Trevor & Jonathans Cruise & Trip to the Far East and Australia 2016

Day 22 - Tuesday May 31st 2016 - Hanoi / Hoa Lun / Tam Coc, Vietnam

So we really did not need the alarm this morning as we both had the worst night’s sleep ever. Of course it was down to the change in time zone but honestly it was one of those nights where you keep asking if the other is asleep yet and the answer always came back as a no. This was not a good start then to a really busy day as we were being picked up at the hotel at 09:00. So with no choice we made it through the shower and breakfast downstairs in the hotel. The breakfast options were actually quite interesting, I mean would you fancy chilli and coriander for breakfast? Normally we might have given it a try but after a sleepless night we played it safe with croissants, toast and cereal.

We met up with our guide for the day, a really lovely Vietnamese man going by the name of Dan and headed off into the crazy morning traffic of Hanoi.It took us the best part of an hour to navigate through the absolute chaos

and sheer volume of traffic of Hanoi to link up with the faster roads leading out of Hanoi. On the way we passed what our guide referred to as the new part of the city complete with modern western looking high rise apartments and shopping malls. It was all white and new looking but the roads were still packed with the distinctly Hanoi way of driving, the mass of scooters and the lorries hurtling through faster than anyone…. some things I don’t think will ever change here and the traffic is one of them.

As we were clear of Hanoi the scenery changes quite radically and it goes green. Everywhere you look on all sides of the roads are green fields. Paddy fields full of rice, banana plants, corn fields but rice was by far the most prominent crop. Vietnam is the world second largest producer of rice only being behind Thailand. As it’s a communist country all the fields are owned by the state and leased out to farmers or small time crop growers to manage and there is a state price of any crop produced so no matter what size your fields everyone receives the same. There are no supermarket price drops here or bargaining powers, just the one price!

We made a brief stop at a tourist souvenir factory as you always do (apparently for our comfort to drink and visit the bathroom) of course this is all about getting you to part with some dong before you move on. As we walked in we were met with rows of needlework artists making pictures from cotton and very talented they were too. It’s actually quite sad as this shop had been set up to help find jobs for people who were affected by the use of nerve gas in the Vietnam war with America and these would be the children of those that had been affected (based on age and what we saw). The cynical side of me would say that this could all be a big rouse to get some more dong and although we did not buy anything, we did make a donation (see we are soft southerners).

Moving on we drove through new town, factories, rice field after rice field, some really seriously impressive houses that were apparently owned by the developers that built these new towns in the first place. The houses that they built were more like a mix of Russian / French palaces of old and full of exterior gold mouldings and carved archways and Corinthian columns with huge roof detailing. These houses are so out of place they look like Disneyland castles in the middle of a rice paddy field and they just go to the show the real disconnect between the rich and the poor and even the not so poor middle classes here in Vietnam. These houses were super bad taste, overbearing monstrosities…..obviously there is no planning department in Vietnam as they should not be allowed on taste grounds alone!

So back to our day trip. Our first stop of the day (well outside of the souvenir nerve gas shop) was the original old capital city of Vietnam Hao Lu. Now you might think this would mean this was a whole town etc. but that’s not the case at all. It’s actually the location of the original palace of the king and subsequently has been destroyed but what is here now are the temples that were built for both the emperor and his son.

So we get a bit of history now but I’ll keep it brief.

So one of the temples was dedicated to the Emperor Dinh Tien Hoang and he was from the Dinh Dynasty that ruled from 968 to 980 with the other dedicated to emperor Le Dai Hanh of the le dynasty 980-1009. The original palace that was here once covered an area of some three square kilometres. Much of what might have been here has been lost to water, in fact part of the tour took us to an area of the original palace floor where they had pumped out all of the water and revealed the terracotta floor. Like I said yesterday, the history of Vietnam is very complex but in a nutshell King rules, does not like his first son so first son gets killed (poison) second son is too young to be king when king dies so wife remarries army leader, she becomes queen for a while then passes crown to her new husband…..see its complicated so let’s leave it there. Why it was important though is that China kept invading Vietnam so they needed strong leadership to fight back and over the years they have always been able to do just that, beat the Chinese from taking their land.

