Travelling through Vietnam - Ninh Binh and Tam Coc

With the first draft of my YARP written ahead of the deadline next Tuesday, I've given myself a bit of time to write something on here. I still haven't got round to telling you all about my Chinese New Year holiday travels! The last post I wrote about them was Hanoi, where the trip started. From there we got our first sleeper bus to Ninh Binh, only an hour and a half away. The city itself is nothing remarkable, the reason people go there is to go to Tam Coc National Park like we did. We only allowed ourselves one night there on arrival with the plan to get the 12 and a half hour night bus to Hue the following evening. When we arrived it was fairly easy to find our hotel as Ninh Binh seems to only have one main road. We found out about our various options for visiting Tam Coc the next day - rented car, mototaxi or hiring motorbikes - and discussed them over a dinner of goat pizza. Goat is a local speciality in the region!

Goat pizza (with a Hanoi Beer in the top left corner of the photo)

The option we decided on in the end was to get three mototaxis. Alex had been keen to rent the motorbikes ourselves but Chloe and I weren't massively keen on the idea having never ridden one before and not knowing where to go. The benefit of mototaxi was that the drivers could take us to all the places we wanted and go along bumpy dirt roads and see more of the scenery. 

Alex with his driver who's looking happy

... mine didn't look so happy

The first stop of the day was a boat trip through Tam Coc's caves. We hired a boat and driver to take the three of us along through the caves and past rice fields for about an hour. We soon learned that the local people had developed a different way of rowing - rowing with their feet! Unfortunately it was the wrong season to see the rice fields in their prime with the bright green and yellow colours as shown on postcards and photographs of the area. 

The three of us in our boat

Interesting way of rowing!

Beautiful scenery

Farmer working in a rice field

Beautiful scenery

Coming out of one of the caves. They were all quite similar...

Towards the end of the boat trip

From there we went to see a "pagoda". This word seems to be sometimes wrongly used in Vietnam. "Pagoda" is a word used for any religious worship place from what I can gather. I would describe this particular pagoda as a temple. It was very nice anyway! We had to cross a little bridge to reach it and once there there was a little path up through the rocks behind with various shrines.

From there it was back on the bikes to go to Mua Cave. We got taken along bumpy dirt roads allowing us to see a lot of the countryside and scenery. Mua Cave was my highlight of Tam Coc. The cave itself was nothing special; the reason people go there is to climb the hill above to a view point where you can get amazing views of Tam Coc on one side and rice fields and Ninh Binh on the other. The climb itself was quite challenging (we were glad we didn't go in the summer!) but definitely worth the views at the top. On the way down we got to see some goats, having already seen some during our boat trip, proof for why the animal is a delicacy in the area. 

Zig-zagging steps to the top of the hill

The start of the climb

Chloe and Alex on the way up

View of rice fields from the top

Looking down at where we went on the boat trip

The three of us at the top

Stunning view

Mountain goats

Our final stop of the day was Hoa Lu, the first capital of Vietnam. It was a small collection of palaces and temples, hard to believe that it used to be the capital of a country. What was perhaps more interesting was venturing a bit further into the little town and seeing the local people who all seemed happy to see us. One lady even handed Alex her grandson to hold. Very strange!

En route to Hoa Lu

Palace

Hoa Lu

Alex with a Vietnamese baby

Hoa Lu

On our way back to Ninh Binh

 We then made our way back to Ninh Binh in plenty of time for our bus. 

Chaozhou, Guangdong

Apologies for not posting very much these days but I've been very busy with exams and my YARP (Year Abroad Research Project). This is something I have to do for University of Southampton and counts for a seventh of my degree. I have to write 6,000 words in English and 2,000 Chinese characters as well as do my own research so it has been quite time consuming!

A couple of weekends ago we had a long weekend for Tomb Sweeping Holiday. This seemed the perfect opportunity to get out of Xiamen and visit somewhere new. We left it quite late to book tickets and were running low on money so decided to go to Chaozhou in Guangdong province, just three and a half hours away by bus. The bus cost 86元 from the Xiamen University booking office and we got the bus from HuBin Nan station in the middle of the island.

