Archive for March, 2010


Tunnels

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.11, 2010

Up early after maybe 4-5 hours of sleep max, we headed to grab some take away breakfast to eat on the bus on the way to the caves.

I would really suggest doing this to everyone who visits Vietnam. We had a great guide that shared some interesting insight into the ingenuity and perseverance of the Vietnamese who fought in the war with the Americans. I managed to fit myself into one of the original entrances, but not without some scrapes up my sides by the shoulders. We saw the over grown trenches, craters from bombs, cooking dugouts, hospitals, traps, and eventually we went through an “enlarged” tunnel for tourists. It was lit, but not always, and when it was, it was dark. You were sandwiched between other people in your tour group, there were dead ends, and places where you would need to climb up or down. At times you are 3 meters under ground. It is a very uneasy experience, and you can only imagine what it would be like to be in an actual tunnel during war times.

There was a gun range where you could pay to fire a gun like the ones used in the war, but I declined. The sound of gun fire through the forest made things seem a little more real though.

We got back to Saigon around 3ish and had some food, cold coffee drinks and then frittered away the day with showers and wandering until we decided to check out a movie theatre. We had missed a showing, so had dinner first at a cool hot pot place, and then we scurried back to catch a showing of Valentines Day. At first we couldn’t figure how a theatre could function with such low prices and maybe 10 people in the show (out numbered by staff 2:1) but watching the movie it was clear it was pirated and it all made a little more sense.

It was about 1:00 in the morning by the time we walked back to our place, and we fell asleep quickly as our bus to Cambodia left really early the next day.

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The Day That Still Isn’t Over

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.10, 2010

When we rolled into Saigon (Ho Chi Minh city) it was about 4:30 in the morning. As we worked out where we wanted to go in the lobby we got a really dirty glare from one of the people waiting there, and Jen came back from the washroom with a bit of a story about the people in there… we had to laugh to ourselves a bit.

Finally ready to brave the wall of taxi drivers outside the train station with our destination in mind, we settled with a driver finally and headed off to Pham Ngu Lao which is Saigon’s backpacker’s area. Most places were still closed and one lady tried to sell us a place way up in a building which seemed like one heck of a dump. We checked it out but quickly headed off in a new direction to find something new.

After waking up a few night watchmen to look at rooms, we eventually left Jen with the bags and went on a real hunt. Eventually we found a really nice place over looking the busy alleyways below. We ate some food, and started knocking off our list of things to see in Saigon. The trips to see the Cu Chi tunnels leave early in the morning, but you need 1 day notice, so that was put off until tomorrow. Instead we wandered off to see the War Remnants Museum. It was by far the best museum we went to in Vietnam, some of the stuff was really hard to look at or read though.

The museum was hot and filled with people, so we headed for the first restaurant with AC. After some food we grabbed a taxi to bring us to the water slides. We were pretty excited about it having read about their toilet bowl slide. The taxi only brought us close, we had to wander the rest of our way based on intuition and hope :P Eventually people started making swimming motions and pointing us in the right direction. When we got there it looked almost deserted. Middle of the day, during the week, makes sense, but still made us wonder a little bit. When we got in, we were told to go to the “foreigner bathing area” were we could lock up our stuff separate to the locals and the girls could lay in the sun in their “skimpy” bathing suits (compared to the essentially fully dressed Vietnamese girls.)

The slides here are fast. Fast like you are out of control fast. So much fun! There were some “black hole” type slides, some straight speed slide, zip lines, tube rides, the toilet bowl, one named “a giant slide”, crazy carpet slides… everything. It was all fun, and we escaped essentially unharmed. We met an American/Vietnamese girl who was pretty surprised we found the slides on our own. Then it was time to head back.

Outside the slides we were lucky to find some cabs waiting. We knew the price we paid to get here, and in Vietnam, it is common for metered cab rides to take a lot longer than ones where you decide on a price up front. We did our best to stick to our guns and eventually we convinced the guy, who seemed a fair bit insulted when we said we don’t want to be driven in circles on a meter, to take us back for no more than what we paid to get there. He drove with the meter to show us how honest he was. On the way we really got to like the guy. He knew very little English, but was very happy to be able to communicate with us in any way possible. Then he busted out his music. Karaoke in the local languages is all over, and hard to listen to after a while, so we prepared ourselves for it, but when it came on… we heard Hotel California!

