Date: 1st July 2011

Place: Sapa

Weather: Slightly cloudy

Arrived at 5am and were picked up from the train station with a sign saying Camel Evans instead of Carmen. We then had a wait in the carpark for another train to come in so we had a mess around with people trying to sell us bread by offering them 1000dong for ages and they just kept trying to sell it to us (they wanted 10,000dong).

When we set off and were going up the hills it was stunning. All the rice fields were perfectly tiered up the hills and they were everywhere. There were little villages everywhere and loads of women walking around in colourful tribal outfits.

We arrived at our hotel and had our breakfast and then had to get ready to go on our first trek. There was a group of 7 of us altogether and as soon as we head out of the door a load of tribal women joined us. For the rest of the journey they would ask us about ourselves and then give us help when we needed it. I thought they were just part of the tour at first and there to guide us.

The walk was really nice. We went down the rice paddies and stopped at the guides mother's house which was so tiny. It was a shack with one bedroom in it, a living room and a kitchen which was basically a stove on the floor. They had pigs outside though which I guessed would be dinner in a few days.

A lot of our walk was really muddy and I needed a lot of help from the tribal women to keep me up. When we got to lunch though I found out why they had offered me a lot of help. They wanted us to buy things from them. I did want a little bag and a bracelet but they wanted way too much for them. Two Irish girls who had just started travelling actually bought a bag from them for 200,000dong when we had bartered them down to 30,000 for the same bag! I bought a bracelet from one of them 5000 dong since she had helped me a lot.

The homestay we were stopping at for the nigh turned out to be really nice. Some other women tried to sell us stuff whilst we were there as well but as soon as they approached me I just said no thanks and turned away. It seemed to work well J. We had a feast for dinner and then Zi bought us out some rice wine. We played a couple of games and learnt a bit about their culture.

It turned out they were mostly catholic which I was shocked about. The age they mostly got married at was 16 but Zi was 19 and not married and this was seen as old. When a man wanted to marry a woman they would be 'kidnapped' by the man and taken to their home for three days where the woman would speak to his mother and sister and at the end of the three days she would decide if she wanted to marry him or not. They also never kiss, even after they are married even though they have sex.