We were set! The best seats on the sleeper bus, well fed, snacks in reserve, fully charged iPad, sleep aids ready to roll...life was looking good.

And life was good...at first. We played cards and hung out as the first few hours of the journey whizzed by the window. G and I tucked into a repeat viewing of "Money Ball" on the iPad and became so engrossed in the movie that when we made the first pitstop of the trip I found myself afflicted with maybe the strongest case of culture shock I've yet experienced.

The place we stopped was pretty f-ing bizarre, I must say. There were several buses stopped there so it was sort of a rest stop. There were dozens of people squated around tiny tables eating strange looking things so it was sort of a restaurant, but on the side of the room there was a bed with a family sleeping in it so it was sort of someone's house. As we moved through the commotion we saw a filthy bathtub with about 2 inches of water, but containing probably 2 dozen wierd looking but alive fish, slowly twitching in the cold night air, so... it was sort of a fish store, too. (?!?)

But, the weirdest thing was in the bathroom area where everyone was lined up to use the few toilets. All of the sudden kids began peeing right there 3 feet from us. Then one kid started vomiting all over the middle of the floor and they were all being encouraged to do so by their parents. Meanwhile a guy relieved himself in the corner of the room. Mind you, this was in the waiting area, not in the bathroom. It was a free for all. Having been so blissfully ensconced in the world of "Money Ball", the Oakland Coliseum and the memories of the 2002 season on the iPad just moments earlier and then suddenly being thrust into this surreal scene was too much; I retreated swiftly, found a spot on the side of the building where the rest of the men were going to the bathroom, and then quickly made my way back onto the bus and immediately returned to "Money Ball" hoping a little more Oakland A's love could erase those terrible memories.

Things took an even more awful turn for the worse not long after that as we made it further into the countryside where the quality of the roads deteriorated significantly. I quickly realized the flaw in our choice of the furthest back seats. The road was pot holed and uneven and of course the driver sped along like a maniac...every bump was magnified in the back row and all the sudden we were being bounced and violently jarred about, at times quite literally getting airborne above our trusty sleeper beds.

By this time G's sleep aid was kicking in and she somehow had managed to fade into a restless sleep...I on the other hand started to get progressively more uncomfortable and nauseous until eventually I had to wake G up (she was not happy) and beg to switch seats as her's had one of the only 2 functioning windows on the whole bus.

And it's a good thing for that too, because not 10 minutes later I had my head out that window and was violently depositing my dinner onto the side of the Vietnamese highway as we sped and bounced along. It wasn't my finest hour. Even my best efforts at tidiness during this affair were thwarted by the bumpiness of the ride and the sheer speed of the vehicle; and I'm admitting, here and now, that I ended up with more than a little residual vomit on my face.

The whole sherade repeated itself a few sleepless hours later. This time there was a dude on a motorbike tailgating and I had to draw out the awful final moments before the main event until he'd dropped back far enough that he wouldn't be plastered with whatever remained in my stomach that wanted out so bad.

After round two, I felt a little better and I think I slept a few minutes before a particularly hard bump in the road bounced me into the air and slammed me down again. No future attempts were made at sleep and I watched in bitter misery as day broke and we finally began to approach the city.

Needless to say we were in rough shape apon arrival; Me from virtually zero sleep and G from very little and a nice collection of bruises on her legs from the incessant bouncing and banging of the journey. We got off the bus and of course we were immediately swarmed by shady types all jockeying to be the ones to take us into town.

We wern't in the mood to mess around, but of course dude was gonna try to milk us. At first he offered a fixed price off 100,000 Dong, but when we asked for him to use the meter he smiled and said OK. We know this game...now he gets to drive around and around pretending to be lost while the meter climbs and climbs. As I said, we weren't in the mood to mess around and as it became apparent he was playing the run-up-the-meter game and it approached 90,000 I told him sternly that he wasn't getting a Dong more then the initial 100,000 he had quoted. Quickly he found his way to the hotel and he was none-to-happy as the meter was closer to 120,000 by this point. We were feeling rotten and I was unsympathetic to his plight, numb to his clear anger and deaf to his Vietnamese curses...I was just happy to be there.

Mercifully, the hotel had our room ready and we collapsed onto the bed and into a blissful sleep. I slept for most of the day as everytime I woke up my stomach felt worse, but G ventured out for a workout and to scope the town. Finally she came back and dragged me out of bed; as she'd secured tickets to the Water Puppets show...actually quite a hot commodity as it is THE thing to do in Hanoi.

So we went. It was interesting and I'm glad we did it, but I'll just say that I don't need to go again anytime soon.

After, we headed out for some dinner; awesome Indian food at Tandoor. I could only stomach a few small bites, so had to sit and watch as G had what looked to be a fantastic meal. That was when Gina finally started to believe me that I was sick and not just being a wuss...she knows I'd really have to be feeling rotten to sit and watch a delicious Indian feed get taken down and not participate.

In the morning I was finally feeling OK again and so we headed out for a nice jog: 3 laps around the lake in the Old Quarter and then ate breakfast and headed out to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum to see the embalmed body of "Uncle Ho" as the Vietnamese call their much revered former leader. We missed him as it closes at 11am, so instead we wandered out to another lake to check out a sweet Temple and then back into town. That evening we visited the travel agency and booked ourselves in for the next few days: a day trip tomorrow and then a 3 day/2 night excursion out to Halong Bay. For dinner we went to a kind of shi-shi vegetarian place recommended by L.P. and Trip Advisor; I had the eggplant hot pot and G the veggie Phò. It was decent; but as tends to happen when eating at those restaurants geared at tourists and westerners you leave a little unsatisfied and slightly irritated.

In the morning we were up bright and early to eat before being picked up for our day trip to Hua Lu and Tam Coc. We really had no idea what to expect as we picked the trip pretty much at random and only because we had decided that trying to squeeze in a trip up to Sapa was a bit much considering our timeline (plus it involved 2 more nights of sleeping either on a bus or train, a prospect neither of us were too keen on). In short; we had a day to kill.

Even with no expectations the day tour managed to fall short. It really wasn't a tour, but rather transportation and a little organization. We stopped to look at some temples; the walk through was rushed with hardly any explanation of what we were looking at. They herded us back onto the bus and we drove further where we were rushed in to eat a pretty bad lunch. Next they rushed us out and onto our little paddle boat.

Now, I have to admit the boat ride was very pretty: it went down a river and through rice paddies and under a few rock tunnels, past some beautiful and huge limestone cliffs. Another cool thing was that the guy driving our boat paddled the boat using his feet on the oars instead of his hands. Mad skills.

After the boat we had to sit around until it was time to go on the bike riding portion; the thing is that what happens is you wait and wait inexplicably, but then when it's time to do the activity everything is rushed. Our bike ride out into the rice paddies was totally gorgeous and probably the best thing about the trip, but it lasted a whole 15 minutes before we were rushed back and hurried onto the bus for the 3 hour ride home. So really the trip came down to this: 12 hours total; 6-7 hours in transit; 1 hour on a boat; 15 minutes on a bike; 45 minutes "touring" temples; 30 minutes eating lunch and the rest of the time sitting around or driving from place to place.

We got back into town, glad just to be back, and decided to do our best to forget about what a crappy tour we'd just been on by having a few beers and some dinner. We went back to the Indian spot and I made amends for not being able to eat the first time.

As we finished up our meal G looked at me and said; "I hope that today's tour isn't a bad sign for the Halong Bay tour."

If only we knew then how right she was...