1st
Today is a travel day. The bus from Cat Ba is about 5 hours. Its Bus, ferry, bus, bus. I dont really like travel days in Vietnam. They take twice as long as you are told, and the buses are old and noisy. So the first bus ride to the ferry is ok. The ferry ride is ok in a old noisy boat that should be scrapped. The bus from the ferry terminal to the bus terminal is ok, just. But the last bus ride is a horror. We think we were put on a local bus rather than a non stop bus, so the trip which is meant to take 2 hours takes 4 hours. We are continually stopping on the side of the road to take on new passengers and let off passengers. The bus is a 28 seater and at times there are up to 40 plus people crammed in the bus like sardines.

Plus the bus is a piece of ****, and the seats are like wood. So by the time we arrive in Ninh Binh we are pretty sore and annoyed. We walk to the hotel, which has forgotten about our booking so the room is not ready. We have a discussion with the owner who is happy to take us to another place to stay. It is a Homestay about 5 ks out of the city. Really nice room, nice host and the smell from his vegetable garden is amazing. It is a real little farm in a little village, and very quiet compared with the city. Well yes there are lots of animals making various noises, but its better than cars and scooters honking there horns 24/7.

But one thing has worked against us, the weather. It is raining when we arrive in Ninh Binh. we hope the weather is ok for tomorrow.

2rd
Not sure if we are cut out to sleep in a village full of animals. The roosters decided they wanted to start making noise around 5am. Managed to get back to sleep till 7am.
Still raining very lightly, so our plans have changed. We were going to stay 2 nights in the homestay, but after seeing the weather we are going to leave shortly and take the train to Hanoi. Hopefully the train will be better than the bus. Its only 100ks to Hanoi, but will still take 2 hours without any stops.Our host at the homestay was really helpful and welcoming, would have liked to stayed longer but we are surrounded by dirt, no muddy roads, so even if we walked anywhere we would get rather dirty.

So after a pancake for breakfast we hang around the home stay till midday when we take a taxi to the train station. Now we are told that there are no seats on the train. After a few minutes the girl manages to tell me that there are some sleeper beds available, so we book 2 of them. Still pretty cheap, about $7 each. The train arrives and we board. Its liking taking a big step back in time. The train must be from the 1970's. Its old and dirty, but our bunk beds are ok. After 2.5 hours we arrive in Hanoi, and then have to fight our way out of the station where it is packed with taxi drivers hassling everyone for a taxi.
The train is so much better than the bus.

We walk about 1.5k to our hotel, where we arrive to a little piece of paradise. The Artisan hotel is ever so nice,we even get a balcony. After unpacking we make good use of the balcony where we sit and enjoy a drink and the quiet street, as this street the hotel is one has very little traffic. So i expect to sleep well.