Day One

1. boat ride in Ha Long Bay
2. walking through the Surprising Caves
3. swimming in the bay
4. night on the boat
5. bong hit of tobacco - a North Vietnamese favorite

We spent a night on a boat in Ha Long Bay. Everything was fine until Evan saw a huge roach smack in the middle of the bathroom floor. I screeeeched. Like the gentle person that he is, Evan wanted to catch it and set it free on the side of the boat, but I was having none of that. I took his sneaker and whacked the hell our of it. It was soo nasty; the guts went everywhere. I then made Evan take his writhing carcass and flush it down the toilet. He wasn’t too happy about it.

Evan took a bong (water pipe) hit of tabacco. This is common among men in the North. When we first saw it on the street, we thought it might be opium or something, but it was done quite openly and in front of police. We inquired and found out it was tabacco. Our guide, Zhong, offered us some on the boat. I (Evan) took a hit and felt very lightheaded, albeit relaxed. Soon after I felt very queasy, almost like I wanted to vomit — supposedly I looked green. I relaxed on the top deck of the boat which was very beautiful,

It was crazy how we had to get on and off the boats. They all jam together at a dock, bumping and scratching into each other. With full packs on our backs, we had to scramble up onto the closest one and then literally jump from one to the next until we got to our boat. There were times I was sure I’d fall in!

Day Two

1. hiked the Cat Ba National Park — don’t bother with it if you ever visit
2. climbed crazy rusted tourist tower
3. visited “Monkey Island”, which indeed had some little monkeys waiting for us
4. Kayaking among the karsts
5. drank a bit at bars on Cat Ba Island

We almost got left behind! We got out of our boat onto one of the fishfarmer places, carefully waliking across 2′ x 12′ beams hovering over shark and large fish bins. I was like, “Are you insane?!” Good thing my momma sent me to all those ballet classes- great balance. One cool thing was when we folllowed the guide through a natural archway into a large lagoon; the archway was so low that the lagoon was hidden during high tide! The water was clear and we could see some sea fans and coral, but that’s about all there was to check out. The guide took off and headed back to return the kayak but it felt so short, especially since we were originally promised 4 hours to explore. Evan and I decided to go around the rock from the oter side. Somehow we got lost. We started to panic at the thought of having to spend a night on one of those dilapidated fishing boat houses. Luckily, the boat sailed around the corner just as were we getting desparate. They didn’t seem very pleased with us holding up the schedule but you know what?? I wasn’t very pleased being abadonded in the middle of god knows where with sharks!

Day Two

1. cruised the UNESCO World Hertage site, passing a floating vilage and school
2. back to Hanoi

The bus from Hanoi to Hue came at about 7:45pm. It was an overniter packed full of backpackers. Such an awesome vibe. Pleaple from all over the world trading bits of helpful info and stories- who’s going where, who just came from there, best places to see, how to get around, cheapest hotels… My 8 week trip pales in comparison to these long-term trekkers. I could easily keep travelling for a year. What an awesome experience!

Highlights of Hanoi:

1. got fantastic haircut for $3.75
2. got visas for Cambodia at $25 a pop
3. got Elena tailored jeans for $9.62 (had to go to the plus size stores in Vietnam!)
4. walked around the markets and saw daily life
5. ate at a lot of different market stalls- bun cha (small BBQ pork burgers w/ noodles)
6. Checked out West Lake and Quan Thanh Temple
7. saw a Thang Long Water Puppet Show- totally awesome!
8. Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and Army Museum
9. Buddist totally vegetarian resturant “Com Chay Nang Tam”- tried mock snails
10. delightful hot pot with some New Zealand friends- Ashley and Teresa

Our trip to Hanoi begins in China. I bought our bus tickets to Ping Xiang, a town bordering Vietnam, from Yangshuo CITS (the Chinese nationalized travel service). I wanted to buy a ticket for the Guilin-Hanoi Express train. I was informed by the agent that there was no such thing as that Express train and that it would take 27 hours. I could instead take a direct sleeper bus from Guilin to Ping Xiang and then cross the border and take a bus to Hanoi. It would take only 12 hours. I heeded her advice and bought the tickets (~$32 USD each). After I paid, I was then informed that “Jack” would meet me in Guillin at the corner where the Post Office was. I was suspicious, but receipts seemed to go a long way in China so went along with it.
We took the local bus from Yangshuo to Guilin with our Canadian friends. After hitting the supermarket, we bid them farewell from the train station. Thereafter begins the Bus Ride From Hell…

While waiting at the aforementioned corner, multiple people offered us bus, scooter, and taxi rides to various places. One friendly Chinese teenager told me there was no direct bus to Ping Xiang. “Jack” was punctual. He walked us to the long-distance bus terminal, 1km away from the Post Office. He assured us that this was a direct bus to Ping Xiang and that the other person had misinformation. When we came upon the bus, “Jack” started yelling at the bus driver and we waited for 5 minutes. The bus ended up being full.

We hopped into a taxi with Jack who took us to another bus station that was about 8km away. Jack stuck us with the taxi fare (~$1 USD) — we’re pissed but didn’t feel like we had much choice. We got on this new bus and were given prime seats up front. We were also given bus tickets that said Guilin-Ping Xiang written on it in Chinese characters (I verified it in our Rough Guide). This bus left at 8pm.