Unfortunately our journey and arrival didn't go too smoothly. After rushing down there from Xiang'an campus for our 2pm bus, we found out that it had been delayed and we would be leaving at 15:10 instead. We sat in the station playing minesweeper on my laptop to kill the time! Once we were on the bus, the journey itself went smoothly. As we neared our destination, I checked to see if my internet was still working on my phone by opening up my email as I'd never taken it to another province before. I then saw that we had an email from Ctrip saying that we needed to call them urgently about our booking which we'd made the night before. It turned out that the hotel we'd booked at couldn't accept foreigners or people from Taiwan, Hong Kong or Macau so we needed somewhere else to stay. After Alex's long conversation with them on the phone, offering us Ctrip coupons to pay the difference of a new hotel they'd found, we decided to get some food while they sorted out the new booking for us. We went to a Chaozhou cuisine restaurant and asked the waitress what she recommended...

BIG MISTAKE. We ended up with Chaozhou fried rice which was ok, but also an oyster omelette. I had food poisoning from the next morning, throughout our entire stay, return to Xiamen and for another day once we were back. 5 days in total! We ended up spending the majority of our time in our hotel room which stank of smoke as it was a "Business Hotel" i.e. where businessmen go to smoke and have fun with prostitutes! Thankfully there was a Macau film channel on the TV with the films all in English with Chinese subtitles which gave us something to do.

Anyway, after the restaurant we decided to walk the 3km to our new hotel (because we disagreed to pay a higher price for a new hotel we got one that was a long way out). The walk wasn't all that interesting as it was just a long, straight road with shops, businesses and restaurants either side. When we finally reached the hotel, the receptionist was very glad we could speak some Chinese as she'd been worrying about trying to speak English with us!

Because of my food poisoning, we only made it out to do some sightseeing on the Sunday. We got a tuk-tuk from outside our hotel to Guangji Bridge which seemed to be Chaozhou's main sight according to our online research. Towards the very end of the journey, we came across a very narrow gap before a bit of road they were doing some work on. Our driver went through the gap and onto this bit of road before the tuk-tuk got stuck and the door fell off leading to us getting out and Alex helping the guy push it. 不好意思 for the driver!

Tuk-tuk

Chaotic section of road

We got to the bridge and decided to get our picture taken by a professional photographer. As we were standing together, she told me to put my hand on my hip to look 很漂亮 (very beautiful) and her colleague edited the photo to make us whiter, the bridge darker and the sky blue.

After this we went in search of food as we hadn't eaten yet that day. I only fancied plain boiled rice as didn't think my stomach could handle that much more but that proved difficult to find. Who would have thought that finding a bowl of rice in China would be difficult? We ended up in a fast-food place a bit like KFC.

Then it was time to go on the bridge itself. Guangji Bridge is one of China's four ancient bridges. It costs 50元 to cross the bridge, 25元 for students, but it is well worth the money. I've never seen a bridge like it! It had so many different sections, the most interesting of which was the middle which was made up of boats. These boats get taken away at the end of the day to allow traffic through and we were lucky enough to be on the bridge at the time this operation was happening when we were on our way back.

On the bridge

Bridge made of boats

Taking pictures with the funny white man

Hand on hip!

Guangji Bridge

On the other side of the bridge we went to a temple built on a steep hill with lots of steps leading up to it. Unfortunately by this point I was feeling really rotten and ended up throwing up so didn't enjoy it too much!

Lots of steps

Alex inside the temple

 Overall it wasn't the best of trips but I wouldn't disuade people from going there. If you do, just avoid the seafood...

Travelling through Vietnam - Hanoi

When we found out we had a month-long holiday for Chinese New Year we knew we had to take the opportunity to do some travelling. Alex, Chloe (my friend from University of Southampton who studies at Nanjing University) and I decided to travel the length of Vietnam from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh where Alex would leave us to go back home and Chloe and I would go on to Chiang Mai, Thailand. The journey from North to South took almost three weeks with some amazing experiences along the way. 

Hanoi

Alex and I flew to Hanoi from Xiamen on 17th January, the first day of the holiday, not wanting to waste any time in Xiamen. We applied for our visas online, printed off the acceptance letter and flew with Hong Kong airlines, via Hong Kong, to Hanoi where we picked our visas up. The visas cost 45 US$ for 1 month. We then got a taxi to our hostel in the old quarter of Hanoi, checked into our room and had a wander around the busy streets to find somewhere to eat.