He LOVED north american music apparently. One of his best lines was “I do not know English, but I do know this!” as he busted out his best air guitar. A few more songs, and lots of busy city streets later we rolled up by our hotel. We was a little bit over on the meter, but only asked for the amount we agreed on before. Of course after such an awesome ride we tipped him well, and he again tried to reassure us that his cab company was regulated and didn’t scam tourists.

We changed, washed, ate, wandered around, Amy shopped, we made sure our tunnels and trip to Cambodia were all figured out, had a snack, had a drink, and then around mid night, finally called it a night. Back at the hotel room we watched some TV, and settled in for a few hours of sleep before getting up at 6:30 to be ready to go see the tunnels.

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The Day That Never Ends

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.09, 2010

Well we woke up early as we had a few things to pick up before heading off to the local bus to get back to Danang. We say bye to Mascha and get to the bus just as it was rolling away. By chance it was the same one as the trip in. It started a lot slower, but soon became a racing, honking, yellow bullet through the crowded streets. At one point we picked up a full load of school kids which added to the craziness. We were able to communicate that we wanted off at the train station (or as close as possible) through some “bumpy bumpy bumpy” and hand motions from the Vietnamese guys. It ended up being a lot closer than when we left… good to know “for next time.”

We had some food, as we finally were confident we had some time before the train left, and then we shuffled on to see what awaited us. Hard sleepers on a new train, after being told repeatedly that you wouldn’t be able to sleep at all, made us just a little apprehensive. When we got in there, it was perfect. No different than China, except there were only us in the cabin for the first 6 hours or so. We played some cards (golf has replaced asshole as the game of choice) and then tried to have a bit of a nap. Eventually we got some Vietnamese cabin mates and we all were forced up into our beds. 2 top and 1 middle bunk. We slept on and off, but it was so hot, you were never really asleep.

To be continued…

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We’ve Got The Scoots

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.08, 2010

OK, even if you usually just skim my blog… I have a feeling you started reading this entry.

We had breakfast and then got the scooters, and armed with a horrible map on a small piece of paper, we headed on in search of the ruins. We did a pretty amazing job of getting there. We asked for directions along the way, but we managed to never make a wrong turn which was really good, especially considering the map wasn’t used at all.

The ruins themselves were quite neat. It was more Mayan-esque than what we saw in Ayutthaya, surrounded by jungle, vegetation crawling over the ruins, streams running through the area. We saw a few different neat lizards around there too.

After we were done with the ruins, we headed back, this time enjoying the views a little more, stopping for pictures, and grabbing some random food from a local restaurant. Scooters are really they way to travel over here. After getting back to Hoi An, we checked out Amy’s tailored stuff and then hit the internet cafe. Food and massage are the plans for the evening. Everything closes really early here (9:00ish.) We travel by train tomorrow in hard sleepers to Saigon (Ho Chi Min City) where the goal is to spend maybe 2 days and then booking it up to Cambodia. We are feeling our beach lounging days waste away and we are really excited to get there, so we are taking it up a notch with the actual planning.

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Sleepless in Vietnam

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.07, 2010

Well, the train has to this point been a favorite mode of transportation for us in Asia. It is usually the most comfortable, it is continuous, there is food and drink available, you can walk around, and when it is for 14 hours… you can catch some sleep.

Unfortunately the train books up quickly here in Vietnam. Travel agents buy up all the tickets and then sell them back to you at really high rates, and that is if you can find one with some left. We managed to find some soft seat (think like a greyhound bus seat, but smaller, Asian sized) tickets and that is what we used. We had planned on sleeping over the night, but there are nothing but warnings when traveling with locals on buses and trains because of the amount of things which are stolen. Jen fell asleep pretty quickly and Amy eventually got some sleep around 4:00am. I think I was waking up every 15 minutes for most of the night just to look around and see how things were. The lights were never off, and the ride wasn’t the smoothest ever, so it was fairly easy to keep this pattern going.

Eventually we rolled in to Danang, Vietnam’s 4th largest city (1 million people.) Our goal was to rent scooters and ride down to Hoi An ourselves. We left Amy with the bags and Jen and I set off in the heat to try and find somewhere to rent them, but after a kilometer or so with no luck we went back to get Amy and find a new way down to Hoi An. The cheapest option was the local bus. We had no idea what it was, and even less of an idea where it was exactly, but we headed off in what we figured was the suggested direction of the guidebook. When we got to the spot, a man came up and asked us where we were from (Canada… ahhh Quebec *french french french french*) when telling him we were headed for the bus to Hoi An, he took us to where we needed to go.

