We woke up in Hanoi and wandered down to the bus station to pick up a combo ticket to Cat Ba Island. It took a little while to find it and when we got there we found out the combo ticket left around 11am. It was not 8am. Too long to wait, so we grabbed a bus to Haiphong that was leaving then. We sat at the back and the ticket conductor came to us. Cannelle asked us which bus station we stopped in and it turned out that he didn't work there, but was a local businessman. He was heading to Haiphong for a conference. We had a long chat about football and Vietnam in general. He told me that they were paying professors of English between 5,000 and 7,000 dollars a month to teach in the Universities. Not bad. Maybe we could live here. He told us Vietnamese football was shit and that he had a good salary as an Engineer for a French company operating in Vietnam. He also said that most multinationals were choosing Vietnam for their headquarters in South East Asia. I am not really surprised. I think I would so far. We arrived in Haiphong and he got past the tuk tuk drivers to point us to the port. He offered us a free ride, but we declined and went for a KFC. The town is very untouristy and you are unlikely to be hassled outside the port and bus station. We walked round to the port and figured we would stay here for a night when we left the island. We got to the port at around 12.30pm and right in time for the boat to Cat Ba. There is one company that goes directly into Cat Ba Town by boat and another that takes a longer route by boat/bus combo. Opt for the former if you can and its run by Cat Ba Resort. We arrived on the island and walked up the hill to our hostel. Surprisingly much less touristy than we had feared. We decided to go and look for Fort Cannon. We walked round the hill and off down to a very pretty harbour town. We asked some Germans. They hadn't found it either, so after climbing some stairs, where a local guy was drying stuff (he even moved all of it so that we could walk up), we went back to our hostel and asked. They told us it was the big silver sign that no longer had anything written on it, because a storm had blown it away. Oh well. We had figured it might be there. So we headed up and paid the new entrance fee of 50,000. We weren't sure, but its definitely worth it. The road winds round the hill all the way up to some great views over the bay. By far the best views of Lan Ha Bay we had. Miles better than the views from the Halong Bay tour. There are beautiful views from all sides of the hill, both over the bay and down to the fishing village. There are some old cannons and tunnels from the time it was a French colonial town. its worth a good couple of hours of exploration and admiration. The cafe has great views, but it is very expensive for Vietnam. Suitably more excited for the tour the next day we went back down to book one. There were a lot of locals who clearly used the hill for jogging and their daily exercise regimes. We still had no news from Jessica. The last e-mail she had sent us was that she had met some doctor, who was like Tarzan, a little weird and they were off to wild camp in the jungle for three days. Slightly concerning, so no news was worrying. We booked a tour with the agency recommended in LP. It was more expensive at $33, but following our good experience for Fansipan, we figured the cost would be worth it again. New Orleans lost again and we were looking like toast at this point. We watched Green Hornet (bit shit) and As Good as it Gets (pretty good) and went and grabbed a kebab from the waterfront along with all the Russian tourists. Then we sat on the waterfront and got accosted by a drunk local who wanted to take us on a fishing trip. He was totally plastered and a little scary, but it turned out to be just fine. Maybe he was the guy who had taken the Canadians out for a 'local experience'.
In the morning we went down for our tour with the only other couple. They were from Germany and Bulgaria, named Ronny and Stanny and thank God they were really cool as you never know, when you end up on a tour, who you will spend time with. We took the boat through Lan Ha Bay, which was really pretty. I am not sure quite how it stacks up against a pure Halong Bay tour, but from what I can see the rocks are a little bigger in Lan Ha and the quantity of tourists is significantly less. We did head into Halong Bay at the mid point of our tour and the number of tour boats went from two to about twenty. I think the middle part is about the same, but the start and finish of each one must be 'same, same but different.' We had heard a lot of people bitch about the tours from Hanoi and I don't know why anyone would take a tour away from the source city in Vietnam as they are always shit. Even better just don't take a tour if you can. We passed through some fishing villages where you could see the floating houses, fish pools and netting. Quite nice. The boat was pitching around on the sea at one point and Cannelle was quite worried, but the guide reassured her that it was quite normal. We went past some coolly shaped rocks and to a cave, that was fun and a 'lookout' that was total shit after Fort Cannon. I think Fort Cannon is by far the best reason you have to go to Cat Ba Island unless someone can tell me of an equivalent at Halong City. We had a nicely cooked lunch. Most of the food we got in Vietnam was really high quality. Maybe this was where the extra money was going. We discussed a whole range of things from EU policy and future to jobs and also to property rentals. Proper couple's conversations. The property market in Germany is mental. It seems like everything is done to make it impossible for you to move apartments. You even have to buy the furniture in the flat when you move in or you can lose out on the flat. Makes France look sane. The more I travel, the more I realise that things are really easy and flexible in the UK. What I took as standard is actually something we should be proud of. After lunch we went sea kayaking. This was cool. To any long term readers of this blog, you will know that the last time I went kayaking, it consisted of me going round and round in circles in a kayak in Guatemala. I can report that this time met with greater success lol. We took a tandem kayak and kayaked through a bat cave and into some private lagoons. We saw a giant black squirrel and also a huge troupe of red arsed monkeys. It was really fun and good preparation for when we would need to take sea kayaks around the bays of Greenland. It was a shame that we didn't take the camera for this part. We spent the rest of the afternoon riding back and having a really nice time. Ronny told us that it was a tradition if you see someone three times in Germany that you buy them a drink or dinner. We grabbed dinner together, where the locals went and bought instant noodles. Stick to the kebab woman. Internet proved too expensive. 20,000 an hour is insane in Vietnam. We bumped into the couple again and they said next time someone would have to pay. It was again a really cool tour and we had a really good time. When we got back to our hotel we were invited to dinner by the hotel owner. He had just finished building a new house for him and his wife and it was tradition to treat all the builders to dinner. Cool country. They were all pretty drunk at this point and it was a shame we didn't join them. We were definitely finding the Vietnamese to be much nicer than we had been told. Jessica finally wrote and didn't seem to be dead, which was good. She was still with Zoltan (the doctor) and was off to Dong Hoi. Arsenal lost to Bradford City, which was amusing. We watched the Beach and Pirates of the Caribbean 3 (meh).
