Howdy from Vietnam! (well sort of, we have got a teeny bit behind with our blogging so just catching up! we are in Bali now, but thats a whole different 4 blogs later....) right! well, Vietnam really was something else.
.ExternalClass EC_ExternalClass .EC_EC_hmmessage P {padding:0px;}We arrived at Hanoi airport and got whisked away in a mini van to our supposed guest house quicker than we could shout SCAM! There was a Vietnamese teenage boy in the seat in front of us playing Celine Dion on loudspeaker and singing along to it with pure emotion. This made our apprehensive journey quite hilarious! Oh, and guess what...? Low and behold, we arrive at a completely different place than expected. That's weird and really makes a change?!?!? We were greeted by a sneaky little s***e of a man who looked like a Vietnamese version of Billy Mitchell from Eastenders suggesting our presumed guest house was "full but no worry, you can stay at my moms house!".
Before we could question and politely refuse the kind offer, the mini van was on its way to Billy's mum's house. This 'family home' turned out to be a lot better than expected, it was in fact GOLDEN SUN GUESTHOUSE!! So after a negotiated price on a double room and the prediction that we were going to try and get sold a whole bunch of tours in the morning at non-discount prices we hit the hay with mixed feelings. This was not his Mum's place. It was his and he IS going to try and scam us! But, the place was lovely and had a tv and free puff pastry breakfast so now was not a time for complaining.
The next morning we enjoyed the luxury of watching Animal Planet (a monkey special, featuring David Perrins) and the anticipated puffy breakkie! And, yes, we were tried on by the mistress of the house, Honey "Don't Trust Me Because I Know Too Much And Am Acting Too Nice" Mitchell.
We ventured out to explore the nuts capital that is Hanoi. We couldn't get over the excessive usage of cars and bikes that all beep their bloody horns until the sun goes down! They seem only satisfied when they have successfully woken up every person attempting to kip in the whole of vietnam. We soon realised this was the norm and it was infact just a signal to tell the person in front that they're about to overtake... I mean, what the Hell are wing mirrors for?? Car mirrors would be a pointless invention if Hanoi was the rest of the world! One example of some psychopathic driving was when we foolishly decided to get into a Pedal Pusher with Jack "Here's Johnny" Nicholson! We agreed 50,000 Dong to the Literature Art Museum and we jumped on. We sat on the front and the driver was at the back up high looking down us. It started quite smoothly but as time progressed the guy was getting weirder and weirder, he kept singing in his own language but he sounded like he was an Exorcist or something.. Then we took a left down a 'no left turn' one way street but worst of all we took this right down another No Entry... Now this was truly mental... It was a four lane main road dual carriage way and he was pedaling in the wrong direction!! We were heading towards and through hoards of oncoming motorbikes and cars that were having to swerve and dodge to avoid us... but the driver was cackling to himself! Actually CACKLING!! And then he would start singing and humming again! With relief we finally pulled up outside the museum. But, because the Vietnamese also use U.S Dollars (the agreed 50,000 Vietnamese Dong would be worth about one dollar) the cheeky git asks us for "Fifty", we say yeah, "Fifty Thousand", he says "Er, no Fifty dollars". We tell him to "Sod Off" and he accepts his money with a cheeky but quite scary grin...
After a sophisticated and highly educational trip to the national war museum, we then watched a few old people dancing in the park, literally! They were all doing stretches, well, if you can call them stretches. It wasn't like it was a class either, they had all chosen to go to this park individually and have a mini workout in full view of anyone and everyone! But, they really didn't care and I must admit as much as they looked stoopid I respect them for getting off their old butts and trying to make the most of the short time they have left!! Hehe! Even I got involved and started doing some exercises with one or two of the eager oldies. (Not sure why Dave was so reluctant, as i really thought it would be his thing...) Reading this isnt doing the park craziness justice at all, you must check out the pics and see them go for it! Also not forgetting to mention the groups of teenagers seeing how long they could kick and keep what looked like an illuminious piece of fluff in the air! great stuff! We learnt badminton must be the favourite over there as on pretty much every street there are people randomly playing a game or two on the pavement blocking every pedestrian. Why not!
Then, one of Dave's worst nightmares!!! He lost his video camera! We had a meal in an italian restaurant, then a pee on our way out and as he washed his hands he failed to pick up the vidcam! So much amazing footage on the tape too. So, we went back to the restaurant to see if anybody had it... they didn't! We were absolutely gutted! One fella even said that we'd taken it with us so we assumed we'd left it in the travel agents that we'd visited after our food. But by this time the T.A had closed so we were b*****ed. Dave stopped off for another wee at one more place on our walk down the street so we went back to see if it was there but no. So i was sure it would be at the Travel Agents so the next day we went back there... nowhere to be seen! Now tears were about to flow. We were so disappointed, not just because of the camera itself but the tape was priceless and the fact that we couldn't film what we had in store for us over the next few days only hurt us even more...