Now we have been scammed so many times (or attempts made at least) that we are a very skeptical group. I didn’t have a horrible feeling from him, but we just kept waiting for it to happen. Eventually he saw us off and it was all fine, he was just being nice (I got to use some of my French with him which was fun.) We regretted not offering him some money after we realized that it was all just to help us, but the opportunity was gone. Up rolls the local bus and it is a dash on to the stairs as it just keeps rolling by. The system is, listen for the continuous horn, wave when you want it, run like hell to get on it, and grab something when you make it in. It was about 30 – 45 minutes of this and then we got to Hoi An.

A German girl named Mascha got off as well, and she joined us on the hunt for a guest house. After finding one, showering, and dropping off laundry, we headed off to find some food. They have “fresh beer” which is made daily and disposed of at night if there is any left. It costs about 20 cents a glass and it is very tasty. We had a set menu at a place by the river and everything we were brought tasted fantastic. The restaurant was empty when we arrived, but through the magic of having tourists sitting at at table in your place of business, soon after there were 7 other tables filled.

The evening was spent shopping with Amy (custom tailoring is huge in Hoi An) and topped off with a massage. The goal tomorrow is to rent the scooters we wanted earlier and check out the My Son ruins.

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Formaldehyde, Glutaraldehyde, Methanol, Ethanol

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.06, 2010

Well, Hanoi part 2. We had a day to spend until our train leaves later today at 11:00pm. We loaded up on free breakfast and then hit the streets on the bikes. The Drift was really nice in letting us keep our bags here free, and still use the free bikes. I am currently using the free computers now (at 6:30pm) even though we checked out at 9:00 this morning. Amy and Jen are off to use the showers for free too. Very nice experience here over all, too bad you can’t bring a hostel with you on the trip.

We checked out Ho Chi Min at the Mausoleum, it was quite something and hard to imagine what is going through the heads of the throngs of locals and school children on field trips showing up to see the body of their revolutionary leader. I didn’t really even know what I was thinking as I walked by his body.

We rode back to pick up David and then we headed off to grab some food and run some errands. We then checked out the Vietnam War/Army Museum which was closed for lunch earlier when we tried to see it. It was quite something, maybe the best one of the 3 we have seen here. There was a preserved prison where they kept prisoners of war which we wanted to see, but never had a chance as things close so early here.

Since then, we have come back, and Alex and David had traveled off to Hoi An and Laos respectively. We are also going to Hoi An, so we might see Alex again there. We caught a movie in the movie room at The Drift, and I think plans are to go for dinner after and maybe ride swans around the lake it they are still open. Tomorrow afternoon will be the start of a new adventure. Hoi An is an old port city (I think still used) and should be neat to see. We might stay a couple days and just rent bikes or scooters so we can see things at our own pace.

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Ha Long Bay Trip – Day 3

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.05, 2010

Another earlier than usual morning for us. Breakfast was bread with jam, not really going to keep us going too long… but oh well. We then drove back to the boat, and there was a whole new group of people on it. At this point, we had kind of been exhausted of constantly meeting new people and just sort of sat there and played cards. At one point, the boat came along another floating village and we had an opportunity to kayak (for $2.50) a couple of caves. We went for it, figuring “when would we get an opportunity to kayak caves in Ha Long Bay again.”

Luckily for us, only our small group of four and one other couple did it. The caves are more like short tunnels which lead to a huge enclosed bay. The mountains of the island around you formed a circle and there were flower petals on the water. With only 3 boats in there it was a really special experience. Word is some Jackie Chan movie had a scene filmed in one of them but I couldn’t really understand the guide and I couldn’t find it myself. Then it was food and travel back to The Drift. There was this big deal with the tour guide at the end. Another case were some one got themselves out of a tip. We are a little out of the old core, so I guess they didn’t want to drop us off at the hostel, even though that is part of the package, and everyone else on the bus was dropped off. He was just losing it, and the bus driver was screaming too. We just stayed calm and told him he could drop us off at the train station or the hostel, either is fine with us, but we were not getting off until that was done, and eventually it was done. He was never happy about it though. It is really funny because all the guide books talk about how you should never lose your temper in Asian countries as after you lose face (freak out), they will lose respect for you, and you will get no where… but they lost it and then some.

We headed off to get train tickets out of Hanoi. We couldn’t get sleeper seats for the 14 hour ride, but we got some soft seats, which should be enough for us. We are used to long travels at this point. We had some dinner at the place that we were trying to find the first night in Hanoi and it was nice. Then we headed back for an earlier night so we could wake up early enough to see the Ho Chi Min Mausoleum tomorrow. We also met up with Alex (who was the girl on the boat with us) who said she would like to come as well.

