Hoi An's happy hour

Turns out that every hour in Hoi An is happy hour. It is also free to look, no pressure to buy anything and no hassle (as long as you don't take them telling you all these things constantly as hassling).

It is also a very pretty little town with a wonderful night market and an amazing atmosphere about it. It is a local tradition to light a candle and float it down the river in a lotus flower as it brings good luck (and more happy hours!).

The first thing we managed to do was get dragged into a shoe shop by some of these no hassle shop keepers. It was brilliant though. They had no shoes we liked, so we decided to get some custom made leather ones! I got some flip flops and some smart brown shoes and Gill got some sandals and boots. It was great because we could chose bits from one and combine it with bits from another, and then select the leather colour and feel you liked best. Then they would tweak them until they fitted perfectly. And all for significantly less than UK prices! Brilliant.

With our new new shoes sorted out, we went so seem some of Hoi An. We went to a place called My Son which was a very old temple with buildings nearly 1600 years old. The whole place was nearly whole until America decided to bomb the living daylights out of this part of Vietnam in 1969 so many of the buildings were destroyed after surviving for such a long time. We decided to go for a sunrise tour though and it was an amazing time to visit. There were about 10 other people in the whole place and as the sun rose, the golden glow hit off the red brick buildings and it looked stunning.

Another thing we did in Hoi An was went on a Vietnamese cooking course. We first cycled out to a farm and met this amazing couple. They didn't speak a word of English but he was 85 and she was 80 and they have been married 60 years. He was out hoeing the field when we met and he let us help out with hoeing and watering! It was amazing and genuinely felt like we were in the real Vietnam. We carried on going and got to the allotments where the herbs and veg was growing that we needed to make our food with. Next stop was the market. 1 kg of fresh saffron or lemongrass costs 30p. Tescos and sainsburys have us bent over a barrel with their prices!!

So we started off by cooking some fried pork spring rolls and then made some sweet and sour pork and veg and a shrimp and mango salad. Then, we best bit, we got to eat it with rice and some fried 'morning glory' (a bit like spinach). It was all delicious!

Our next stop is Nha Trang which is a 12 hour sleeper bus away.

Moped madness

After arriving back in Hanoi, we meet up with Gary again and Helly and Olivia from uni! A wonderful evening followed and we went out for dinner and drinks and Gary and I got a 'Good Morning Vietnam' T-shirt! Happy days!

Unfortunately, our time in Hanoi was over as we had to get a sleeper train (with beds and everything!) to meet up with the rest of the group again. The train turned into a 14 hour marathon but we arrived in Huè around lunchtime in the pouring rain. Talking to friends back home and other travellers, apparently it always rains in Huè.

So as we were wet anyway, we decided we should just go swimming. So we went to the "Olympic" pool. We are pretty sure Vietnam has never hosted the Olympics but that didn't stop them having massive great signs and Olympic rings everywhere. The exercise was good though!

We wanted to explore the town and as it was fairly spread out, we decided that hiring a moped was definitely the best idea. Neither of us have ever ridden one before and, as anyone who has ever been to Vietnam (or apparently anywhere in Asia) the traffic is mental. Bikes, cars, mopeds, pedestrians, trucks and buses follow no rules and obey no right of way, traffic lights or even one way systems in a cocktail of constant near misses. Imagine cross roads where there is a constant heavy stream of traffic coming from all four directions. Perfect time to learn. The man who rented the bikes out laughed when we said we had never ridden one before and asked if he could show us how to work it. Better still, we were on a busy main road where I started it for the first time. Even better than that, we were facing the wrong way and had to cross over the road to head in the right direction. And, for the first ever time riding it, I had Gill sitting behind me and clamped round my waist holding on for grim death as a pillion passenger. This man thought this was the last time he would see us and his moped for sure.

With a wobble we were off and eventually we managed to sneak over to the other side of the road! All was going well until we realised the tank was empty and we very much needed some fuel. The only petrol station we knew had run out of petrol (!) so we were driving around a city in chaos searching for a petrol station whilst running on vapour!

As you can imagine, this wasn't the most enjoyable part of the trip but we survived nevertheless. But after we had filled up, and pootled about for a bit, I had got the hang of riding it and we were actually quite enjoying it. Gill had even loosened her grip.

We did manage to see some really amazing things. We visited the citadel and old palace, lots of pagodas and the tombs of past kings. We sped through narrow streets and country lanes and past fields and through villages. When we were on a quiet bit of road, Gill said she wanted to have a go. So after a 10 second tutorial (I couldn't really offer much more than that!) she stepped on and was off. She zipped off so quickly she left me behind. After 5 minutes of no sign or sound, I was starting to worry a little so I went off down the road. But there she was, coming slowly back towards me. Apparently, when she tried to turn around, she accelerated rather then turned so squealed as a local stood and laughed at her!

