Vietnam: Part 2

Ever since the day of our rigorous trek in the mud and rain in northern Laos, we have been met with rain whenever we leave a city. Every bus we have taken in Vietnam has been met with rain once it heads out. It sure makes it easier to leave these beautiful cities and move on to the next.

Since leaving Hoi An with much heavier bags and lighter wallets, we have spent most of our time at the beach. The first stop was a city called Nha Trang. It's a busy beach town that resembles the likes of a bustling South Beach or Miami. There is a great mix of locals and tourists. Around 4 or 5 o'clock, throngs of Vietnamese cross the boardwalk and go for a swim in their clothes, or set up for a picnic style dinner on the beach. The beach stretches for miles from a distant peninsula past a gondola that takes people to VinPearl Island. From what we heard, the island is home to a small amusement park and a few boats. We never made it across, but I admired the lights from the island in the evening and the Vin Pearl sign that resembles the Hollywood sign in LA.

We spent two days in the city enjoying the beach and the refreshing South China Sea. We went parasailing along the beach, being pulled around be a boat and flying high up in he air under a parachute. We also took advantage of the DVD player in our room to have a relaxing night in. It felt great to do something so normal after spending so nights wandering around cities by foot. I've also found myself eating mostly western food for the past couple weeks. Vietnamese food is delicious, but I just can't seem to bring myself to order another noodle bowl or plate of fried rice. We did have Pho the over night, a large bowl of rice noodles with your choice of meat that's eaten with chopsticks in one hand for the noodles and a spoon in the other for the broth.

After two days in Nha Trang, we hopped on a bus to Mui Ne, another beach town, though much smaller and resort like. The town is one long road that follows the sea for about 10 kms. Our hostel had a concrete deck facing the water hat the massive waves crashed up against and occasionally splashed me while I sat and read my book. There were sections of actual sandy beach further down the way, but we had some sand when the tide was out in the evenings. All afternoon, I could see dozens of kitesurfers and windsurfers out on the water.

We spent a day and a half enjoying our last views of the water. On our last day, a dark and ominous cloud thundered its way across the shore but didn't let a drop of rain fall. Yesterday morning, we boarded our last bus to Saigon while it was drizzling. It was still wet in Saigon when we arrived in the early afternoon. We checked into our hotel then fell asleep for a good couple of hours. For dinner, we headed out for another round of traditional Vietnamese Pho noodle soup then walked over to the Bien Thanh Market and wandered around the streets, picking up a couple things along the way.

Saigon is much more commercial than Hanoi. With a wider acceptance of commerce and trade, it has shaped the city into a relatively modern centre with a mix of commercial offices and stores and traditional, small corner shops. The roads and sidewalks are overrun by motorbikes. The streets look like the starting line of a race when hundreds of bikes are waiting at a red light. It's a bit hectic, but the broad sidewalks and boulevards make roaming the streets a little bit easier. This evening, when Simone and I were leaving a dessert cafe in a higher-end tourist area, we were escorted across the crosswalk by a security guard since motorists don't follow road rules like the ones back in Canada. A crosswalk here is more of a guideline for pedestrians of where is best to cross the street. By no means does it suggest people will actually stop for you. We cross the road with a look on our faces that says, "Hit me, I dare you," and keep walking as the traffic flows around us like a river around a rock.

Our one full day in the former capital of South Vietnam (now officially known as Ho Chi Minh City, though everyone here still calls it Saigon) was spent entirely on foot. We made our way to the former President's Palace, now called the Reunification Palace. It was left exactly as it was on the day Saigon surrendered and tanks stormed the front gates. The basement was the most interesting part, as it housed the war rooms and communication stations of the President. Maps of Vietnam and SE Asia with cities circled and routes laid out covered many walls.

