Saturday, April 17, 2010
Arrive Hanoi time overcast but no rain. A stroll in the city, pleasant, old city is pleasant, small shopping areas with streets specific to different business, a ride on a small market, mango and candied strawberries too good ^ ^. The ballad after noon, try to find a jacket in windy or rainy it will be better than the t-shirt. Buy a $ 15, and no way to fall further, trading is difficult here.
I booked a bus to Halong City tomorrow morning, or I reach the island of Quan Lan, a little tourist island has the deviation of Halong Bay that I should go through while avoiding the tide of tourists.
Photos in Hanoi
Sunday, April 18, 2010, bus to Ha Long City is I booked a tourist bus, load it full of tourists with a one of hotels in the old city and then hit the road. I go away reassured with this bus full of tourists when I thought to be only a pause in a railway station tourist resort style all on the freeway, it reminds me how I was not ca.
Arrive in Halong City, all the tourists go on Jonke, the magnificent wooden motor boat that they are all the same glue 2 sails, they go for a ride organized by 2 or 3 days. I took a motorcycle taxi queue and the other side of town has a pier to go to the island Quan Lan.
The boat is a small nutshell, already responsible for some supplies and construction materials on site. The loaves of sugar known as Halong Bay are already in front of the pier, the boat leaves and I can already see the floating villages and fishing boats,
local life, and not a tourist. The crossing of 4h is beautiful, the deemed sugarloaf that emerge from the water at the beginning of the crossing, the area is protected by UNESCO, and lots of other islands, larger or smaller, and less Arronnes forms of sugar loaves, some inhabited by fishermen, small paradise peace. Passengers waiting patiently, playing cards for some (the only woman who takes all ^ ^) and Chicha for others, a water pipe. Here you put a small ball of tobacco, and everyone smokes, no opium or cannabis if that answers your question. This pipe is never far from bitter coffee served everywhere in Vietnam and it's free.
Pictures of Ha Long Bay
Upon arrival, I took a taxy-bike colection, no choice besides so guys come and get me on the boat.
Short tour of the village, 4,000 people live here on the island. Fishermen fish, jellyfish, some farmers and some small hotels. A small restaurant has a page of its menu in English and a fried fish with tomato ginger or excellent.
Monday, April 19, 2010, breakfast of coffee house, bananas, clementines and cakes for dogs (as marked on the package). Visit the south of the island, a tower to get lost and I find collectors of seafood, lots of women come to dig the sand for shells, or for the Sandworm sold very expensive (yes AC recalls a movie. ..).
I pass a cemetery, tombs decorated, trimmed sticks of incense were burned on the stones, copies of bank notes by lurking earth displaced by the wind, these are offerings made to ancestors.
In Vietnam, each home has a small temple, sometimes just pictures of ancestors, a few sticks of incense and fruit poses before an offering, sometimes an entire room dedicated to them, that the family is Buddhist or not, the ancestors are called upon to protect the remain alive. I continue, the road is nikel and must date from after the war, there are the same here milestones in France.
dream beaches, person, white sand, the sun is hiding, fog invaded the islands in the distance, it is good, and the water is almost hot!
I continue to the end of the island, a camp / mill fishermen who bring jellyfish, women cut into pieces, the pieces are rinsed, dirty and packed, it seems that c ' is very good.
A small family pays me the tea, cakes, vodka and then eventually made their mangoes and candied strawberries. Difficult to compredre, the father returned by boat to Halong city tonight.
This corner is very miserable, fishermen sleep on a bed of concrete, it reminds me of the rooms at St Lawrence convict!
I return to Halong dinner early in the even good little restaurant yesterday and overnight at the local, it is 20h!
Tuesday, April 20, 2010, up early again, but he begins to float, not the time to move the clothes that were drying.
The rain, huge, lasts until 10am. I am happy not to be at sea with the wind soufffle has that speed. The rain stops, I change the pad to have more feet in the fleet. Necessarily, roof, or rather a future stage, which is flat with a kind of watershed, drafts of future walls of the floor, are real reservations fleet that seeps into the walls. Then I'm off to the north by bicycle.