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Ha Long Bay Trip – Day 2

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.04, 2010

After breakfast we boarded Cat Ba Island – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_Ba_Island – the weirdness started here. Half our group was on a 2 day 1 night trip, so they all left, then our group of 6 people who were going to the island were separated into a group of 4 and 2 groups of 1, all heading with different groups to do the same thing.

We first stopped at the national park and hiked the most sweaty hike of our lives to the top of a 250m hill. At the top there was a 30 meter tower which was kind of scary to climb… OK, a lot scary to climb. The view wasn’t really any better and once you were up, after a picture of proof, you just wanted back down… but after the trek up the hill you want to do it just because it is up there. We then got dropped of at the hotel where we would spend the night. We were on the 6th floor, which was actually the 7th floor and our room looked over the water. It was really nice.

The fourth guy of our group was a guy named Ishai from Israel. We found another guy named David who is from Australia and was from our boat who had a full hotel to himself, and we all headed off to rent scooters to check out the island. It cost 3 dollars for the bike, 2 dollars for gas, and we were off. The first beach we came across was just amazing. Light brown sand, clear water (which appeared a little brown because of the sand it was picking up) and the waves were huge and just crashing up on shore. We hung around and walked the beach, found a path and another beach in the distance. Figuring it was probably more fun to go back and scooter to the new beach we did just that. Eventually we found a third beach which had some little bungalow huts on it and a restaurant and we had a bite to eat and a drink.

Off again to explore the rest of the island we ended up down a lot of roads that just ended at the ocean. Eventually we found a cave with a restaurant outside it. We asked how much for the cave and they said “no dong no dong” (dong being the currency here) we checked out the cave ant it was really neat. On the way out we were so impressed with finally not being taken advantage of here (it happens a lot in Vietnam) so we all prepared tips for them. Amy was ready to give 100000 dong (5 bucks) and I was willing to pay a little too much for some drink or something. Then the “ticket ticket ticket” chant started coming out of everyone and they wanted 15k from each of us. Screwball tactic that made it so we no longer were so thrilled by their friendliness and as a result, they got only the cost of the ticket from us, no large tips as was planned.

We continued down the road and headed off on what looked more like a sidewalk/lane which took us through some country side. David had a spill at one point, but he was OK. We ended the exploration at a place called “The Hive” which is a little relaxation point for people who climb a mountain near by. There were hammocks around and chickens, dogs, cattle, everywhere. A walk through their fields and we got to go see a few people climbing. There was a really tight cave but my flashlight was not nearly bright enough for me to go too deep into it. We rode back, and short of Amy running out of gas, it was a simple trip.

We had dinner at the hotel, spent some time at the only real hangout which had absolutely horrible drinks (we couldn’t finish them) and then I had one of the best massages of my trip. Unfortunately it was only head and shoulders, not full body, but it was still very much well worth it. It is another city which sort of lives by the curfew in place, so we needed to rattle the gate to be let into the hotel to go to sleep.

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Ha Long Bay Trip – Day 1

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.03, 2010

In what was a ridiculously early morning for us, we hurried downstairs for a couple pieces of our free breakfast (toast with jam and a banana) and then waited for the guide to show up. There was some huge confusion (as has become the norm over here) over a girl named Alex, who was down there the whole time but we just could never find her even after talking to her a bunch of times. We were pretty excited on the bus, it was barely 1/3rd full, had leg room, AC, it was nice… we got really good feelings about the trip.

Funny, as I type that, at least for me, it almost has an ominous feel to it.

We got to Ha Long Bay after about 4 or 5 hours, shuffled on to a Junk boat:
Junk Boat Image 1
Junk Boat Image 2

It was a pretty decent group of people, all about the same age except for a poor old dutch couple who much have felt a little stranded with all of us despite our best efforts to make them feel included. We headed over to an island and went into a massive cave which was apparently only found 20 years or so ago. It was one of those ones all lit up with coloured lights and it looked very cool. Then it was back on the boat, past the fighting cock island, then on to a floating village which consisted of about 10 shacks on small rafts. We had some time to swim and kayak around. The kayaks went quickly, so we jumped off the boat to swim until one came back. They were 2 person kayaks and for a while Amy and I had Jen in tow, then she worked her way up to sort of sit in one of the bag compartments. It was a lot of work to climb out of the water because the ladder was a good foot or so above the water so Amy and Jen pretty much just swam, but I got out to jump off the boat a few more times.