The next stop was the War Remnants Museum, a shocking and overwhelming display of pictures, propaganda, and weapons from the Vietnam war. Having learnt about the Vietnam war from a North American perspective, it was eye-opening to see war stories from the other side. There was a very obvious propagandist tone throughout the museum, though one particular display of journalists' photos gave a very real telling of what happened from all sides. Outside the museum was an impressive collection of Army planes, helicopters, and tanks that loomed high over our heads. It felt a bit eerie to be standing next to such powerful machines that have played part in so much destruction.

After lunch, we kept walking, this time to a pagoda hidden down a small alley which turned out to be slightly unimpressive. Then we headed back to the hotel, stopping at the Notre-Dame Cathedral and elegant post office building along the way.

We're all tuckered out now from the miles we walked today. Tomorrow, Simone and I fly back to Bangkok where we've booked ourselves in at a rather luxurious hotel from a discount website. It will be a nice end to her month and my 4 + months of travel. I'll be home in 3 days. See ya soon.

Vang Vieng & Vietnam: Part 1

After trekking ourselves out in Northern Laos, we sat on the side of the road in the VERY small town of Ban Don Chai waiting for a bus that never came. After a good 30 minutes passed from when the bus was supposed to come, we ended up hitching a ride with a man in a nice Toyota truck that was headed to where we needed to go. Our driver spoke no English whatsoever, but we ended up in his truck anyway with the help of one of the shop owners in the town. I felt pretty safe about it, until the sun was setting and our driver pulled over to the side of the road. My thoughts briefly went to, "Shit. And this is where we die." But that thought quickly dissipated when I realized he just had to pee.

We were dropped off at the local bus station where we cabbed to our guesthouse. We were in Luang Namtha, and were there for just one night. We flew out the following afternoon on the only airplane the Luang Namtha airport sees in a day. The propeller plane flies from Laos' capital of Vientiane and back, once a day. The airport's baggage x-ray was broken, so a small Laotian woman did a short, manual search of our bags. Our boarding passes were handwritten.

Once in Vientiane, we got a taxi to the bus station... but we didn't quite make it there. The driver knew we needed a bus to Vang Vieng, so when he saw one behind us on the main road, he waved it over to the side of the road and threw our stuff in the back and we got in. The bus had a couple dozen locals on board along with several packages of flooring tiles, stacked one upon another in the centre aisle and at our feet. After 15 minutes of driving, the bus made a quick stop to pick up some more packages and filled up the back of the bus. Then it stopped a second time, this time for longer, to fill the bus up with boxes containing motor oil. By the time they were finished, we had boxes surrounding us on all sides and up to the armrests in the aisle. Passengers had to crouch to climb on top of the boxes to get on and off the bus. This is what you get for a 4 hour bus ride that only costs $5.

By 8pm, we were in Vang Vieng and quickly came across our hotel and the girls we were meeting there. Vang Vieng is in central Laos and surrounded by some beautiful mountain scenery, but that's hardly why most people go there. VV is famous for its tubing on the river, but more famous for the drinking that is done at the riverside bars before you can even get your feet wet. I spent all of 45 seconds in the water the day we went "tubing". There we others who were daring (or rather, stupid) enough to go off the rope swings and into the fast river that varied quite drastically in depths and was lined with rocks. I was a bit too busy with my bucket of vodka/7up to bother trying.

The post-tubing day included a whole lot of nothing. It was a much needed day off after the week of adventures and the day of partying before. We visited one of VV's many TV bars; semi-outdoor restaurants that have several TVs playing non-stop episodes of "Friends" or "Family Guy," or in some cases, movies.

The following day, we headed back to Vientiane on a bus then flew to Hanoi, Vietnam in the afternoon. We arrived in Hanoi around 5pm and made our way to our hostel in the Old Quarter. It was Saturday night and the night market was buzzing just a couple blocks over. We meandered around a little after dinner. The streets in Hanoi are constantly packed full of motorcyclist and the sidewalks are impossible to walk down since half of them are used as parking stalls for the motorbikes. But we managed to make it through the night unscathed.