Again, magnificent. A large extent, at low tide, between Quan Lan island opposite, I could cross on foot. Small green rice fields of beautiful, small houses scattered, mostly very humble. Hellooooo from everywhere with lots of smiles, has a few men too jaded few tourists who come to the island, usually Chinese.
I agree with the point north, the 2 most beautiful beaches and most beautiful last, with a view of the broad face and on the island of Quan Lan on the side, with bar sugar at the end of the island and another island of Sugar Loaf on the other side, like a door at sea
I eat some stuff purchased in the tiny grocery shop in the small harbor, under some limited sunshine.
The return is peaceful, as if I did not go, do not want to finish this tour, this monent on this little paradise is not only an impression.
Pictures of the island of Quan Lan
Wednesday, April 21, 2010, sunrise at 5am, motorcycle taxi to the wharf to take the boat back to Halong City.
The sun comes out, I relax on the roof of the boat and down to the shelter at 10am, too hot. All return is still beautiful, different colors of go with what little sun.
City bus to Halong City, to the bus station, I fall asleep an hour before taking the van that takes me back to Hanoi, he (s) operate (s) like crazy, I'm lucky and they are very clever to avoid accidents, as well as for the risk!
Arrive Hanoi, I reserve my plane to Bangkok. Dining in the street, excellent pasta, small peanuts CRUSHED, 2 fried fritters, pasta filled with meat and thin slices of chicken, with some bean sprouts and mint leaves, I regale and hungry.
Thursday, April 22 2010 , wake up early, I will see time on the internet because I want to go to Ha Giang, even if the weather looks overcast. Unfortunately, it floats above the well. Program change management and Ninh Binh this after noon, also called the "Ha Long". My pumps $ 8 Bangkok are already burnt out, the pad can not even be reattached, I found a pair of sneakers in 45, a record, and more for $ 10 for everywhere is 42 fullsize All pumps and is immediately $ 30 starting price to negotiate.
Lunch of spring rolls, pasta and rice fried in a little walk and then depart by bus from town to the bus station. I took a bus for $ 3 to Ninh Binh, the bus leaves the station and slowly fills up and as the reel is out of passengers in the street.
The 22 seats are taken, it is 38 in the bus, standing, sitting between the corridor, or a 3 on 2 places, everything is done. Fortunately, this driver will not crash on the 2h on the rutted road, despite it rolls like crazy, well I mean like all the bus drivers here it all the time and want to double push trucks honking and even with their hands when the puller pushes the door the shoulder of the driver of a truck that doubles!
Arrive in Ninh Binh small town with nothing ay see from this peaceful community life. I ended up finding a hotel, and negotiated the room after being up on the 2nd floor with my backpack in pretending to be down again that I do not want the pad for what happens down the boss finally goes down the price . I pass the electricians who bobinent engines in the street, a job that is becoming rare in our crosses and this kid who had to eat too many sweets Doremi ^ ^
Friday, April 23, 2010, I rented a scooter and go for a ride in a boat Trang An, full of tourists ... Vietnamese.
They come to pray in a temple and deemed ask luck and success. The ride is really beautiful, one passes in 9 loaves of sugar by small caves, the longest is 600m, Being on the boat and walk between and under the loaves of sugar, it's really good too,
look at the pictures of the temples on the heights of the loaves of sugar, hidden in the vegetation ^ ^.
Photos Trang An
I continue the ride towards Wha Lu, but it gave de bus at the entrance of this ancient city was the capital of Vietnam for a while. I eat too much fried rice and file. I visit Bai Dinh to finish, a huge pagoda, I've never seen it. Parking is assailed Vietnamese tourists, and on the website, a lot of people, it's still huge.
About 500 carved stone statues of Buddhist masters are installed around the site, 4 large temples, pilgrims and tourists in Vietnam, full! They look at me surprised to see a European, and happy to be cuckoo.
