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2 August: SaPa

Our luck was in, the sun was shining again! We got up and headed to a breakfast of Pho Bo at the market. Afterwards it was time for some physical exercise, we walked down the valley to Cat Cat Village. The walk took about 30 minutes down hill, before we came to the entrance gate and paid the fees. The village was very touristy, mostly Vietnamese tourists. All along the streets of the village were houses which had been converted to shops, displaying their crafts outside. Some had paintings, woodcraft and painted cloth, we walked past to the stairs leading down to the waterfalls below. Along the way we passed one of the rice pulping mechanisms powered by water from the river. With all the rain of the past few days the river was flowing very strongly and the waterfall was quite impressive.

From there we followed a small winding road leading above the river to what they called "fairy stream". The road there was beautiful with the trees alongside the road and ferns near the river. The heat had really been turned on down in the valley and soon we were feeling like we were in the tropics once more. We reached the end of the road with some Vietnamese tourists picnicking there and decided to turn back, although there was another road, we weren't sure where it led.

Walking back all the way up the steps and it was steep! We stopped half way for a rest before continuing further up. We found a small shop about halfway to our accommodation and stopped for an ice cream, unfortunately it wasn't the best. At least the shop had amazing views over the valley! Walking back we were a little paranoid that it would start raining with our clothes and shoes still hung out to dry, luckily it didn't.

Back home we freshened up and enjoyed another cup of coffee on our balcony overlooking the valley below where we had just returned from. Strange to think that the temperature can differ so much with only a 30 minute hike apart. The rest of the time Leanne read through the blog adding what I had missed, while I caught up with some mails from friends.

We left for lunch after which we walked through the souvenir market on top of the food market, I bought a good morning Vietnam shirt, and we added Tiger balm to our already extensive medical kit. The rest of the afternoon we spent lazying in the sun on the balcony even playing a few hand of cards.

It was dinner again, starting to feel like we're just going through the motions here in SaPa, can't wait for China, still a little scared of what we'll find. Dinner was fresh springrolls and a noodle and vegetables dish. Afterwards we went to the amphitheater to watch the sunset and enjoy another ice cream for old time sake. The sunset was beautiful with its pink and red strokes crisscrossing the sky. We were almost sad having to leave Vietnam in the morning, we had been here almost two months. The evening we packed and updated the blog for the last time, music from the laptop as background. Hope we get the minibus to Lao Cai on time tomorrow.