We are back home safe and sound.. What a wonderful trip, we had so many interesting and unusual experiences and are now happy to be home.

The most wonderful part of the trip was the Vietnamese people. They are without a doubt the kindest and friendliest people we have ever come across, the majority of whom live in appalling conditions most westerners can only imagine.

I will post some more photos as soon as they are edited.

Our last night in Vietnam and we are back at the Sunway Hotel in HaNoi.

Saturday evening our guide in SaPa, Dao, met us at the hotel and took us to the restaurant where he cooks. It was close so we walked in the rain. The restaurant sits up on the hill with no windows and a great view. We were afraid it would be cold but, they had all the bamboo shades down and a huge fire in the open pit in the middle. He cooked the best beef dish for us.

Sunday morning we left early in the rain and fog to drive to BacHa where the famous Flower H'Mong Sunday market is held. SaPa is at over 4000 ft above sea level and the road down to Cao Lai which sits at close to sea level is 38 km and very steep but in good paved condition. We then drove up the other side of the valley and the road got worse as we went. After about an hour we saw a lot of tour cars and buses coming down, and someone who knew our driver flagged us down and said that we couldn't get to Bac Ha as there was a landslide and the road was covered. Our guide said that the road is dirt and gravel and one side is straight up and the other straight down. He kept saying, "What a pity, you can't go." About then I needed a bathroom so as we drove back they kept slowing down to look at the roadside stops, finally Dao said they were looking for one with a nice bathroom. When we did stop it was at a typical little spot selling a few snacks, a few clothes and drinks, all on tiny plastic chairs and tables about big enough for Kate or Cam, with a blue tarp to hold the rain off. The bathroom was the second worst squat we have seen in the whole trip and that is going some. You have to touch nothing to stay healthy. We sat down and had tea before driving on.. our driver poured tea into all the cups, rinsed them and then tossed the tea onto the road before filling them to drink.

We went back to Loa Cai and saw the Chinese border, the Red River is the dividing line there and both cities are quite modern and built right up to the river with a bridge and modern border offices.

We then went to an interesting pagoda that had a zodiac circle and huge marble carved animals for each sign.

The rest of the afternoon we wandered around a couple of markets and waited for the train. The town was full of tourists since the major attraction was Bac Ha Market.

Our train car on the way to HaNoi was even noisier than the first one but we managed to sleep through it.

Trang, our HaNoi guide, was waiting beside the track when we pulled in and tapped on the window. All of the guides have been very responsible and really take good care of us. We left from the train station at 5am to go to the Perfume Pagoda. It was something that we sort of wanted to skip, but it was too early to get into the hotel so we went, and it was wonderful.

The village of Houng Son is about 40km west and they control the pagoda which is up in the Perfume mountains west of the village. The only way to get there is by boat of which there are hundreds docked in the river. There are no motors and each boat is rowed by one or two people depending on the size. It is beautiful country with lots of trees and mountains that look just like the ones in HaLong Bay. This month is the busiest time there, as it is right after the Lunar new year when all Buddhists make a pilgrimage. It is like their mecca.

Today was not a "'busy day" since it was Monday, but there were thousands of people there. The cave is at the top of a mountain 2.5km up a path. We walked in the footsteps of millions of Buddhist pilgrims. Or rather we walked down in their footsteps, on the way up we rode a brand new German made cable car. The entire 2.5km of the path was lined on both sides with booths selling food, drinks and souvenirs.. they all seemed to have the same stuff. The people take big trays of food into the pagoda and then carry it all the way back down to eat after it is blessed. The cave at the top was huge and people crowd in and stay there all day, eating and sitting.

Some of the food stalls had dead animals hanging out front, dogs, cats, rats, deer, goats and chickens. We didn't eat until we were back in the village. Trang ordered lunch for us and we had a special treat, whole fried shrimp, head, tail, shell, legs and all. He dished up a large helping for me and I chewed it down... really wasn't too bad if you didn't think about it.

Everyone was so friendly and wanted to talk with us since we were the only westerners there. Most tourists come later in the day. A couple of college girls asked us to pose for a picture with them. Since we were going on 30 hours in the same clothes and no shower we added a bit of perfume to the area ourselves. We were very happy to get back to our hotel and shower.

Tomorrow we leave for home at 11pm.

We are in SaPa at the Victoria Hotel. Our train arrived at Loa Cio at 530 in the morning and our guide and driver were waiting for us. It is about an hour drive up here, and lucky for us the hotel gave us our room so we could shower. On the train we had a sleeper, and bought all four beds so we had privacy. We didn't think we would be able to sleep a wink, but both of us got a few hours sleep. The shared bathroom was vile.