That was all we really saw of Hanoi. The next morning we headed out on a tour to Halong Bay, 3 hours east of Hanoi and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There are over 3,000 islands in the bay and they make up a sea of domed, rocky islands. We spent the day and night on an elegant, dark-wood boat with about 40 other backpackers. We sailed around for the afternoon then went for a swim before hopping into kayaks. We kayaked to one of the islands and walked around inside a big cave. The cave was beautiful and a little creepy. But at one point, the guides made us crawl through a small opening into a completely dark area. We all turned on our flashlights at the same time and saw a glistening cave with formations hanging from the ceiling. I haven't a clue what any of the proper words are to describe what I saw, but it was really cool.

After a night on the boat and rainy morning heading back to the habour, we bused back to Hanoi only to get on another bus a short while later. This time, it was a sleeper bus. My bed was about 13 inches wide and about 3 inches too short for my height. I had a bed against the window, but my left side was being held in only by a small, short handle. Somehow I still managed to sleep quite well on the 14-hour overnight trip to Hue. Hue is just outside the DMZ (demilitarized zone) from when Vietnam was divided between north and south. We only spent the morning there as we hopped on another bus to Hoi An at 1pm.

Since arriving in Hoi An that evening, we've enjoyed our hotel's pool, the beach a mere 10 minute cycle away, and the more than 200 tailor shops in the town. This place has the world's largest concentration of tailors and I have already dropped an unmentionable sum on custom made clothing. We leave tomorrow evening which makes me a little sad because it is such a beautiful and low-key town. The food is incredible and the architecture is charming and elegant. We arrived on the night of a full moon and the town was lit with lanterns. But I am also relieved to be going since I don't know how much more my wallet can handle being here.

Gibbon' it all

I had the strangest feeling the other day; I got in a truck in Laos and realized about 5 minutes into our drive that we were driving on the right-hand side of the road. For the past 4 months, it has always been the left-hand side. It was weird to feel what is normal to me feel wrong.

We were on our way to "The Gibbon Experience," a three day, two night zip-lining and trekking adventure in the middle of the jungle, in the northwest part of Laos. We arrived in Laos late Saturday afternoon after a 6-hour bus ride from Chiang Mai to Chiang Khong in Thailand. Then we crossed the Mekong river in a shaky, long-tipped boat to Huay Xai (pronounced "way sigh") in Laos. It is a small transit town for tourists and backpackers, with one main street that has all the guesthouses and restaurants, though not very many locals can speak English.

The next morning, we met in the Gibbon office with ten other people. We split up into two groups of five and seven and piled into trucks. The road was a lot better than I expected. Laos is further behind than most of South East Asia in terms of development, so I was pleasantly surprised to find myself on a nicely paved highway for most of the journey.

Our trip came to a stall when our truck had to pull over and fix something with the axel. We sat on the side of the road for close to an hour while our driver worked to fix whatever was wrong. We were at a small store that seemed to be a meeting point for a lot of the Gibbon employees.

Once we were ready to go, we all got back in the truck but didn't make it more than 100 meters when the driver turned back around, we all got out, and he started fixing something again. Another fifteen minutes passed and a new truck arrived to take us the rest of the way.

We finally turned off the highway a little bit later and drove for another 30-45 minutes down a rough, dirt road to a small village where the other group was waiting. I didn't quite understand why they were waiting for us because as soon as we got there, they took off and we had to wait five minutes before heading out.

We heading out on foot towards the mountainous jungle with only a small backpack with our clothes. We stopped after fifteen minutes for lunch then continued on. It was almost straight uphill after that. We climbed and endless amount of makeshift stairs to make our way up to the base camp. I started to feel the burn in my untrained legs very quickly and I was surprised at how hard I found I to breathe. Everyone had passed me at this point and I was slowly making my way up the never ending stairs with just a guide with me. I started to worry how I would handle the rest of the trek if I was having so much trouble already. After several breaks to give my legs a stretch and my lungs a chance to catch up, I made it to the base camp where the others already were.