Our first meal in Hanoi

Alex sitting on his plastic kiddie chair at the side of the road. Street food culture is a big thing in Hanoi

The next day we decided to look into the different day trips we could take from the city and booked to go to Halong Bay on the Sunday and Perfume Pagoda the day after. As Chloe was arriving on the Tuesday, we didn't want to do all of the sights in Hanoi without her. Once the trips were booked, we went to Hoa Lo Prison where political prisoners were kept by the French colonialists and American POW stayed during the Vietnam War, nicknaming it "The Hanoi Hilton". It was a very interesting place to visit and we were happy enough to go again when Chloe arrived a few days later. After the prison we decided to try to find Hoan Kiem Lake, another of Hanoi's tourist attractions. We ended up getting a bit lost and having to buy an overpriced tourist map but we found it in the end!

Alex outside Hoa Lo Prison

Hoan Kiem Lake

Our day trip to Halong Bay started at 8:30am when we were picked up from our hostel by our tour guide and taken to the minibus. The drive to Halong Bay was 3 hours from Hanoi so if you have more time consider going for more than just a day. When we finally got there we got onto our boat where we had lunch on the way to see a cave. Halong Bay is stunning. It is one of the natural wonders of the world and a world natural heritage site. I highly recommend going there if you get the chance! Also included on the tour was kayaking in a floating fishing village. It was great to get the chance to explore the bay and its caves by yourself rather than staying with the group the whole time. After the kayaking it was time to go back as by then we'd spent 4 hours at the bay. 

The Perfume Pagoda day trip started off in a similar way, getting picked up at 8am and taken to a minibus. The journey was only about an hour and a half this time though so not so long spent travelling! When we arrived we were taken on a 1-hour boat trip up the river as minibuses are not allowed to go into the protected area. Before going up the mountain we had our included lunch and bought tickets for the cable car having decided that there were too many steps for me to walk it (I've got a bad knee)! I was really glad we'd opted for the cable car as it was really simple and you got a good view as you went up. Perfume Pagoda is the biggest centre of Buddhism in Vietnam and they were busy preparing for when the pilgrims came during the festival. Apparently thousands of pilgrims arrive to spend a couple of days a pray at the numerous temples and pagodas. We went to see the main pagoda which was in a cave at the top of the mountain. It did feel like quite a spiritual place but was slightly ruined by the amount of tourists! At the bottom of the cable car we saw one of the main temples which was impressive. One thing we noticed was that people seemed to have brought offerings of western biscuits and soft drinks. I suppose that's what Buddha likes?

Boat trip

At the top of the mountain

Perfume Pagoda

Temple

On Tuesday Chloe arrived and Alex and I went to pick her up at the airport. When we first arrived, Hanoi had felt very foreign, more foreign than China, so we didn't want her to be arriving alone. We booked a taxi from a travel agent as it was cheaper than getting one on the meter and waited for her to arrive. Once we'd found each other we got back into a taxi and took Chloe to her hostel. She'd accidentally booked a different one to us but thankfully it wasn't too far away! We took her for a meal in the evening, traditional Vietnamese Pho (the country's national dish, a noodle soup) and then let her sleep after all her travelling.

The next day we went to a travel agent to organise our travel through Vietnam as we'd wanted to wait for Chloe to arrive before we did it. We opted for getting an open sleeper bus ticket costing 63 US$ as it meant that we had some flexibility for when we went between places and the price was cheap! Unfortunately, as we were there during the Tet festival, the ticket was more expensive than it would usually be and we had less flexibility as so many of the locals were travelling home to see their families. Once we got the important bit out of the way, we went off sightseeing. We went to Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum, Ho Chi Minh Museum, One-Pillar Pagoda, Temple of Literature, Hoan Kiem Lake for the second time and booked tickets to see the Water Puppet Show that evening. A very touristy day!

Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum

One Pillar Pagoda

Ho Chi Minh Museum

Temple of Literature - Vietnam's first university

Chloe and I at Hoan Kiem Lake

Hoan Kiem Lake in the evening

Water puppets

 For our last day in Hanoi we went back to the prison as Chloe was interested in going and went to the temple in Hoan Kiem Lake. This was just about all we had time for before we had to get our first bus for the hour and a half journey to Ninh Binh, where we stayed that night.