Today we trekked 6 miles to a H'Mong village. When we came out of the hotel three teenage girls in H'Mong traditional dress started walking with us, and continued the whole way. They were so cute and buttered us up for sales. Whenever anyone else came near us one of them gave the best stink eye... these are our Americans and stay away. The trail we took was the "easy" one, and we can't believe we did it. Part of the way was on pavement, then it turned into a steep downhill trail with large rocks for a long way. We walked past the terraced rice paddies, and there were pigs and water buffalo wandering around. Len said, " the worst of the trail is over" and about a block later it turned into a virtual stairway of rocks and dirt, then we walked over the rocks that held the water back for the rice, and along a steep hillside on a 12 inch wide trail. Our guide was great, and helped me all the way. The three girls had flip flops on, and jumped from rock to rock giggling all the way in a sort of mountain ballet. They had a great time teasing Len. We stopped at a shelter for lunch which Dao (our guide) had in his pack. He prepared our sandwiches for us which consisted of good bread, scarey lunch meat, laughing Cow cheese, and then he pulled out the best part; raw bacon. Len ate his and I slipped mine over the railing when no one was looking. Then we had fruit for dessert. He took about 10 minutes to peel and slice an apple, not sure about his chef abilities.

As we were leaving lunch one of "our girls" said, "would you buy something from me now so we can go home?" We bought a couple of little trinkets, and gave them a bag of M&M's which really got a smile.

We then walked further through a couple of villages and met our driver for a ride home. Tonight our guide is going to cook dinner for us, he is a chef at a local resturant.

Hopefully we will still be alive tomorrow after todays lunch.

We drove about 3 hours from HaNoi to the ocean. Along the way there were many international factories built in the midst of miles of rice fields being farmed by water buffalo with farmers planting rice seedlings one at a time. We went through a red clay area with brick factories, then a coal mining section with coal fired electric plants. All the way the pollution was as bad as in LA.

When we arrived at the dock in HaLong City there were a dozen or more tour buses and hundreds of tourists milling about. We have learned to stand back and let it happen. Our tour guide was negotiating with several people, someone came and collected our passports, we were told to follow another fellow onto a boat and within 5 minutes we were away from the dock. There is no way you could do this on your own, it is not at all apparent how things work.

We were on a boat with a capacity of 12 and there were 7 of us. A couple from Germany near Kohn, a Swiss couple and an English lady who is traveling around the world alone. They were a great bunch and we enjoyed visiting with them. The Swiss couple took a bit to warm up.

We cruised for 2 days out in the bay which is about 1000 square kilometers and has 1969 islands both big and small. They are limestone and jut straight out of the bay with very few areas to beach the boat so all the excursions were by a bamboo boat with a sort of raft built on top of it and the boy stood up and ran the oars. Of course no life jackets in sight but we didn't go out of swimming distance from shore. We went into one large cavern similar to Lewis & Clark and then stopped at an island named Titop. It was where Tito and HoChiMinh had a meeting. There were stairs to the top which we climbed for a beautiful view, although my calves paid for it that night. There was a beautiful sunset after which we droopped anchor for the night in a secluded cove. The next day was misty in the am and high clouds all day and we cruised around and looked at more caves. We saw monkeys on the hill side. It was such a quiet and relaxing place and a respite we needed after the noise and crowds.

When we pulled into a fishing village all the kids came out is boats trying to sell us seashells. One little 5 year old was being rowed by his Grandma, Kate gave him a dollar which he wasn't too sure of, then Len gave hime 20000 dong which equals a dollar and he broke into a huge grin, stuffed the dong in his pocket and handed the dollar to Grandma.

Our driver and guide were at the dock to meet us and we stopped at a handicapped workshop on the way back to lighted our wallet.

We are in HaNoi now at an internet cafe waiting to take the night train to SaPa. Will write more from there.

We spent today in Ha Noi, visited Ho Chi Minh tomb which sits in the middle of a huge park and parade ground. It is open limited hours so there were thousands of tourists there, and security is high. You line up and go up stairs and into the semi-dark room where his body is laying. It looks to be perfectly preserved, we thought it might be a wax effigy, but our guide says it is a secret process that the Russians and Chinese know. Maybe the same as what they used to produce "Bodies". After that we walked through the grounds and saw the presidential palace which is very French, then were Uncle Ho worked and lived. Our guide here is Trang, and we don't love him. He is full of the importance of Ha Noi and the North and spouts party line at every opportunity. We then went to the Temple of Literature where students studies Confuscianism in ancient times. It is large and beautiful but we hit overload about halfway through, making us think about "mother & child" in the museums of Europe.

