Halfway

Hello my fellow readers,

I’m currently writing from the side of the road nearby Vinh, Vietnam, as poor luck has stranded me and my travelling companions for a couple of hours at a mechanic. A lot has happened since the last time I wrote. Ill incorporate more random/general stuff in my writings this time as well.

Last time I wrote I was in Sapa with Huut and Phil, we took 2 days to travel to Ha Giang and stopped just before that. I was not happy with the pace of travel and ideas of travel and thus decided to move on by myself from that point.

I hanged out with other backpackers soon after my arrival in Ha Giang in the morning. I decided it was a good idea to wait one day to inform myself on the motorbike loop and pick out travelling buddies. The day after I started the loop with 2 French guys, and we were all stricken by the beautiful mountains of the province. The loop didn’t really have interesting stops but the scenery was absolutely amazing. I explored the most Northern part of Vietnam and even crossed the border to china illegally, since this is marked on maps.me. I did not finish the loop as my plan was to go towards Halong bay along the Chinese border. The day to come was the worst day of travelling so far.

I set out to go to ba be lake, the largest fresh water lake in Vietnam (or only northern, idk…). Whilst driving there, I went for a swim in a random river and put all of my belongings into my rucksack. After the swim, I strapped my rucksack on top of my backpack on the back of my motorbike. A couple of hours later, after a short brake, I noticed that my rucksack has fallen off of my bike with everything of value in it. My wallet, my credit card, my phone and my passport were all in it. I went back and forth twice to search for it but I couldn’t find it. I was lucky to have the two French guys with me still. We went to track my gps location on my phone and followed it towards a mountain path. This was the worst road we’ve ever seen and we decided it would only lead to the broadcasting tower on top of the mountain. We went back to the city and I was going to the place where the last short brake was. I happened to run into a duo that I met the night before, one of them being a Vietnamese guy that spoke really good english. They wanted to help me and it lifted my spirits a bit, as I was full of terror at that moment. Tran, the Vietnamese guy, said that the gps location was actually a little town up in the mountains, and so we were going to check it out. It took us 2 hours to come back with the information that one kid heard that somebody found a bag. We got informed later that there was a wedding party at the small village. We check my gps location again when we got back down from the mountain and it had moved to another city. We all went to that city and it was already dark. The gps location was again in a small village atop of the mountain. We had dinner and Tran and I went to the police station. The police had a police station in the village, where they checked out the gps location, to no avail.

The gps location had moved the next day, just out of the street it was initially in. The police said they didn’t have, after a couple of phone calls. So Tran and I started to get ready and checked the gps location again. It was now in the city! I got on the back of Trans bike with a small hope that they brought it to the police station. I checked the gps location again and now it was outside the city, to which Tran responded with that they where probably on their way to china to sell my phone. Tran and I pursued the gps signal for the better part of an hour on very shitty dirt roads, packed with loose rocks. We didn’t go faster than 20kms and hour and eventually halted a group of 4 scooter drivers with a lot of cargo, halfway to China. Tran almost immediately said that they had my phone, and after 20 minutes we managed to buy it back for 1 million dong (nearly 40 euros). Tran said we were going to head back, to which I responded with ‘’but what about the rest of my stuff????’’ Apparently, we were to wait for them to come back to china to sell their cargo and then receive my rucksack at the police station, 4 hours later. Apparently this worked out good and I got everything back except for the 2 million in my wallet. They did not know what a credit card was and they even left a 50 euro note inside it since they didn’t know the value of it!!! I was really happy that I had everything back and I am forever grateful to Tran. Thank you so much Tran!!!!

Later that same day we were bound for ba be lake again and reached it at 7 or 8 in the evening. Soon after dinner I was laying in bed. I fell asleep very quickly since my mind was at ease again =) The next day was spent on the lake, a nice relaxing boat day with beautiful scenery and a nice swim. Although touristy, it still had a charm.
I wanted to see the waterfall at the Chinese border before going to Halong bay and thus spent the better part of 2 days to see it. It was a really rainy day when I went to the waterfall and I found out my fake Northface raincoat of 5 euros wasn’t waterproof. The waterfall itself was really awesome but the weather did kind off spoil it. Ah well, I’ve seen plenty of waterfalls so I wasn’t too sad. Next couple of days where spent to get to Halong bay, but I ended up on Quan lan island, the less touristy alternative to the other tropical islands. The island was really nice and I relaxed at the beaches. I got to Halong city and found out that the boats weren’t going anymore because there was a typhoon approaching. It stranded me for 2 days.

