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Short whistle stop tour around Vietnam and Northern Thailand...
Just before we left for Vietnam we took the two and a half train ride from Bangkok to Ayutthaya on hard wooden seats, so we were grateful when we pulled into the station. Ayutthaya was the ancient capital of Northern Thailand and UNESCO world heritage site, but the city was badly damaged during numerous conflicts with Burma. It is still amazing to see the extent of the ancient city, looking across from ruin to ruin across kilometers of the new city. We took a private tuktuk ride around the city (from a couple whose children we picked up from school on the way back to the station) for a few pounds and saw all the sights which were are said to be like an introduction to Angkor Wat in Cambodia.
Next was Vietnam, and a part of the trip that was very unplanned and we took everyday very much as it came. However, that was one of the aspects that made it such a great place to travel around and all the Vietnamese had the same laid back attitude. Our experience started in Saigon (HCMC) and after smoothly getting through immigration/ customs we fell for one of the oldest ploys in the book- "getting new tourists to pay for the airport car park gate fee to leave the airport". This left us slightly deflated- more over the principle rather than the couple of pounds that it left us short; however, it prepared us well for the rest of the trip. Upon arrival in the city though we found a really nice guesthouse and wandered out to sample the legendry cheap beer (35p a large bottle) and food. It wasn't long before this cheered us up and a little later we capped things off by booking a trip on the Mekong Delta leaving early the next morning. The trip was very enjoyable, travelling around on traditional delta long tail boats, visiting the regional floating markets, a rice factory, candy making business and a bee farm. At one of the small villages the guide tricked us into easting a lovely sweet purple coloured pepper. Taking a tiny bite of the pepper it turned out not to be sweet, but possibly the hottest pepper that we had ever tasted- lesson learnt about trusting strangers LThe extent of the Delta and the lifestyles of the locals using the river in almost every aspect of their daily lives was extraordinary. However, the highlight was most certainly the home stay with a local family- the supper including steamed elephant fish was amazing and they were very generous with the food and lethal rice wine in equal measures.
After the Delta trip we travelled back to HCMC and onto a nightmarish bus journey to Dalat in the Central Highlands- wind, rain, dark, noisy bus, bad driving etc etc. Dalat was a very pretty city not too dissimilar from a French Alpine town. From here we arranged a trip into the highlands visiting coffee/ tea plantations, a silk farm, magnificent waterfall and local craftspeople making bags and items of clothing.
In Dalat we stayed in Crazy House which is a kind of Alice in Wonderland fairytale place with themed rooms and stayed in the Termite room. The pictures came out really well, but it makes it look like we stay in some weird places J We also experienced the outer edges of Typhoon Ketsana, blowing us around the pathway on the boating lake which brought much chaos to the whole of SE Asia. Three people died in Dalat that night, however, thankfully we were not exposed to the worst of the weather in our part of town.
From Dalat we took another eventful bus journey, this time a good one due to the wonderful scenery as we passed over the highlands and to the coastal town of Nha Trang. We were slightly limited at this time upon places to visit as the typhoon had made all of the coastal hotspots such as Hoi An, Hue and Danang inaccessible, however, this sea side town which was popular with Vietnamese tourists was a great find and we enjoyed a couple of days relaxing on and around the lovely beach, before embarking upon hectic Hanoi. We had an eventful meal not far from the beach one afternoon when we ordered a traditional Vietnamese broth. The broth was really good but we couldn't work out what the meat was- it was the reddest meat that we've ever seen and it was really well cooked. After a while we were pretty convinced that it was dog- which is a delicacy in the country and continued to eat through gritted teeth. At the end Claire plucked up the courage to ask what meat we had just eaten, but it turned out to be innocent beef- phew!