After lunch we took a cyclo ride through the old quarter which is colorful, each street sells one product, they even had a "home depot" street. Shopping here must be difficult.

The city is very beautiful, wide tree lined streets and very clean. Our guide said that twice a day the loudspeakers come on each block telling the retired folks it is time to go out and clean up the street... hope that idea doesn't catch on at home.

Tonight we attended a water puppet theatre, which had traditional live music and puppets on a stage of water. They are famous all over the world.

Tomorrow morning we leave for 3 days on the boat to Halong Bay, then three days to SaPa, so we most likely won't have internet access or phone coverage. Will write more from SaPa if possible.

Thanks for the computer tip John, we will give that a try.

We spent today in Hue which is a beautiful city. It is much cleaner than we have been in so far. First thing we took a trip in a Dragon boat up the river to an interesting temple. The family who runs the boat also lives on it and it is about the length of our upstairs bathroom and half as wide with no furniture but a couple of little plastic chairs for us to sit on. We saw boats that people live on that earn their living dredging sand from the river bottom with hand wenches, and then sell it on shore for construction.

Our next stop was the Citadel which is similar to the Forbidden City in Bejing. There are a few buildings that survived the 1968 Tet battle, and many more are being restored. It is a huge place and was built by the Nyugen Dynasty which were the first to combine Vietnam into one country in 1802.

From there we went to a couple of burial sites of the emperors, each different and very elaborate.

Ahn our guide was telling us a little about his family. His parents met while fighting in the jungle for the North Vietnamese army and were married after the war in 1975. In 1979 the country was at war again with China and all Chinese in Vietnam were arrested and sent to "reeducation camps", his father among them. His family was not together again until 1985 when his father was released. It seems like a terrible injustice, and he said his father is very depressed and bitter.

We are waiting to take a 9:30 flight to Hanoi.

We had a free day in Hoi An yesterday and just spent the whole day in the town which is very interesting, touristy but fun. We went to the central market where they sell everything, as we walked through the food part there was an old woman selling vegetables who had a table about 5ft square and she was squatting in the middle of her produce eating a bowl of noodles. Looking at everything we were glad we didn't have to eat it, and today the realization hit us "We are eating it". Every vendor comes out trying to hard sell you and your face is frozen into a smile and throat is sore from saying "No thank you.


The Vietnamese have a great sense of humor, one young woman in the market held up her baby and said " Souvenir Madam?" Then the peanut seller was joking with Len trying to get him to buy and she patted his stomach and said "You're a happy Buddha".

We went into lots of shops and saw lots of things to buy until we realized how far we had to carry it until the flight home.

Today we drove north through Danang and stopped at a holy site called Marble Mountain. It is a temple carved into a natural cave in the mountain. There are steps up into the cave to the top with a view out to the South China Sea. Len and the guide went to the top and said it was beautiful. Our guide for the three days we are here is a young man named Ahn, who we like a lot. He is a native of Hue and is married with a 13 month old baby.

In Danang we stopped at the Cham museum where there were a lot of artifacts from the numerous sites in the central part of the country.

From there we drove over a high pass, about like Logan pass, but starting and ending at sea level. The road was build by the Americans during the war and there are still remnants of bunkers at the top, and also some down lower in the rice fields. There is a tunnel through the mountain opened in 2005 which makes a fast trip for everyone but tourists. We had a warm day but it was hazy, not sure if it is haze or air polution.

Our hotel in Hue is the Saigon Morin which was built in 1901 and is very elegant. It sits just 1/2 block from the bridge that was in the video clip John found on the web. We walked down to the market after lunch and bought a scarf from a vendor who said he had a sister in Seattle.

Tonight we went on a boat on the Perfume River, just Len & I and our guide on the boat with a musical group of 7 young people. They played and sang beautiful traditional Vietnamese music, then gave us each three lotus shaped boats with candles in the middle to float down the river for our three wishes to come true.

We ate at a little hole in the wall place down from the hotel and walked away stuffed for $7.00 including tip. We are spending more on laundry than food.

We are missing seeing you Kate & Cameron..

We're in Hue, waiting to go on an evening boat trip so I'll post more later. I can't do pictures because there is no WiFi and I am having trouble getting the laptop to work anyhow. We have a fast connection here at the hotel so will be able to tell you all we have done the last couple of days.