I really wanted to go out again, for meeting English speaking people and needing a good drink, and spend my 2 nights there at the backpackers pub, alcohol flowing richly. Best hangover day in Vietnam as they have a Asian variant of KFC and a good movie theatre, in which I saw the new Kingsman. Loved the movie, although most people say they didn’t like it as much as the first.

I continued writing this after a couple of days, started too late with writing at the mechanic (we eventually waited for a little bit more than 4 hours). Im in Hue at the moment, but I will continue my story again.

I went to Cat Ba after the storm was settled, spend a couple of nights partying and a lot of relaxing. The weather wasnt too good on the island and it spoiled the cruise I had booked. The scenery was still quite beautiful nonetheless, though it was a cold day which wasn’t any good for swimming. The weather has actually been really bad in general since the storm, almost feels like home. Rain and wind everyday, except it is still ‘’warm’’ here. Day time it is around 26-28 degrees, which is chilly for me at the moment sometimes. Back to Cat Ba, I really enjoyed my time there. Didn’t do a lot there, but I guess that was the beauty of it.

I headed towards Ninh Binh after Cat Ba. I don’t really look up anything about a place anymore, ill hear the stories from other backpackers and let it surprise me. I’ve heard great stories about Ninh Binh but to my unfortunate surprise, they’re wrong. I could see the beauty of the place, but I’ve seen more places that were a lot more interesting and more scenic than this area. Although there was a really nice coffee place that actually had Italian coffee. The Vietnamese coffee is really bitter and usually really sweet. Some people like it and other people find it disgusting, me being the latter unfortunately…

My next place of interest was way nicer, Phong Nha. This place has a great tiny motorbike loop and some nice caves in the area. I was really impressed by the Paradise cave, biggest cave I have seen so far. I think I have walked for more than a kilometre inside, one way. The town I stayed in also had a really nice backpacker hostel called Easy Tiger. This was run by an Englishman and it was by far the smoothest running place I had come across. A little expansive but the atmosphere was really good and there were plenty of people around to enjoy a couple of cold ones with.

I have just arrived in Hue so I cant really say anything about it yet, I guess that is for the next time. My plans are a bit more solid now, ill spend a while in Hoi An and stay in Vietnam until the 20th of December and then catch a plane to New Zealand to spent Christmas with my sister.

So I did promise to write some more general stuff and random experiences about Laos and Vietnam.

At the second hostel that I stayed at in Laos I noticed that thick mattresses aren’t what they look like. A lot of places in Laos and Vietnam have these kind of mattresses, they seem to be filled with concrete or wood. Hard beyond comfort, and still somebody thought ‘’ah yeah people love to go back to basic and feel like sleeping on the floor’’.

Theres animals everywhere on the roads. Chickens, goats, cows dogs and buffalos mainly. Cows and buffalos are usually predictable, as they wont dart across the road. They sometimes just chill on the roads and don’t move at all when theres traffic, so everyone just needs to go around it one way or another. Even on the highways in Vietnam (they have the best roads so far!) theres cows and buffalos crossing the road. Chickens and goats are suicidal animals in these countries, as they would dart across the road last minute (I already hit one chicken, no serious injury to the chicken though).
You know that youtube movie where they throw hundreds of bouncy balls down a hill? I saw the shit version happen as a goat strapped to the back of a scooter started releasing his bowels. Just thought you wanted to know.

So Im driving a motorbike here. I did not think that driving here was so damn slow. If you’re going through mountains then keep in mind that you wont make it past 40km/h, usually 30. Good roads are usually between 40 and 50 per hour (pssst, there are not a lot of good roads in the north). Bad roads so now and then between 10 and 15 per hour… Most kilometres I’ve driven on a day was 306, which was today. Took me 6 or 7 hours of driving, and the last part was a highway. The motorbikes here in Vietnam don’t go faster than 80km/h, so its still not too fast.

At first I was quite hesitant to buy a motorbike, but I bought some protective gear in Hanoi. I have elbow pads, knee pads, gloves and a decent helmet (other helmets here don’t have the full chin protection). It looks a bit silly, but quite a few people are jealous. Ive also seen a lot of backpackers with road rash, im glad that I am still without any accidents.

My motorbike does need a lot of repairs unfortunately, I spent 70 euros so far whereas other people spend up to 50 on their whole trip. I think im at 3/5th of my Vietnam trip, so im sure theres more repairs coming. They’re not really serious, but it happens every 2 or 3 days. I could still recommend it to anyone here, its a lot of fun and you save money in the tourist places since you don’t need to book any tours to get somewhere.

This is it for now. As always, I hope you enjoyed the read! Take care guys!