Day 12

This evening we boarded our overnight train to the hilltop town of Sapa which borders China for some hill-tribe trekking. Not so much of a good night sleep with the bumpiest train ride I have been on but we got there in the end 10 hours later (looks alot closer on the map!)

Day 13

Arriving at La Cao train station we got our transfer up to the hilltop town of Sapa! Weather not so good, we are still to see the sun hence the lack of tans in our photos! As Sapa is quite high up there is alot of mist but it sort of adds to the atmosphere :) We had some breakfast and then met our local hilltribe trekking guide, Zhe who was from the Lao Cho tribe. She had a bunch of friends with her who all wanted to know our names and where we are from etc etc, halfway down the mountain our hilltribe friends wanted to sell us everything under the sun, with their catchphrase 'you buy from me, you buy from me' I bought a bag and got ripped off I later found out but you live and learn! these hilltribes descend from the Chinese and they wear really colourful bandanas and clothes which is pretty cool. Our trek today was quite an easy one and we just visited the one village, Cat Cat village, and saw the locals at work and how they lived. In the afternoon we visited the local food market, they also eat some crazy ass stuff here, and seem to like their dog, gross! The whole time we had more hilltribe ladies approaching us with their catchphrase - 'you buy from me you buy from me' needless to say I have a collection of hilltribe crafts just to get rid of them haa haa!

Day 14

Weather still super foggy today but we still headed out on our 14km trek through the lush and very MUDDY terrain of Sapa! we had loads more hilltribe helpers today and as we started to descend down the steepest mountainside with the most amount of mud I have ever seen, I realised why we had helpers. So cute I had a 12 year old Vietnamese girl holding my one hand and another middle aged women holding my other hand and leading me down the mudslide! so many people were slipping all over the place it was hilarious!! this went on for about an hour and a half and past the rice paddies and a few bush pigs and some random water buffalo! we got to the first village Lao Chao village and had some lunch and then headed down to the last village after that. Our previous helpers were replaced with two 9 year old girls who stuck right by our side so cute! eventually after going through the last village we were told by our guide to wait for our driver while she went to find him. 10 minutes later Zhe pitched up on the back of a motorbike with another motorbike in tow, apparantly our driver had got fed up waiting and left so in her words 'dont worry motorbike ok you go and hotel pay' WELL stuck in the middle of the Vietnamese jungle not quite like we had much of a choice hey and we still had to catch our train later on that evening. So off we went me closing my eyes half the time, as we were going around mountain passes and it was super foggy, OMW we went tearing around bends, through massive mud puddles, past chickens and waterbuffalo and eventually thank goodness got back to Sapa village 20 minutes later. Picture me on the back of a bike with a vietnamese crazy driver who speaks no English fun....

Just as if it couldnt get even more exciting the traffic was blocked at the top of town due to a fire in a bar, and the whole thing was alight, so we watched them put the fire out for about an hour before running past and hoping the rest of the wooden structure wouldnt come crashing down on our heads!

Later that night boarded the train from La Cao to Hanoi in our super spacious and comfortable sleeper beds (NOT!) Really enjoyed the scenery up in Northern Vietnam and meeting our hilltribe friends!