What I have not talked about yet is the landscape that all of this sits in and it is beyond beautiful. My words will not do this justice at all but imagine all these beautiful ancient Chinese inspired buildings sat in the valley floor surrounded by towering limestone mountains that are pointed and jagged and covered in plant life and vegetation that defies gravity. Trees clinging to rock faces, grasses shooting from cracks in the limestone faces. All of this reflected back at ground level in crystal clear waters and the lushness of the green rice planting. I have to write this in capitals to remind myself just how beautiful it was, THIS PLACE IS AMAZINGLY BEAUTIFUL, there I said it, yes its stunning.

It was time to move on, we had already been on the road for coming up to four hours and after a bad night’s sleep we had both been struggling to stay awake when in the car but with this much beauty on offer around us we soon banished the tiredness. The bodies senses were totally rejuvenated by natures glory all around us, and we were not going to miss another thing.

Our second stop of the day was at the Bich Dong Pagoda. Our drive there took us past more of the limestone mountains, the paddy fields, the pure greenness of it all is other worldly. On the side of the road you would sometimes see goats (they are a food speciality in this area of Vietnam) and water buffalo and the odd cow here and there. Of course all of this just adds to the uniqueness of the place, it really did feel like we were exploring Vietnam’s outback and we were not even half way through our day trip yet!

So back to the Pagoda. So this pagoda dated back to 1428 and it is the only known pagoda in Vietnam that you access over the original stone bridge. Think of a traditional Chinese bridge, that shallow arch and that is what you had here, like curved stepping stones made out of limestone placed into the water taking you to the Pagoda that resides on one of the limestone monolith structures that shoot out of the water looking like a shark’s tooth. Now this pagoda is very special and it is actually made up of three. The structures are called the Ha, the Trung and the Thuong Pagodas but it’s the top two that absolutely take your breath away. The fist pagoda sits about thirty steps up into the mountain and to be honest looked very similar to the pagodas temples that we had seen in Hanoi yesterday, still beautiful but not a surprise. The only difference being that behind the main structure of the Pagoda were the burial sites of the monks that built and made this pagoda home. They must have been really keen monks as to build anything in this location would have taken real stamina, skill and in those times and awful lot of muscle without heavy machinery. So to reach the next pagoda or temple you had to climb up the side of the mountain, up a slippery limestone staircase with stairs all made in different heights to reach a cave and then go inside the cave itself. The cave was dark and well and you could only just about make out where you had to walk to get to where we were heading. We both turn on our iPhone torches to aid the way but it was still really difficult. Inside the cave it was like being inside a big cheese with lots of holes in it but his cave had another staircase inside it to climb in the wet and in the dark, it twisted and turned but eventually we found ourselves at the temple actually at the top of this staircase inside the cave…. wow! We had never ever ever seen anything like this at all. But it was not over yet, stepping outside the cave on yet another level we headed even further up the mountain, up and even crazier staircase than before. It was steeper and narrower and wetter and it just kept going up and up until eventually you reached a plateau and the third and final temple. This was all about being closer to the Gods and the temple itself was spectacular. The only small downside was that you could not really see the view. Such was the growth of trees and the sheer volume of greenness that it had actually grown right around what would have been an incredible vista. I raised my gopro camera up on its tripod stick and filmed hoping for the best……have to wait and see how that turned out. We were in all honestly speechless, this is mind-blowing stuff especially when it surrounded by such natural beauty. We did not have time to take it all in as we still have places to be and things to see so it was time to head back down the snaked staircase, trying not to slip as we went, back through the dark cave and back into our waiting air conditioned car. The only question we had at this point of the day was could we see any better, was there something even more breath-taking around the corner. We would have to wait a while to find out as for now we had another drive through the endless beauty of the countryside to get to our lunch stop for the day.