A little later Gill tried riding again and this time I got on the back. After a big wobble at the start, Gill didn't turn for a corner and we very nearly cascaded into a ditch saved only by a very late emergency stop. Again, the locals loved it. So we made a hasty getaway.

We were wandering around and it started to rain again so we got out our ponchos and carried on walking. After a while I was feeling particularly self conscious as people kept staring at me. Even more than normally. Then I realised that my poncho (that was given by the bike man for use on the moped) had a clear plastic square that normally sits over the headlight but as we were walking, it was perfectly framing my crotch! Rubbish.

So we made it back safely and handed it back to a very relieved owner! Turns out, we actually both loved riding it and are considering one for the island when we get back! How exciting!

The rest of our time in Huè was spent eating, playing jenga and snoozing. We did have one minor incident when we were sleeping in our dorm room and a random drunk man came back into the room after some very loud whispering, he sat on the edge of the bed I was sleeping in! So I (semi-gently-ish) kicked him off and got a "oh, I'm sorry, didn't realise there was a person in there...."

Anyway, off to Hoi An!

Ha not-quite-long-enough Bay

This was it, one of the most eagerly anticipated destinations on our trip, Ha Long Bay.

After an early pick up from the hotel, and a boring 4 hour drive with compulsory stop at an overpriced tourist centre, we made it to the dock in Ha Long City.

The only others from our trip we were sharing with was Sean and Cara, a couple from Corby and a collection of random multi nationals. Once aboard our luxury junk called "Luxury Imperial", we headed into the bay itself and started to see the first of the limestone formations appearing from the haze. After a few more minutes there were thousands of them rising beautifully out of the calm waters. The view was spoilt only by the millions of other boats (or junks) ferrying eager tourists round, just like us!

We visited a place called Surprising Cave and the only real surprise was that it didn't cost extra to get in! No it was actually quite big and pretty and worth a little visit. After that we had a spot of kayaking around some of the islands and exploring some more of the caves. And after a delicious seafood dinner, we relaxed into the evening with some squid fishing and a chill out on our balcony watching the lights of the other boats reflecting off the water. Our fishing didn't quite go as expected but we did manage to scoop out some tiddlers with a net (9 in total) but not a squid in sight!

Our room was fairly spacious with a king size bed and a double monsoon shower so we lived the life of luxury. The next day, after half a fry, we headed out  to a place called Lan Ha Bay which actually is much better than its better known neighbour because we didn't see another tourist boat in sight!! Just floating villages and local fishermen.

After a bit of a cruise, and a quick visit to a pearl farm, we landed on our island and moved into our bungalow. This was huge with windows covering 2 walls and only a matter of feet away from the lapping waves on the sand. We had a nice relaxing swim and found our very own island with no one else about. And after a delicious lunch and a kayak we went to Cat Ba island, the largest island in the whole area, and had a bike ride. The scenery was phenomenal and it was actually good to do some exercise again!

And essentially, the rest of our trip, other than football, volleyball and frisbee on the beach, was spent chilling out and doing some more cruising about and even eating a delicious beach BBQ.

The only problem, it was about a week too short.

If you get the chance, go to Ha Long Bay. But better still, go to Lan Ha for absolute peace and quiet in a stunning little cove.

Happy kabisa.

Good Morning Vietnam!

I've always wanted to say that in Vietnam! Done now. I even have a T-shirt with it on! How exciting!

This is when we tried to split from the main group for a nice little holiday from others to spend some time by ourselves. This didn't overly work our as we managed to drag 13 others with us! We arrived in a rainy Hanoi as the tail end of the typhoon rages in. But we were in Hanoi with a task to do: to book our trip to Ha Long Bay. After a morning of scrabbling over brochures, haggling and avoiding red tape, we all seemed to agree to disagree and booked ourselves on different boats - which suited us down to the ground as we wanted a break anyway!

With that sorted for the next day, we headed for the city itself. There are some really nice and interesting places to visit in Hanoi including a one pillar pagoda, a literacy college and a flag tower. But the most unusual and my (Alex) personal favourite was a little pond down winding back alleys. During a raid in 1972, 32 American B-52 bombers were shot down over the city and one of them landed in this pond. The locals left it, mainly submerged, to act as a memorial for all those that lost their lives. And as you stood in what felt like someone's back garden and looked at it, you couldn't help but be moved. There was even an American dressed in Shakespearian attire and riding a tandem bicycle filming a documentary as we were there!

Later that evening, we met a good friend from back home, Gary. We had been missing him by a couple of days in China and Laos but finally managed to be in the same place at the same time. So we had a good old natter and catch up, swapping travel stories about ridiculous situations we had managed to find ourselves in, over dinner and a local pint. What a great finish to the day!

But tomorrow was one of the things we had been waiting for since the start of the trip...