The taxi took us to the bus station, and the driver kindly walked us round to where you can buy you ticket for Ninh Binh. The woman on the ticket stand showed no interest in us. A few men caught on to where we were going and tried to get us to go with them, but i was sceptical. But then the ticket woman pointed for us to go with the men, so we did. Outside with the buses, loads of men came rushing at us, actually pulling and grabbing us to try to get us to get on their bus to ninh, binh, but we stayed with the first guy we talked to, very crazy. Got on the bus, which was actually A/C, surprisingly. It was very strange, men got on and off, we moved very little around the station, then about 10 tubs were loaded into the aisle of the minibus. Finally we set off, stopping when the driver saw somene to try and get them to come on his bus. One stop and a man got on with a ig cardboard box, then got off.

We were dropped off in less time than we thought, and at a very random location. With no map or bearings, we went to a big official looking building, which turned out to be a post office. She rang a hotel, and a man on a scooter came for us. He had a card to a hotel we had heard of so we followed him.

Checked into our hotel - with satellite tv, apprantly something all hotels must have. We checked out the small town. We seemed a novelty here with children al saying hello and waving. Finding a resturant prved inpossoble and we ate at a local rooom sellng food.

The next day we got a motorbike, not one with gears, but an automatic. got a bit scared and eventually i setteled with james driving. We drove to Tam Coc, basically an inland Halong bay. We had our own little boat with a rower who took us around the mini river through the big limestone mountains. There was almost no one else around and it was so beautiful, lovely and quiet after hectic Hanoi. The trip took about 1hr and a half, and even though we finished it at 1130 the sun was BOILING, we had an umbrella but still we managed to burn, in random places. The top front of my thight, my shoulders, andmy left arm, great. We drove the bike around, but decided against walking up this mountain as we were way to hot.

Adrive back and another walk around the town. We were asked to sit and drink outside with the locals drinking beer, but we had no idea how we would talk so decided not.

We had to hang around the hotel resturant as the sleeper bus didnt come till around 9, which was annoying.But we got chatting to a couple who gave us some good reccomendations.

Our bus came early and we boarded. We thought it would be full of westerned, but no full of locals. You actually have a bed where you can lie down, and i managed to sleep for most of the 11ish hour journey.

Next stop Hue.