We have 3G on Damian's phone!

So, we made it through another overnight train journey! This one was a breeze compared to our last. Left Hanoi at 9.10pm last night. arriving at Sapa at 5.40am this morning.
Kids slept the entire journey.
We ALL had silk sleeping bags as well :-) which we all agreed made a big difference.

The set up was slightly different anyway this time which made the journey in itself far easier. Sapa being such a "tourist" destination, us "foreigners" were given a separate, MUCH smarter departure lounge...pictures instead of rules up on the wall..and we were shown onto the train! (again a carriage just allocated to us, away from the locals)
The cabin was the same size as last time but had a very small vase filled with silk flowers to smarten it up :-)

On arrival at Sapa we were picked up in a coach . 1 1/ 2 later we were in Sapa town itself...it reminded me of a ski resort minus the snow. Very charming with lots of women and children dressed in their tribal colours.

We were dropped off at our guest house to have a shower, and have breakfast.
10am..Our guide, Lang arrived to meet us to take us on our trek through the rice fields!

Lang is from the Black Hmong tribe and her family has lived in Sapa all their lives. She has only left Sapa once to go to Hanoi. She is married with one son, Chu, a very very cute 18 month old.

Again...wow! As we start to make our way into the depths of the fields, we see the true beauty and hard work to maintain the rice fields come alive. It's beautiful...

Oh my goodness! This trek was very hard core! I discovered muscles today I didn't know I had. We were lucky it was slightly clouded over today, otherwise walking the distance we did would have been unbearable. The route would cover 14km, within 5/6 hours, but we aren't talking straight fields but going through steep hills,bogs,forests, streams, and meeting pigs, buffaloes,ducks, chickens, locusts, butterflies, frogs, worms on the way!
And we had to take care to avoid buffalo poo on many occasions !
Lang and her followers of 4 others, Sue, Jay, Tu and Baa from her tribe were very good and stopped for rests when we looked like we needed one! Needless to say, there were many! They were amazing..I slipped numerous times and clung onto Damian for dear life, while they held umbrellas to keep the sun out, carried large weaved baskets on their backs,helped the kids if they needed help with the trek, made the kids intricate pieces of art out of leaves and sticks (me a headband type thing) We didn't reach our lunch destination till nearly 3pm!!! We were exhausted!!!!! The kids did brilliantly.
Lang was brilliant..she really gave us an insight into a typical life living in Sapa.

Lunch at her cousin's restaurant in the town of Lao Chai (delicious home cooked chicken fried rice) then only another 1 hour's walk to Ta Van to take us to our homestay where we would be staying the night.

5.30pm Our homestay is with a local lady, Mu. We choose to sleep on the upstairs floor, which we have to ourselves. Each bed has its own mosquito net and it all looks very pretty.

Dinner was a feast! Mu cooked sooo much. She ate with us, as did Lang, her husband and Chu. It was a very lovely evening full of broken chat in English and Lang's dialect Hmong.

I think we will all sleep very well tonight.
Tomorrow another 5km trek, then a bus back into Sapa town, then our overnight train back into Hanoi.

Px