26.Aug.08
Had a nice sleep on the train and arrived in Lao Cai very early, then took an hour bus to Sapa. It really pays sometimes to book ahead on the phone because the hour ride up to Sapa was free through our hotel and took us right to the front doors. In some cases a little planning does go a long way. Right away we noticed the masses of women on the streets all clad in beautiful blue outfits with colorful, intricate embroidery, and all with different style hats. They patiently awaited us as we got off the bus to make quick conversation so we’d remember them later and buy their handicrafts. We’ve gotten too good at this by now. They are smart at least and don’t bug you about buying right off the bus, they wait instead until you come out of he hotel again later.
There were cheaper places to stay in Sapa, but our book said that Mountain View was just that, a great mountain view. We hoped our room was going to be worth the extra cash, and one look at the big clean, comfortable looking room followed by a look right out the window…I’ll let you decide if this room was worth ten bucks a night.
We had a soup breakfast and inquired about taking a three day hiking trip through the mountains. We got all the info from our hotel and decided to wander the city to check other booking agencies prices. Right out the door we got hit by a barrage of “you buy from me?” from the beautifully clad H’Mong women outside. The H’Mong are the local ethnic minority of Sapa and surrounding villages. Their outfits are exquisite and all wear unique hats to differentiate tribes. It is difficult saying no to buying their handicrafts because it is all so beautiful and they are very nice. Then again, we are terrific at saying no to anyone by now. We wandered a bit, checked prices with other places, but found our hotel had the best deal of $55 per person for a three day all inclusive guided trek down the valley, we went back and booked it starting tomorrow. We spent the rest of the day exploring the cities nooks and crannies which there are plenty of. We wandered the markets and were awestruck by all the stunning handicrafts one can find, but we determined to wait until return to buy. Ate some pizza with the delicious local wine for dinner and headed home for some shut eye.
27.Aug.08
Early we began our muddy, wet trek led by our Black H’mong guide Cho. There are three groups of H’mong, Red, Black, and Flower, they are just differences in how they dress and sometimes their different religions, which an unfortunate many have been converted to western religions because with no education they tend to believe anything westerners tell them, then again Buddhist, Christian, Animist; it’s all pretty much the same shit anyway. Our guide is very competent, speaks perfect english, and comes from a buddhist village nearby. Unfortunatly it is raining today, not so hard that we get too wet under our ponchos, but hard enough that the mud becomes very slippery and once or twice found our asses quite muddy. We are followed by two older women, also Black H’mong, trekking with us back to their villages from Sapa. They are both very helpful at helping us not to slip as they are as skilled as goats when they walk the steep rocks and mud. The entire time they are with us they keep picking different grasses, stalks, and reeds and make little souvenirs out of them for us; vey sweet.
Again, it is pointless describing the extraordinary scenery as pictures will do much better, but in brief; little villages dot the rolling green hills covered in rice fields. The fields stack on top of one another cascading down the mountains; as water flows through the rice fields it makes hundreds of little waterfalls from field to field. Absolutely stunning butterflies are constantly spotted the whole trip, our favorites being black with bright shining blue spots. The first part of the day Jess and I are the only tourists on the whole track, and it is all the more beautiful greeting locals draped in their awesome traditional clothing.
We stop for fresh sandwiches for lunch at a shack filled with locals eating, drinking, and later smoking tobacco out of a massive bamboo bong with a can on the end as the holder. At least we think and are told it is tobacco, but growing quite commonly here are marijuana plants. You can smell them a good deal away; that fresh skunky/earthy smell. We didn’t smoke any, but if it’s anything like avocados and strawberries, it is much better in California!
After more and more beautiful scenery we reached a very large village where our two followers departed to go their own way, but not before asking if we would buy some of their handicrafts. They were gorgeous hand-made wares and we bought some beautiful pillow covers from them and said goodbye after tying some pretty bracelets on our wrists as a gift. Our purchase attracted a bunch of little girls attention and they ran up to us trying to sell more little bracelets and other trinkets. Again, you have to get good at saying no even to little kids if you travel in Asia, but even then they followed us the rest of the way and practiced their already terrific English with us. We walked and walked more through the rice fields and between the mountains and we finally reached our destination. We stayed the night at a homestay which is basically a families house with a bunch of mattresses up in the attic. It may sound dingy, but it was very clean and nice and the food was good. A french couple were staying the night as well and we all chatted and went to bed exhausted.
28.Aug.08
Our second day of trekking was similar to the first. Similar landscape, more little villages, although some sun peaked out, no rain, and it started getting a bit warmer. As always I fell in love with all the littel creatures of the villages. I chased the piglets around, barked at dogs, and picked up a little peep duckling for Jessica.
It was another wonderful day of trekking, and much easier without all the mud. We went through a bamboo forest, more pot plants, butterflies and rice fields, chatted with our guide Cho and the french couple who were with us most of the way. We stopped at a big waterfall, crossed rivers, and simply took in all the beauty the earth has to offer.
The last hour of the trek down to our homestay was pretty grueling. The heat picked up since we’ve come a lot lower and the last couple kilometers were very steep downhill. We all made it down sweaty and muddy to relax in the deck chairs of a new home where we were served another scrumptious dinner. Each night they have served us some awesome garlic fries; really garlicky! We always have rice and different stir fry greens, a dish of meat, lots of mushrooms, and the usual Vietnamese spices, peppers, mint leaves, basil leaves, limes, cilantro, etc. Lunches have been typical Vietnamese soups and sandwiches, and breakfast always banana pancakes, done very well compared to the usual super greasy overcooked pancakes in Asia.
After dinner we spent the rest of the night drinking local rice wine and playing cards.
29.Aug.08
Started off the day with banana pancakes! We did a short hike in the horrible heat to a dumping waterfall into a nice cool river. We spent some time swimming in the river cooling off from the heat and started our trek back up a bit. The hike was one of the worst, most grueling hikes we have ever done! The heat was unbearable and there was very little shade. We went steep uphill in mud the whole way and since it was the same trail as yesterday there was nothing new to see making it even worse.
Finally we made it to the main road and hopped into our waiting car to ride back up to Sapa. We just hung out the rest of the day and repacked our bags. Washed our clothes and shoes of mud and topped the day off with a great beef hot pot dinner with some excellent Sapa apple wine.
30.Aug.08
Today was almost wholly uneventful. We did a bit of shopping in the market, had some decent meals, used internet a bunch, walked around, chatted with some locals and other tourists. Nothing special to report, we just killed time until our bus in the evening taking us to Lao Cai to board our train to Hanoi. At the train station we had some trouble because we had booked tickets, but only recieved a reciept to get tickets at the station. The woman who booked our tickets in Hanoi however had written the date as the 28th instead of the 30th like we said. It seemed a bit of a sketchy system as we then had to buy new tickets to Hanoi form a guy standing outside the station. They assured us we could get a refund in Hanoi, and we had the earlier reciept proving our 30th request, so we paid for a new ticket and boarded the night train back.
thanks for sharing!