We stopped for lunch at a rather grand house / restaurant for the area. We were served a full lunch, pumpkin soup, spring rolls, battered fish, goat meat skewers followed by stir-fried veg and chicken with pineapple and a desert all served up beautifully on a Lilly pad. In and amongst the rice paddy fields you see areas covered in Lilly pads and the occasional lotus flower in full bloom. Its bright pink hues breaking up what is otherwise a sea of green.

Lunch over and we asked to walk to our next stop (it was only just down the road) to just stretch the legs for a bit. We did not have a clue what was around the corner but we knew we would be going on a kayak for about two hours so we needed this little walk as our legs and our bums were about to go numb!

So I need to pause here and just say that the next two hours of our lives we had the privilege to travel through some of the most beautiful, peaceful, unique landscape we have ever had the privilege and honour to travel to. Thank you Vietnam for giving us so much to remember in this one part of the trip alone…..I will now try to explain what we experienced but I know I will not do it justice.

Our guide (Dan) took us down to the rivers side and we boarded our narrow aluminium Kayak alone (well minus Dan, guides don’t come as it just adds weight to the craft). In charge of our Kayak was a woman who lets say was in her fifty’s, maybe more but certainly she was not of an age that you would expect to be doing this kind of thing but the strangest thing of all, all of the guides that take you down and back up the river, they all row with their feet…..yes I’ll say It again, their feet and this is surely a unique skill. How they don’t end up with oar shaped foot arches I don’t know but its like they are on an exercise bike all day long pushing and pulling the oars with their feet……remarkable!

So we travelled one hour up river and the other back down through the most remarkable scenery. It’s a river area known as Tam Coc and it’s a waterway set in the valley of limestone mountains covered with foliage and trees. The river sides are a mixture of Lilly pad borders with lotus flowers protruding or rice paddy fields, it’s just idyllic and beautiful. As we progressed down the river we actually travelled under whole mountains. Yes you read that right, we went underneath a mountain on a kayak. Where the water had eroded the limestone over thousands and millions of years you can now glide under a whole mountain that’s just suspended there by the strength of its sides.

We passed children swimming in the clear waters, traders selling drinks and food snacks all from their kayaks (all women as well) but most of all this was all about the peace of being on the water and the scenery. It’s like no other and its beautiful and once again my words will fail me so I will leave it there but if ever you are in Vietnam you have to do this, remember Tam Coc, we always will!

We left Tam Coc behind knowing that we had just experienced something very special indeed, now it was time to face the long journey back to Hanoi and the traffic once more. If we could have stayed in Tam Coc we would but maybe that’s for another time…..

Now our driver was hardly the fastest driver in the east, we were one of the slowest moving cars on the road so it took us the best part of three hours to get back to Hanoi whilst we listened to Dan talk us through more history and more facts about Vietnam. When we said goodbye at the hotel we tipped them both said thanks and that was that. They were fantastic (well apart from the ridiculous slow driving) and we would have no hesitation using them again. Anyway it was straight over to the laundrette (remember that) to finally collect our washing from the filthy hole that was the laundry facility. Luckily the clothes were cleaner than the place we collected them from. The old lady made us do all the maths for her and weigh all the washing out but we were good boys and told the truth and paid her a million dong for her efforts (even though the clothes were still slightly damp and had not really been pressed hat well, at least they were clean. See how quickly you come back down to earth and real life?).

As we had both had a huge lunch neither of us were feeling that hungry so we headed for the hotels Vietnamese snack bar that had been moved into the posh part of the restaurant for a snack of spring rolls and a scallop and spinach dish with rice. Both were yummy and for hotel food actually really reasonably priced (makes a change).

After dinner we had a quick walk around the town square, we were blasted with the heat the moment we stepped out through the door. We were hoping to find a nice bar and actually went into one playing uber cool music (deep house) and filled with a very young crown. Maybe its because we were western and too old and certainly not cool enough that they chose not to serve us, after ten minutes we just got up and left and headed back TO the comfort of the hotel bar and a much needed G&T.

I’ll tell you something after today we are both going TO sleep tonight, I have no doubt of that at all!!