There were lots of people on the bus, as well as bags of rice, stacks of palm stalks, some animals, and a rat or two. I slept in my mosquito Cocoon. I am also about 8 inches taller than the average Chinese passenger, as evident from the length of my sleeper bed. The ride was relatively smooth and I fell asleep.

I awoke in the middle of the night to the bus lady telling me to get off and to take another bus — it took a couple people speaking broken English and a whole lot of body language to figure this out. I quickly realized we were in Nanning, the major city between Guilin and Ping Xiang. The CITS lady and Jack both lied to me. We were directed to the back of a van with our luggage, along with a few sacks of rice. The bus driver got in the front seat and the van driver took us away. I must say that if this was New York City, I would be shitting in my pants, but it felt quite natural in China.

The sketchy van ride brought us to another bus terminal where we were met by a woman who walked us to another bus. This bus left at 7am. So, we were already 11 hours into the trip and only halfway there. Another CITS lie.

This bus was filled with a bunch of motion-sick Chinese people who were spitting and vomiting in little baggies — they puked hard at the rest stops. The one next to us needed a bucket and everybody refused to sit with her. Elena and I felt fine, but were a little worried about getting sick. There were also five middle-aged Russian women on the bus. This bus ride was about 7 hours and we got to Ping Xiang at around 11am.

From Ping Xiang, we took a auto-rickshaw to the border, which was about 15km away. Elena had never been on one [I was on many in India], and to the uninitiated, it is as sketchy as being thrown in a van in the middle of the night.

It took about 2 hours and a 1km walk to get through the border, most of it dealing with the Vietnamese side of things. After ridiculous amount of bickering, we got into a cab with an American, a Brit, and our driver “Crackhead Dave”. This guy either was insane or high-as-a-kite, or both. He kept laughing and using his cellphone and driving on the wrong while looking at us all in the car. He also drove insanely slow.

“Crackhead Dave”’s deal was that he wanted to break our deal of a ride to the Lang Son bus station — the nearest town, 10km from the border. He wanted us to pay for his cab ride and then take his arranged mini-bus to Hanoi. We wanted to arrange our own mini-bus. After a ridiculous amount of time and us finally telling him to stop. Right then, he turned around and pulled into a gas station and a van pulled up. It was the pre-arranged van. We figured the crazy dude was driving slow to give time for his mini-bus to arrive. His Chesire Cat attitude was probably because he knew that, either way, we would take his mini-bus. He was right: we ended up taking it because we had little choice and we couldn’t arrange a much better deal than that ($10 per person).

The mini-bus ride was about 3 hours to Hanoi. We were dropped off in front of a hostel that the mini-bus gets a commission from. The rooms were very clean and cheap and the hostess, Moon, was very nice and spoke English well. We were also extremely tired, so we took it.

At our hotel in Hanoi, we met some people who had the exact same experience the day after us (from Yangshuo to Guilin).

Overall, many lessons were learned:

1. Don’t accept travel advice from somebody who stands to gain from it.
2. Just because CITS is nationalized, doesn’t mean that agents don’t care about their commissions, and hence must be included in lesson #1.
3. Arranged travel in China may seem sketchy, but it’s just their way sometimes — especially for less traveled routes.
4. For your ticket, there are an amazing amount of people involved:
   1. CITS booking agent
   2. her boss
   3. Jack
   4. the bus driver
   5. the bus hawker (person who manages people coming on and off the bus)
   6. the van driver between stations
   7. the second bus hawker
   8. the second bus driver
5. Vietnamese people are much cooler than “Crackhead Dave” terrible first impression.

Here’s a recap of our total transportation from Yangshuo to Hanoi:

• Mini-bus from Yangshuo to Guilin
• Walk from train station to bus station
• Taxi from bus station to another bus station
• Sleeper bus to Nanning
• Van from bus station to another bus station
• Bus to Ping Xiang
• Auto-rickshaw from Ping Xiang to border
• 1km walk across the border
• Car ride from border to Lang Son
• Mini-bus ride from Lang Son to Hanoi

Overall, this took 18 hours. And there is a Hanoi-Guilin Express train and it takes 17 hours without any of the hassle. I defintely feel like I grew from the experience.

Craig, Evan, and I took a vegetarian Chinese cooking class at the Cloud 9 restaurant. It was incredible, we learned so much. First we met with William, the owner of the restaurant. He lectured to us about Chinese cuisine — what the different provinces ate and why they ate it. He also taught us about food from a Taoist perspective. Different foods have different energies (yin and yang), as do different cooking methods. It is important to keep these energies in balance.

The class itself was totally amazing. Evan took a bunch of video and pictures. We made:

* Steamed vegetable dumplings

* Braised eggplant with garlic

* Braised mushroom with tofu

First the chef would prepare a dish; he made it look so easy. Next it was our turn. They use cleavers for everything, whereas we are used to chef’s knives. We learned the fine art of dumpling making which was pretty cool.

Afterward, we sat to eat all of our dishes. We agreed that Craig’s was the best. Carrie, the lady who assisted us during the class, sat with us while we ate. She was from a nearby village, spoke excellent English, and was amazingly hospitable. She took great pleasure in helping us enjoy our time there.