In the morning I wanted to go and see Cat Ba National Park and then stay in Haiphong. Cannelle wanted to go in the morning and get to Ninh Binh. She won, so we skipped the park (everyone has since told us that it is very nice. Shame). We went to the port to grab the 10am boat and booked the boat at the wrong counter. Damn it. Along with Ba Be Lake we were getting sloppy. Instead of a direct boat we had the stupid bus/boat combo. We were pissed off, but in the end it is not so bad, the boat trip is shorter if you are not a keen boat rider and we got to see a bit more of the island (albeit the ugly part). We arrived in Haiphong and went to see the cathedral and the opera house, which were both nice but not amazing. We went to both KFC and Lotteria. Terrible I know. There was a woman who offered to help us with directions and chatted with us for 5 minutes before finally trying to sell us a postcard. Impressive long sell. We went and got the local bus for around 60,000 to Ninh Binh. Much better than going via Hanoi. The bus had an accident on the way and was stuck with the police for around an hour just outside of Ninh Binh, We didn't realise quite how close we were to the city though. Eventually they drove in and tried to drop us off in the middle of nowhere but we persuaded them to take us near the bus station. We were met by a guy on a motorbike, who had a cheap hotel. Its a cool place that has everything you could need. Queen something two guesthouse. They had a cheap room and motorbike rental. They also had a good restaurant. They offered very expensive bus tickets to Dong Hoi so we declined that. We told him we needed the motorbike for 6am the next day as we were going to do everything around Ninh Binh in a day. Ambitious but possible.
We got up and eventually got the bike at 6.40am which was annoying as time would be tight. We went first to Phat Diem to see the cathedral as it was in the opposite direction by 27km. The road is quite good, but full of traffic at this time. We got there in an hour and a half, stopping at a few cool places along the way. At the cathedral they wanted us to pay for parking, but we elected to park round the corner for free. The cathedral is super cool. It is well worth the trip. So different. It looks like a typical European cathedral cross bred with a Chinese temple. Lest just say you won't have seen anything quite like it. I am sure its unique. It started to rain a lot though. It often seems to here. We got battered on the way back and I was sitting in a puddle of water on the bike and I felt like I had wet myself. This was not going to be fun. I was thinking that we were not going to get to Cuc Phuong National Park. We went back to the hostel to change clothes and google image the park. We decided not to go, as we would see monkeys in other places in Vietnam (or so we thought) and the park looked average (which we were told it is). We set off next for Tam Coc. Halong Bay on land or so they say. Its only 9km away and they wanted to charge for parking again. Fuck them. We parked it right in front of the boat desk and paid nothing. Then we got our row boat. They had wanted $1 and I was stressing a bit on the boat trip that they might fuck up the bike or do something to it. It was a big risk for $1. The locals row you with their legs (which is super impressive and our rower was around 55 years old). You go along the river, past yet more limestone and through three caves. We were looking for the part that you can see in the photos and then it dawned on me. The river seemed much wider than the pictures. It was flooded. They were rice fields in the pictures and those pictures were from the summer. The weather is pretty miserable in the North in the winter. Still it would be good to see it with the contrast. The ride was really cool. It was only ruined at the end, when the rower asked us for a tip and then kept asking. We had had little hassle on the river itself due to the shit weather. We gave her $1 and her friend asked for double. Fuck off. Cannelle was annoyed that they had asked for a tip and it was a little annoying as we had decided to tip her before she spoke. Cannelle hadn't wanted to give her anything in the end. We then headed for Hoa Lu to do something in the afternoon and got lost a lot. It was also my first experience of riding a bike on highway one and it was quite scary with the trucks and all the traffic. When we eventually got to Hoa Lu, we realised they were pretty cool old temples. It was worth the trip. If you get going at 6am and have the right weather, you could do all three places and the national park as long as you just want to see the old tree and the monkey centre. It would be a long day though. We came back from a good trip. The riding around the limestone scenery is really beautiful as well, especially if you haven't already been to Laos. We got ourselves soft seating on the night train to Dong Hoi as it was cheaper than the bus. There was a weird Canadian at the station (always weird, huh), but we were spared her boring bullshit, because all the foreigners were in the sleeper cars. So it was just us in the seating section. Ninh Binh itself is a bit of a shit city, but the stuff around is definitely worth a day, but try to pack it all in as none of the things are worth a day on their own. Onwards to Dong Hoi, now that I had finally persuaded Cannelle to visit it.
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