We ate dinner and avoided the horrible karaoke on the roof while enjoying the night sky. The current through the islands spun the boat in slow circles and it was a really relaxing way to spend an evening… minus the guy who took muscle relaxants and had way to much to drink who eventually decided to jump off the boat in the middle of the night to swim to another boat in the bay after an hour or so of threatening. The staff did the best they could with the guy, but he was just too far gone. It all ended fine though.

We headed to our cabins to sleep for the night. Both our room and Jen’s room had a cockroach in the shower/shower drain, but other than that they were enjoyable enough.

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10cc Injection Of Culture

Filed Under: Vietnam
Mar.02, 2010

Well today we set out to do the city a little bit. Being Hanoi, there is really more “city” things to do than “fun” things. Museums, buildings, theatre, shopping, etc etc…

We got some free bikes from the hostel, and armed with what has got to be the best free map we have received so far on the trip, we headed off to find the Museum of History, and the Museum of Revolution. They were close to each other, and they seemed like good ones to check out. Now keep in mind… these roads are not like roads back home. There are thousands of scooters and motorbikes weaving all over the road, buses, taxis, just a big jumble of what looks like (from the sidewalk) chaos. The slight apprehension of using the bikes wore off quickly as you realize once you are a part of the chaos, it all makes sense. Crossing roads ended up being the hardest part, and even that we were pretty much masters at by the time we hit the museum.

They were decent… interesting perspective on their history in the Revolution Museum compared to what we see so often in Hollywood movies. The Museum of History was pretty much what you would expect in a museum.

After we hit the water puppet theater (another gem from The Amazing Race.) It was confusing to get in, but it all worked out and we got to see the show from front row seats. It was pretty funny to watch, and well worth the time, even if we were the only ones in the theater under the age of 50.

Heading out, we weren’t really ready to get back on the bikes, thinking about food and exploring the streets in the area (we were in the “core” of Hanoi.) Hanoi doesn’t have markets so much as streets relegated to specific items. Shoe street, shirt street, metal street, toy street etc. And when I say street, I don’t mean block… it is a HUGE length of shops, both sides of the street, on and on as far as you can see. We stumbled on a travel agent and booked a trip for Halong Bay leaving the next day because the price was roughly half of what was being sold elsewhere. After Jen went and bought some shoes, we grabbed some dinner, bought some pineapple, and had a snack over by a lake. It was dark at this point, and the small island, pagoda, bridge were all lit up with lights, and having it all right in the middle of the busiest part of the city was really neat to see.

We rode back, got a little bit off track, and then figured out the way back and relinquished our handy bikes back to reception. After spending a bit of time checking out the hostel amenities we figured we could probably eat a bit more and went off hunting. Everything closes down in Hanoi around 10:30 and it was a lot of walking and not a lot of eating. Places only offering coffee, places saying they were closed because no one spoke English enough to answer us… eventually we were able to find (essentially) street food at one of the restaurants that just spills into the sidewalk from a small storefront.

Back to the hostel and it was time to rest for our 3 day 2 night excursion to Halong Bay.

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The Amazing Race

Filed Under: Laos, Vietnam
Mar.01, 2010

We squish back into the bus, drive for a while, hit the border, go through the checks upon checks, visa, passport, form, passport, bags, bags, passport, passport, load the bus, get off the bus… it was very involved.

There were three old French people and they eventually gave up when we stopped for food and charted a mini-bus privately from some guy who was eating in the restaurant. We drove through what seemed like an endless city just on and on and on. I would fall asleep for a couple minutes, only to wake up as large parts of my body were senseless and numb. Amy and I ended up in some ridiculous positions trying to keep each other comfortable.

To make the title make sense, parts of the trip I recognized from out of the Amazing Race. It was kind of a double take for me. Anyways, to make a long ride short, we got to the bus station in Hanoi… eventually got a semi-legit cab, were followed to the hostel by a creepy guide that liked lonesome sally (to much to write but I will remember to tell you later.) The place is called The Drift, and it was suggested to us by a guy at the bus station in Laos. We got a 2 nights for one deal, which no matter the quality made it worth while.

We checked it out, the rooms were amazing. There was another Canadian already in the room. We headed out for some food had Italian of all things (we couldn’t find the place we were originally looking for.) Amy and I went for a sauna massage without knowing what it really was and ended up confused and laughing afterwards. Then it was time for sleep!

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