We were each given a harness for the zip line as it started to rain. The rain didn't matter much because we had all soaked through most of our clothes with our sweat. It helped to cool us off as we still had another 2 hours to go to get to our treehouse.

We reached our first zip line after a ten minute walk. I snapped my safety carabeener onto the cable and climbed onto the main part of the wooden platform. Then I unhooked my zip roller and latched it onto the cable as well. The roller is two metal wheels that slide along the cable and are held together inside a metal casing. There is a piece of a rubber bicycle tire on top to serve as a brake when squeezed against the cable.

I sat down on the edge of the platform and waited for the okay to go from the guide on the other side of the line. After hearing it, I slid off the platform and accelerated along the cable through the trees until they opened up and I was speeding along the line in the middle of the sky. I looked down at my dangling feet and saw the ground very, very far down below. I looked out to the forested mountains in the distance and the huge open area around me. I felt excitement and exhilaration, but also major fear and panic from being so high up. A series of unprintable words ran through my head as I realized what I was doing.

Forty seconds later, I was arriving at the platform at high speed. I hadn't actually tried out my brake yet so I wasn't pressing down on the right part. I zoomed toward the platform and nearly crashed into the tree that the cable was attached to. Thankfully our guide stopped me before I could injure myself.

We carried on through the jungle, going across more zip lines and hiking up more inclines. After climbing the stairs at the beginning of our trek, my legs were shot. It became even harder for me to walk through the trees and up more hills. It was one of those tests that was so physically demanding that all sorts of thoughts and emotions were running through my head. Anger, frustration, sadness, and more were all building up inside me. I started thinking mean thoughts, the kind of thoughts that only come up in times of intense pressure, but that you would never actually say out-loud. There was no way I could stop going and I didn't want to. But I was shocked at how my body was handling the trek, or not handling it rather, and I just wanted to make it to the treehouse.

Finally we did. I was elated to be finished, but nervous about the two more days ahead of us. I pushed it to the back of my mind as we explored our treehouse. It was a circular, open-air treehouse about 50-60 meters off the ground. There was a small staircase leading to a second level that had room for two people to sleep. The main area had room for six more to sleep, and had a kitchen sink and area for a small table and camping chairs. There was a bathroom with a shower-head attached to one of the branches of the tree, a sink, and a squatting toilet. The toilet was often swarmed with wasps as there was a nest nearby, so we had to use the shower-head to spray any buzzing around before going about our business.

We had a cooler full of fruit and other snacks in our treehouse that our guide cut up and put out for us to eat. Other guides zipped in and out of the treehouse bringing dinner and hot water for tea and coffee from the kitchen not too far away. The sun went down around 7 and though we had solar powered lights, we sat in the almost complete darkness with our group watching fireflies and drinking the "whisky" in our cooler. We were with a German couple who seemed to be in their late twenties, and a Dutch girl the same age as Simone and I.

The second day turned out to be much better than the first. We packed up our bags and zipped out of our treehouse and headed out on another two hour trek. This had some hills, but nothing compared to the stairway to heaven (or hell) we had to climb the day before. We hiked and zipped all the way to a waterfall where we stopped to swim and eat lunch. We trekked another 20 minutes or so to our new treehouse for the night. We zipped in under the treehouse and crawled up a few stairs to get inside. This treehouse was smaller, with the bathroom being below the main area, next to platform where we zip in on. It was more set in amongst the trees so it felt lower to the ground. But looking down we figured it was probably a bit higher. It also swayed whenever someone came to or left the treehouse.

It was only 1pm when we got there, but it felt like it should have been much later. A thunderstorm started to roll in around 2 so we couldn't go out and use the zip lines until it passed. We went out again around 3:30-4 after the rain stopped then had dinner. That night passed much like the night before, drinking the so-called whisky from our cooler and hanging out with our group.

