Ahoy Hanoi! I managed to pry myself away from Dave long enough to have a visit with my good friend Caroline, who had stayed with Dave and I for awhile in Perth. Don't feel too bad for Dave, he gets more stressed out when I'm in Perth armed with a credit card then in a third world country.
There is proof yet again that world news is grossly over-exaggerated ie. the time that tanks overtook Bangkok when the government was overthrown. Most Thai people didn't really ever know about it. Again the typhoons that hit Vietnam were extremely localized and I had nothing to worry about as I landed in Hanoi on Oct 1st.
Caroline and I got busy walking the markets and catching up on the past couple of months away form each other. We watched an indoor water puppet show, really interesting, though I fall asleep. We hopped on a sleeper train that night and headed up the mountainous region of Sapa. This area is famous for the local hill-tribes who are unfortunately relegated to making their living selling to tourists. They are good natured and high spirited, even without buying anything they still joked around with us. We signed up for a 2 day trek...so did 200 other people, but we soon developed a familiar group of trekkers each going our own pace.
Our group stayed at a "home-stay" that was more luxury than I expected and completely unlike the homes we visited in the area. Caroline and I spent some time in H'mong houses, which could easily be compared to small barns. We were more than happy to spend a few dollars for those who were gracious enough to let us visit with them. Most people were busy cutting rice, Caroline and I helped with the sorting process and realized quickly that we weren't very good at it.
Back to Hanoi after our trek, we slept well that night and turned up at the tour office in Hanoi at 7am ready for Halong Bay. Unforunately, we were told that our trip was canceled due to the weather and we had to find another activity. We decided to take a bus to a place called Ninh Binh and take our chances with the rain. We toured the temples, caves, rivers, parks and other interesting tourist sites without any rain. We stayed our last night in Hanoi in luxury ($18 US) room charge and I flew out the next day. I was expecting a good long nap on my flight, but I had several seats of engineers and geologists around me who were flying back from work in Thailand. No one shut up the whole flight! Good trip. I'm awaiting a DVD of Caroline's more professional photographs.