So, videocameraless we were off to Ha Long Bay for three days. The first night is spent on a boat and the second in a 4* hotel on Catba Island. Ha Long Bay is a huge a salt lake river with huge rock forms scattered everywhere! Legend has it that a dragon descended on the area and brushed it's little tail against the headland in rage and that's why the rocks are scattered everywhere in such a random form... It's nothing to do with weathering and erosion... Its the dragon... The dragon... He even managed to make some huge caves with that tail of his. Very clever, but very angry. These caves were amazing though! Founded by the French, mind you, back in 1902. One cave led to another and another and before you knew it you were deep under sea level and inside a really magnificent natural structure (oh, no sorry, not natural, the dragon did it!). Murky lights have been added to give them an eerie effect and they really are spectacular.
So to the boat for a spot of lunch. We'd paid for the deluxe trip so were eating delicious seafood and drinking wine on the boat. Was still pretty cheap though! There were another dozen or so people on our trip too so we made friends with them all, especially an old french couple who blatently didnt undestand the brummie twang in daves accent and the speed he was chatting at! At some points they just stared dumbfoundably at him, and when he had finished they responded with a completely different subject altogether! Very sweet couple though, possible future south of france holidays for us maybe?? The boat was bliss, but the scenes were breath taking. We kayaked, swam in the lake and relaxed on the deck of the boat whilst looking out to what was nothing short of incredible!! There were hundreds of huge rocks and stacks everywhere in this enormous lake and you could see miles and miles into the distance-with it being such clear weather, too, we really got the best out of it. It's hard to describe! We wish we could look at the video footage but there is none as our Vidcam was nowhere to be seen! :( !
That night after a few midnight dives into the water, we all cosied up and watched a film (the reader -quite saucy!!) but... in typical rodent fashion, just as we were trying to get to sleep there was a rat scratching around just above our room. That brought us down to earth for sure!
The following day was spent cycling through to a local Vietnamese village and trekking through some jungle to another cave where, this time, soldiers had hidden out from the Americans and planned some assaults on them so that opened our eyes. We tried to get scammed cycling back to the boat by some sod on a moped who sent us the wrong direction so that I would find it too hard to cycle up the incline and that we would have to rent his moped off him!! He'd been after us from the moment we'd left on our bikes! Dave was a bit more switched on this time than I was and knew what he'd done the moment he told us to go the way he did, but another couple were with us and they were intent on going that way but Dave was even more intent on making me graft my socks off instead of letting that conniving little git get any money out of us. He would've dragged me up that hill if he had to. But i cycled my white legs off and made it to the summit!! Then it was a doddle from there on in! Down hill slope paradise!
We sailed to Catba Island and enjoyed a night out with a couple we'd met on the boat who were staying in the same hotel as us, good cocktails and good music and we even managed to get up the next morning for some more boat tripping!
We sailed down the lake and saw some more great sites. Dave even took it upon himself to get behind the wheel of the boat (is it called the wheel?)! The crew literally left him to it and he banged up the pace a little too much at one point. No harm done though, just a b******ing from the captain and a sacking from the steering! Nevertheless, he knew all those weeks as a sea scout would come in handy!
And that was it. Our three days was over before it had begun! It was a great experience and the food was out of the top drawer. We never did get to see the dragon though.

Back to Hanoi and the task of finding the video camera!? By the time we were in Hanoi again we really thought that someone would have been kind enough to hand it in somewhere. So we went to shops near by where Dave stopped off for a wee but no one had handed it in. We checked the Travel Agents once more but by this time they were getting agitated that we were almost implying that they'd robbed it (which had crossed our minds once or twice). One more stop and if it wasn't there then that would be it.. We'd have to scour vietnam ebay to see if it was on there. We went back to the restaurant that we'd had a meal in on our last night in Hanoi and asked the staff if they'd seen a video camera... two of them had a little word with one another and one stood up. We didn't get our hopes up as, in all honesty, I really didn't think they'd understood what we had been trying to say. He walked to a cabinet under the stairs. By this time we were getting anxious and sweaty. He was ruffling around and we didn't really want him to pull anything out of the cabinet because our hopes were now so high that they were bound to be pulled back down as soon as he pulled out a photo album or a disposable camera... We stood back and watched as he continued to rummage... low and behold, there it was!!! The VIDCAM!!!! It was such a great moment -Dave jumped on about 6 people in the restaurant!!!! WAHOO!!!! We've since lost it again.... not really! Ha!
We were well and truly gutted to leave Vietnam as we would have loved to see the southern part but had to decide between that or Laos as time really wasnt on our side!! (surprise surprise, its us) We had no regrets though, seeing the capital and exploring Ha Long Bay was worth every minute. So we stuck to our plan and booked our trip to Laos and looked forward to our 22 hour journey that awaited us....