The next morning, some of our group went out for a morning zip before coming back to the treehouse for coffee. Then we zipped out of our treehouse and then across the river to hike down to the kitchen for breakfast. It had started to rain before we headed out and it didn't stop throughout our entire trek that day. We trekked for a solid two hours back to the village where the truck would come pick us up. It was a really nice hike, through some cool parts of the jungle. The rain fell constantly, and though we were drenched, it kept us cool. We often stopped to pick off leeches that latched on to our shoes and were trying to crawl up our legs and inside our socks. We had to cross three different shallow rivers, two of which the bamboo bridges were broken. If our shoes weren't drenched already, they were after that. When we reached the third bridge, we didn't even bother using it since it didn't really matter at that point.

Unfortunately, we realized because of the rain, the trucks would not likely be able to make it down the dirt road to pick us up. After sitting around for an hour discussing the possibilities, our group along with the seven people from the other group, and two guides headed out again in wet shoes for the highway. No one really knew how long it would take because the locals were giving us all different answers.

Turns out it was a 4 1/2 hour muddy, mostly uphill hike. Two guys went barefoot and the rest of us walked with our shoes constantly getting clumps of heavy mud and clay. My feet felt like they had extra ten pounds each attached to them. As we worked to get rid of them mud, it would just continue to clump up on the bottom of our shoes. But we just had to keep walking because we had no other option.

The group started to break up as some moved faster than others. I was at the back with the dutch girl from our group and our guide. Simone stayed with us for a while until her impatience with uphills got her motoring to the front of the group. At one point, we were walking next to a man with two small horses and he told me to hold on to one's tail as it pulled most of my weight as I moved my feet along. It was really helpful except for when the horses let one or two rip. I got pulled by the horse for about three hills until the man with the horses stopped to collect some water on the side of the road.

From there, we trudged on the endless road for what I though had been an hour or an hour and a half since we had left. Turns out it had been three. I couldn't believe we had been walking for that long already and the guide said we had another two hours to go. About ten minutes later, I decided I had enough with my shoes. I had planned on ditching then after the trek anyways. So I undid my shoelaces and took off my soaking wet socks and left them on the side of the road. It was either going to be a great idea, or an awful idea.

As soon as they were off, my pace picked up. It was a lot more slippery and I slipped and fell twice, breaking my bamboo walking stick in the process. As we got closer to the end of the road, the mud got harder and there were more rocks. It got harder to walk and my feet got scratched up, but I had no other option since my flipflops weren't going to hack it in these conditions.

An hour and a half after taking off my shoes, and four and a half hours after leaving the village, I saw the last river to cross. I walked through the foot-deep water, cleaning my legs along the way, then finally made it up the last hill to where our very late lunch was waiting. Sigh.

Thailand

It's been just under a week since my last post, but it feels like a month. After arriving in Bangkok on Sunday with Sandra, we headed to her old apartment where she lived this past year. We met up with some of the other teachers still there and went for a quick dinner. We went to a place around the corner where the owner speaks barely any English so the girls have to point to their ribs to order pork ribs and flap their arms to get chicken wings. He also runs down the street to buy a case of beer whenever they arrive because he never quite has enough in stock for what they drink...

After dinner, Sandra and I rushed off to the airport where we were late picking up our friends, Simone and Andrea, who just arrived from Winnipeg. We taxied into downtown Bangkok to our hostel near the popular Khao San Road, a short street filled with bars, shops, street food vendors, and people trying to get tourists to go see a "ping pong show" (if you don't know what that is, too bad, I'm not about to explain it here).

We crashed shortly after midnight and got going again the next morning around 10. It was Sandra's birthday so we went out to one of Bangkok's many malls to do some shopping. After a lunch break that saw many communication barriers come into effect (like Andrea attempting 3 times to order a Pepsi and finally getting it after about 25 minutes) we headed back to Khao San for our first experience with the famous Thai massage. I got a 30-minute foot and leg massage for $4. We were led up to a room with at least 25 cushy mats, each right next to each other. Most of them were full so we took whatever was available and waited for our masseuse to find us.

