Last days in Vietnam
After leaving Halong Bay, we were lucky to make a connection in Hanoi and board a sleeper train to Lao Cai in the very northwest of Vietnam, from where, if we had visas, we could have literally walked into China. That’s the second time we’ve been within 20km of China and not managed to get across the border (the first being in Pakistan 3 1/2 years ago), but something tells me we’ll make it to China one day soon.
Instead, we took a connecting bus to Sapa, a mountain village famous for its nearby scenery and ethnic villages. It’s an incredibly touristy place these days, but still very enjoyable if the weather’s right. We arrived at about 7am, having left Halong Bay at 12:30pm the day before, and would have liked nothing more than to get under our cosy blankets and sleep the morning away. But it was shaping up to be a glorious day with no clouds in sight, something rather unexpected as other travelers we had talked to said they often couldn’t see 10m in front of them in Sapa because the place was enveloped in mist and cloud.
So instead we trudged off down the hill for a 12km round-trip walk to the village of Lau Chai. Our guidebook says you need to have a guide and permit to do this, but we managed (rather skilfully, I thought) to avoid these restrictions and walked unhindered to the village. Largely because of Sapa’s popularity with foreign tourists, the ethnic Vietnamese villagers in this area, especially the women, have retained their traditional garb, unlike in other parts of the country. They really do look very pretty in their different outfits, depending on what ethnicity they are. The most striking are the Dao women, who shave their eyebrows and head and wear brilliant red headresses. It’s also pretty amazing to hear how well some of these women speak English, owing to the giant tourist trade. Many of them walk down from Sapa with the foreigners, chatting about their families etc. This invariably leads to offers to buy handicrafts once you get to Lau Chai, but it’s a nice way to converse with the villagers and learn a little about their lives all the same.
Once again we were disappointed to have arrived in such a place at the wrong time of year to see the rice fields at their best, but the mountain scenery was still quite lovely, and we really were blessed to have such a fabulous day. The next was very overcast (though not as bad as what had been described to us earlier) and we couldn’t see any of the mountains around Sapa that had been so clear the day before. It’s very cold in the mountains at this time of year, especially on days like that, so we considered ourselves lucky to have had one nice day up there and made our way back to Hanoi.
After a visit to Nimh Binh, where we saw some old royal temples, took a boat trip through Tam Coc, which literally means three caves, and met a group of five cyclists trying to make it overland to Europe (check them out: http://www.fueledbyrice.org), we went back to Hanoi for one final time and, after nearly four weeks in Vietnam, decided to fly back to Bangkok to spend the last couple of weeks of our trip exploring parts of Thailand that we have yet to visit. We arrived two days ago and will spend the next week or so in the central plains and northeast area. If time permits, we’ll head south to enjoy the scenery of Krabi and some other places.
Tags: Asia, Sapa, Southeast Asia, Travel, Vietnam
Nick