South Africa & SE Asia 2008

Ho Chi Minh City – Nha Trang – Hoi An – Hue – Hanoi

Days 84 -89

With not very much time left until we fly home from Hong Kong, unfortunatly the last week seems to have been taken up by a lot of time on coaches making a speedy journey north.  The coaches vary significantly in quality and we seemed to miss out on the luxury that others have had with their open bus tickets. Firstly, despite confirming our connecting bus from Nha Trang to Hoi An, they insisted we hadn’t and so we got stuck in Nha Trang for a night a day that was not planned.  This involved us having an arguement with officialy the worst manager and the rudest man we have encountered on our trip.  I wont bother explaining any further, it is still too raw.

When we made it to Hoi An we were not dissapointed.  Having loved Luang Prabang, Hoi An overtook it as our favourite old town. With tree lined streets, crumbling architectural features, yellow painted colonial buildings, and attractive small river front cafes, Hoi An is very pretty and very enjoyable. Admitedly we were there for a day and a half and there is not much to do in the town itself, but we were very contented.

 We found Hue not as interesting or charming and were dissapointed by the Forbidden Purple City – that still remains all very vague to us still. The moat and walled city are attractive enough, but inside the structures were lacking and not very well maintained. I felt a little lost in my purpose walking around the area…

Now we are in Hanoi, and within a few hours of arrival have booked our train to the Chinese border. It all seems to have come round so fast. 

to be edited

 Day 79 – 83

We were lured to stay longer in a city once again…Phnom Penh didnt feel entirely like a city, so it had been a long time since a Bangkok scale of things  We busied ourselves in between a lot of chill out cafe time seeing the sites.  The War Remnants Museum had an excellent and vast collection of war photography but the Cu Chi tunnels wasnt a great experience.  This was perhaps due to our guide quote “look at this metal trap put down by the Viet Cong, it folds up and is portable so they could put it in rivers to injur American soliders, this is my favourite!” and “look take souvenir photo by war tank, American solider died here and here and over there”.  There seemed to be no mention of what awful things American soldiers did to Viet Cong soldiers if there were found, nothing about their condition of living just glorification and celebration of their heroism.  Admittly the 250km of underground tunnel network is pretty fantasitc but the whole presentation by our guide on all the traps and fighting strategies was very distasteful.

The Museum of Fine Art was OK, although there was an odd visiting exhibition of Koonsesque monk statues with lovely paint effect.  The Reunification Palace gives you a tour included in your ticket and that was pretty good, particularly seeing the rooms with maps all over the walls from the 1970s where they discussed fighting strategies. 

We had a good day at the Dam Sen Park (which we didnt realise was a theme park) and headed for the Ice Palace, which was freezer temperature inside, and despite the lovely pink padded jackets we were given i started to panic when i couldnt find the exit.  Its a small exhit of ice sculptures and mini buildings impersonating, the Colosseum, the Taj Mahal etc…with brightly coloured tube lights around the blocks of ice.

So time to head up north Hoi An is our next stop, that is if the open our company we bought our ticket with actually decide to let us have a seat tonight.

Sun 23 March Laura arrives Durban Mon 24 Plan/explore Durban Tue 25 Leave Durban: • Greyhound/Translux/Baz Bus/Minibus to Richards Bay then hire car from Richards Bay drive to camp. Night game drive if possible Night in Hilltop rest-hut Wed 26 Morning drive Drive over to other camp ... [Continue reading this entry]

Left to Right - Laura, Tiah, Sophie and Emily