From what little I know, I think that Buddhism prone satisfaction of what was already without asking more is contentment, and this site is really excess, expenditures Pharaonic ... (Un) useful? (Notice the comments!)
Saturday, April 24 , I return to Hanoi by train. The train does not leave until 13h, so I'm having a massage by a blind, pleasant, many pressure points in this gentle massage, light and energetic, especially when she rubs the skull, ca reveille.
Photos Ninh Binh and its surroundings
Return by train, I took a seat in a cheap hard, wooden benches, and the car is a mess! Jumbo boxes everywhere, people sitting on benches or the floor when there is enough room, or even extensions to the nap, it's time. I can not open the gate at the window, after the glass pane and the yellow metal to have a little air and light, but my neighbor across the preferred darkness to keep her complexion clear, although it is already a mask over the nose like so many Vietnamese.
I arrive at the train station in Hanoi, returning to the old neighborhood on foot, guided by a guy who was waiting for a bus stop, so nice he decided to make the journey on foot to show me because it's not far. In a street beater hotel offers me a good pad. Dining in the street, noddle soup was not great but fair price of 15,000 VND, half euro, a little foam in the street, two little girls play to use their few English words come and ask me if I like dogs and elephants (I have a head to love elephants?). I'm going to take pictures but my camera is no longer the development fails, damage to this photo, and it is a shame because dust that I should be able to clean or the device is definitely dead . I finally finished the section of Saigon on the blog, sleep!
Sunday, April 25th, far behind on the blog I am trying to catch up, to finally put online the week when I'm up in northern Vietnam. I have a concern for SD card that crashes, or USB card reader can be. I'm off the streets to test the card. I already had a problem yesterday with the camera that re-runs today without worries, now the card fail more than I lose the latest pictures!
I pay a tea, lastly, pay 10c euros ^ ^ surrounded by guys who make their break. The husky laugh as I pointed nose and hair almost white arms. I laugh at his flattened nose and he has no hair on arms, torso, ... after I know. I pass a small snack and pay me a sandwich 1 / 2 Euro, egg, chicken (size like son), and tomato salad, I keep my card and tested in an internet, the card reader that is death, phew! Purchased in India, it will not last long! I pass this street clothes and there are all possible, then the small side streets, a small street that sells buttons, thousands, and labels, all these labels in cardboard to hang clothes on sale in stores, the labels in the garment sewing, just choose the brand that wants to give the dud, and voila, an Umbro or kappa or addidas to choose from!
And you can even change the size of vetememnt with a simple label, I who was trying as much misery in XL jackets while none had the same size ^ ^, or in another corner labels from the same size but different lengths when I try the jacket. Dining in the street, I found a corner full of people and lots of dishes, steak fries, frogs' legs, the pigeon fried fish or seafood, anything is possible on the cheap. Back before the internet or I finished the chapter on the rise northward from Nha Trang, Hoi An and Hue.
Monday, April 26, 2010, last stroll in town, then check out the hotel. The guy gives me a dollar exchange rate was 19,500 and falling as I grumble when he was posting a rate different to my arrival. I refuse to pay, and begins to annoy me, tired of having to reorder so often and avoid small scams! I got my nerves more, I never much Pissed off since the beginning of the trip ^ ^ and it solves the problem. It is not just for a few gold coins, Yesterday morning I had to negotiate for a cafe that was understood but the guy did not want to offer, and I must speak up, stand firm, if it is I who raque. This is the song that always keeps a little askew on all the little guys who scams constants increase slightly the price after trading or they refuse then resigns himself to not take the head with pro who always try small to draw any tickets to their advantage, which is also often ready to give, but not in any way, not a guy who is announcing a price starting with a breakfast that I must Then I really fight to get it. The Blue Star Hotel in Hanoi, therefore, to avoid! I took the road to the airport, a cafe, then a bus to the airport. 3 hours to wait until the registration and 2 more hours in the lobby, looking how to spend my half dollars Currency Exchange after having my Dong Dollars, candy mint, it will be the last purchase in Vietnam ^ ^
photos in Vietnam
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