After booking some last minute accommodation in Hanoi we were picked up from the airport and marvelled at how the car seemed to avoid the thousands of bikes on the road and take us to our hotel in the centre of the city- another interesting journey. The city seemed to be just as if not more crazy by night than day and had a very warm atmosphere. We visited the famous water puppet theatre which performed traditional Vietnamese music and enacted traditional puppetry all under/ through water which was pretty amazing. In Hanoi also saw and felt our first foot massage which was painful- toes should never make the cracking noises that they did. Through the pain they did feel amazing to walk on afterwards. Another highlight of the city was getting suits made, which went extremely smoothly and they have beaten us back to the UK by about two and a half months. The city was beautiful with a very picturesque lake and a wide range of food/ bars and we found the people to be extremely friendly and helpful. It was a whistle stop tour of the city, all within three days but we found it to have a really great atmosphere and would be somewhere that we would definitely consider returning to.
Having not known what to expect from Vietnam, we had a really great time, from the slow paced life of the Highlands to the cosmopolitan areas of Hanoi, made the country such an interesting place to travel.
Leaving Hanoi we had to leave our guesthouse at 05.00 to make our flight back to Bangkok and then upon arrival back in Thailand headed for our 14 hour sleeper train ride to Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand- long day.( Bizarely the daughter of the woman who owned the guest house was studying at Keele University and looking to return to Vietnam once she had graduated. Through her daughter she seemed to know about half of the UK and she was telling us that she was hoping to visit to see her daughter graduate next year.) The train ride was quite fun though with fairly comfy beds and remarkably good food- should send some tips back to Virgin etc.
We had arranged our trek whilst in Bangkok and the morning after our arrival in Chiang Mai we were picked up for our three day two night trek into the hills to the North of Chiang Mai. We started off by stopping off at an eco tourism village that had been set up to retain the skills and way of life of the Karen Long Neck tribe where the women wore huge neck rings. It was interesting to see the way of the tribes people, however, it had the feeling of all being very staged, so we were in two minds as how to feel towards this visit. We then met up with the main group who we would be with for the remainder of the trip and after a short elephant trek began the days walk to the first hill tribe village. The group was 11 which was a little larger than expected but there were a large range of characters as well as nationalities- German's, Dutch, British and South African. The beginning of the trek was possibly the most difficult including Jo one of the girls in the group throwing up and the dog that followed us from the village from the trip was bounding ahead of evryone. After ten minutes everyone felt that they had just walked through a shower, although when we reached the village in the late afternoon there was cold beer awaiting and a great view from the main hut where we all slept that evening. In the evening the guide and friends played guitar in the main hut and we all joined in with a bit of a sing-along.
The second day was a mixture of trekking through the hills and swimming in a couple of waterfalls which was a fantastic break from the intense heat. We also saw locals fishing in shallow river beds where they scooped the water out of the shallow pools and simply picked the fish from the dry rocks- very simple. The second night's accommodation was again in a single bamboo cabin, this time next to a stream and after dinner we sat around the campfire, which took the evening chill out of the air and kept the bugs at bay. The final morning we trekked to the main river and did some white water rafting which was a first for both of us; it was great fun and neither of us managed to get too wet which was a miracle. The trip finished off with bamboo rafting down the river, which was strangely where we got the wettest and lunch before our trip back to Chiang Mai with 12 in one pickup.
Our final stop in Northern Thailand before heading back to Bangkok was Pai, which is a really relaxed travelling town about two hours north of Chiang Mai. We spent a couple of lovely days here topping up our bracelet collection and having our first oil massage, which was interesting to say the least. We also found a chilled out Jazz bar which had live music both nights we were there. Funnily on the last night the owner said that the next night the band had someone that could sing really well-"oh now they tell us!" J Lol! On the last night we got chatting to an expat from Birmingham who had lived in Thailand for 25 years, but still had a really strong accent. He was doing the usual thing of talking down Britain- how wonderful life in Thailand was; but you could tell that he missed it really.
South East Asia was a real eye opener in terms of how the native villages live and their hospitality was always amazing. Thailand and Vietnam were both fascinating places with the great cities of Bangkok, HCMC and Saigon with the huge temple complexes, ancient ruins and also 21st Century centre to beaches and also beautiful countryside. 6 weeks in the area felt like a good length of time and we were both so excited to see what New Zealand had in store for us next.
Missing you all,
Dave and Claire xxx
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