It felt pretty strange to be lying quietly in a room with so many people getting massaged at the same time. The room was silent except for the murmur of strong Thai hands digging into tourists' muscles. Then there was the occasional moan or sigh, then the thwack-thwack-thwack from the traditional Thai massage of hitting one's back with the outer edges of your hands.

There are Thai massage places everywhere you go in Thailand. I went for a back massage last night, but it probably looked more like a one-sided wrestling match with a teeny-tiny Thai lady who had fingers that made up an iron fist. At one point, she had me sitting up with my hands behind my head and she pretzled herself around me then stretched me out and every vertebrae in my spine cracked. This was followed by her rolling onto her back and taking me with her so that my body made an arc over her like a footbridge. It was a good thing I was facing the ceiling so that she couldn't see my face of complete shock and awe over what was happening at that moment. I have yet to decide if I enjoy Thai massages or not. I had a couple bruises on my feet after my first massage and the one yesterday was quite the adventure, as you can see. But one thing is for sure, these little ladies are impressive.

We spent the night of Sandra's birthday on Khao San. We had dinner then sat at an outdoor bar that serves buckets of drinks for 200 baht (~ $6.50). You can get any liquor you want mixed with any juice or soda, topped up with a heap of ice. We're uncertain on the quantity of liquor actually in one bucket, though it easily surpasses any amount that could legally be served in Canada. At midnight, the birthday torch was officially passed on from Sandra to Simone. But the night ended soon after when one of guys from our hostel got a little too excited over the celebration and let his beet bottle slip and smash into the ground... as well as Andrea's foot.

The next day, we flew north to the city of Chiang Mai. It's a town surrounded by beautiful, lush and green mountains. Our first full day here, we took a cooking class. I learnt how to make cashew chicken, spring rolls, and red curry with pineapple. The curry lesson was the most interesting. We made the paste first, which was exhausting and caused all to break out into a sweat from mashing a mix of ingredients together in a mortar. Then we used the paste to make the actual curry dish. I was first up and our teacher greased up my wok with oil then threw in the chicken. That's when the giant flame erupted from the wok and nearly burnt off my eyebrows.

The cooking class was followed by an almost as exciting day riding an elephant and white water rafting in Mae Kong river. It was 10kms of muddy water with amazing level 4 and 5 rapids throughout. It's something that I've always wanted to do and was absolutely amazing. We were 5 in our raft, but we stuck close to two other rafts of the same company. A couple people got tossed from the other rafts, but fortunately I managed to stay in at all times and only sustained a minor toenail injury.

Yep, we went through this.

We wrapped up the last of our Thailand adventures today with a day out rock climbing at Crazy Horse. This is the mountain below. We did a couple routes on the backside of the mountain, then did two more after lunch on the lower left handside of this photo.

The first climb up was challenging because I was getting used to the feel of everything. It was a level 5A (levels go from 4A/B/C to 9A) and about 12 meters high. I followed that one up with a level 5B about the same height. There were two more routes at that location, but I had to sit them out to avoid aggravating my knee.

It was a lot of fun climbing but incredibly exhausting. I came down from my first climb dripping with sweat and unable to keep my hands still. During my second climb, I was near the top and my left leg was shaking uncontrollably from having to hang on for so long. By the third climb (a 23 metre hike shown below), my arms felt dead and my thighs were weak. I got about 1/3 of the way up and was stuck at a tricky point on the wall. I didn't trust my knee enough to hold up, so I had to lower back down and call it a day.

We leave Chiang Mai in the morning on a bus. We're crossing over into Laos in the afternoon, then heading on a 3 day/2 night excursion in the Bokeo forest where we sleep in treetop houses accessed only by ziplines.