make sudden dodging movements. Survey the road, peer in each direction, and then check the other side. Begin by holding your breath when your toe points to take the first step off the curb. In the face of clamorous traffic, persons hauling baskets, bikes, or motorcycles, and frenzied honking, walk slowly and evenly. They will swerve around. It’s all about rhythm and flow.
In its chaos and communism, Hanoi was arresting and exquisite – and safe. The enterprising Vietnamese women, entrenched in the hospitality industry, were engaging and intimate. The men, however, were seemingly unapproachable, but once we initiated communication, they responded with smiles and were very helpful. We were entranced by this dazzling and energetic culture. The people were small in stature but fit and strong.
After 5 lively days in Hanoi, we took the eight-hour sleeper train to Sapa, a town in the northern mountains near the Chinese border. Cabins had enough bunks for four and a communal squat toilet and sink were located at the far end of the rail car. As the train lurched and veered around corners throughout the night, the fluid in the toilet would roil and splash savagely against the floor and walls.
We started with an innocuous 16-km trek through the northern mountains of Sapa. We had fun despite some tumultuous moments over the mountainous terrain. Beautiful vistas of rice paddies, with lots of mist and fog, created mystical haunting views. We reached our homestay feeling exhausted yet content about our physical prowess (and wondering whether this trip was slightly more "grass-roots" than we had anticipated).
After a cordial homestay that night with an indigenous village family, we ventured out early the next morning with what had become our usual entourage: numerous diminutive yet mighty village women who acted as our escorts. They accompanied us every step of the way, asking questions about our age (yikes!), our nationality, our children, and if we were married. Some of them had excellent English owing to these long visits with tourists. At the end of the trek the village women would normally bring out wares from the baskets they'd been hauling on their backs, and ask you to buy some proclaiming, "Buy me, buy me!" Only after you’d purchased a little purse or bracelet or bag would they abscond back to their homes and families.
On a dim and hazy morning, we set out for our fateful hike. It had rained very briefly overnight; however, the humidity was high from mist and fog. After about 1/4 km, the burnt-red terrain started to wind STRAIGHT up mountains and STRAIGHT down again at extreme angles. Now, that would have been tolerable, but in the rain, the ground had become slick slippery clay mud – rusty and thick. So when scrambling up and down hills we'd try to get a foothold and then slide – up or down depending which way we were pointing. Only four kilometers, but we endured three hours of heart-pounding, adrenaline-racing, teeth clenching anxiety and fear. It was like walking on sheer ice. All we could focus on was one foot at a time. And many times, we found ourselves on the side of a mountain, plodding on a path one foot wide on the brink of an abyss that fell a mile down into the rice paddies below.
As the rain picked up again, it got wetter and slipperier and even steeper. Our entourage of local female villagers saved our lives by helping us keep our footing. At a point of crisis, they began to sidle up to us, hands outstretched, so that each of us had one or two small women helping us across the vast mountain bluffs, drops, and sludge. Had it not been for them, I would have fallen and broken at least a femur, and probably been hurled down the cliff to my death. One member of our group did fall down a slope in fact and limped on his tangled and twisted knee for days. After walking a tightrope of two bamboo poles across a chasm, we at last ended our hike. Shaken, all we could do was stare at each other and laugh hysterically. We had met the challenge but had lost our minds somewhere along that harrowing path.
With a growing number of visitors to Vietnam, tourism will undoubtedly change. At the moment, it is a veritable free for all, and tourists are participating in events that could easily be considered perilous. Recall Mexico’s 365 steps up the Chichen Itza pyramid, which visitors were allowed to climb at one time, and which has since been cordoned off due to the danger (as realized after several tourists fell to their deaths). We were fortunate to have had these fantastic (yet risky) experiences while we could – and lived to tell the tale.
From the north of Vietnam, we took another overnight train heading south. Eight hours. By now, with stronger thighs, we had had mastered the squat toilets. And on a moving train, that is a talent.
Halong Bay was a diversion from the usual physical exertion. We languished on the decks in the twinkling sunlight, drifted in the sea from one cataclysmic limestone rock to another, visited caves, and boated to small rocky islands. Our junk boat was crafted from wood and housed eight cabins on the lower deck. The mid-deck was for dining and the upper deck was for sunning. Our crew wore stiff bright white uniforms and stoically served us numerous courses of gourmet food carved into intricate designs. Well into the night we entertained ourselves with lively conversation, including stories-of-victorious-mud-trekking, as we gazed out to the moon and stars, enjoyed fine food and wine…and consumed more than a few Hanoi Beer in honor of living to tell our tale.
After another overnight train for 14 hours this time, we made our way to Hue, the Imperial City, where we motorcycled all day through the graceful river ways and rice paddies and rows of banana leaf trees. We continued our journey, speeding off to a Buddhist nunnery (yes, female Buddhist nuns) for a delectable vegetarian lunch prepared by hushed bald-headed nuns. Later we stood, silent, atop Hamburger Hill overlooking the Perfume River and contemplated the war. Then we carried on, meandering on our motorbikes along paths lined with tomb ruins in the jungle, and later embarked on two long boat rides, in time for evening dinner and drinks.
We continued our southerly travels down the coast to the town of tailors, Hoi An, where the craftspeople custom-made clothing and shoes. Especially skilled in silks, we could order tailor made silk suits for as little as $250 (about $4,000,000 Vietnamese dong). We had varying degrees of success in our fabrics and tailoring, but had fun in an energetic town full of restaurants, bars, markets-on-the-river, and small streets crowded with shouting young tourists. One hot afternoon, we rode our bicycles over unexplored pathways through Hoi An’s back alleys and agricultural tracks. In a curious combination of urban and rural elements, we cycled past farmers working their oxen in expansive fields, while we listened to political messages in Vietnamese, booming out of loudspeakers from a makeshift public address system.
Interspersed between the exuberant treks from place to place, there were somber moments when we visited museums and commemorative sites that informed us about Vietnam’s war-torn past. We faced expositions that gave gnarly descriptions of battles, squalor, and grisly torture, and featured graphic remnants of the wars. The fascinating Cu Chi Tunnels near Saigon were a labyrinth where the Vietcong hid out during the American War inside 250 km of three-tier underground tunnels. From that vantage point, they would stage attacks out of nowhere and then disappear into nothingness. We had the opportunity to venture down into the claustrophobic tunnels in 30-degree heat and waddle on bended knee as far as we could, until we felt the grip of panic and needed to surface for air. Hard to believe that during the war people lived down there for months at a time. But to live, people will do what they must to survive.
