travel

We took a train up the coast from Danang to Hanoi yesterday, it was a pretty long train ride, over 12 hours, but very pretty. The tracks edge right along the coast so the view was pretty spectacular. We booked a soft sleeper compartment which had only 4 bunks, and about half an hour into the journey Miles looked under his bottom bunk and found 2 boxes of live pigeons! We thought maybe someone had forgotten them on a previous trip so we told one of the porters and a guy came and took the boxes away. Very strange!

After we go into Hanoi we checked into a really crappy hotel and took some quick (and cold) showers then headed out to see if we could book a 2 day tour to Halong Bay. We were able to find what looks to be a pretty fun tour aboard a “luxury junk” through a reputable tour company recommended by Lonely Planet (Sinh Cafe).

Then we ate some breakfast and checked into a better hotel. It’s kind of amazing how much of a difference 5-10 dollars can make in the quality of a hotel room.

After that we took a taxi out to the Temple of Literature, which was a scholarly institution built in 1070 as a center of learning and knowledge founded by Confucian scholars. The buildings are all in Chinese style architecture and the grounds were really well kept and relaxing.

There was a huge school group of 12-13 year old girls and they thought I was the most fascinating thing at the Temple. After I said hello to them they actually surrounded me to ask me more questions and giggle every time I answered that my name is Caitlin and I’m from California.

It was on to the Museum of Ethnography after the Literature Temple, and the museum was full of neat displays about the traditional cultures of many of Vietnam’s ethnic groups. Unfortunately, the museum was not air conditioned and was super stuffy (and about 100 degrees inside) so I didn’t spend a ton of time examining all of the displays. Outside on the grounds they had recreated a bunch of small villages in the architechtural style of several different peoples, so we walked around those (and entertained yet another school group) then had a super tasty lunch at the museum’s cafe.

Tomorrow morning we’ll head out for the Halong Bay trip.

Random notes about the trip so far:

Strangest things seen carried on a motorbike:
- a mid sized refridgerator
- a basket of live geese
- a 20 foot long bamboo ladder

Best oddly translated tshirt:
- Las Vegas – where I lay my mac down (a Mac-10 gun reference, worn by a youngish woman)
- What a great day my mind is paralyzed! (on a children’s t-shirt)

We are in Hoi An now, got in yesterday morning bright at early after a night time train ride up the coast from Nha Trang. We took a bus out to Nha Trang the day before, and took the train out the same day, but we had enough time to check out the beach in Nha Trang and get caught out in a surprise downpour.

The beach was beatiful, I can tell why Nha Trang is a popular scuba/snorkling destination, but we were only out for about 10 minutes before a crazy rainstorm came through and soaked us in less than a minute!

We were able to book a night train up the coast to Hoi An, and as soon as we got on the train I took an Ambien to help me sleep, instead, it turns out that I am one of those people who gets the crazy side effects and it made me hallucinate like crazy! I think I slept but I was still really, really drugged in the morning and I can’t really remember getting off the train or getting to our hotel here in Hoi An. (Miles and Leanne said that I really wanted to brush my teeth in the morning and I that I wandered around the train station toothbrush in hand looking for a bathroom.)

I felt a lot better after we got into our hotel and I was able to take a nap while Miles & Leanne got some breakfast. After they got back from breakfast we ventured out in search of a good tailor. Hoi An is located on the old silk road and is famous for both its tailoring shops and silk. There is a tailor shop every five feet throughout downtown, but we headed for one that had been recommended both by our guidebooks and by a nice French couple we met in Dalat who had also recommended out hotel here.

I looked through a bunch of pictures and picked out 3 dresses and a skirt to have made at Yaly, and after walking around more and checking out the sights also had a pair or leather flip flops made for me ($10) and found a good size knock off North Face backpack ($11). Since M&L only have carryons and I have been carrying significantly more stuff, I had been wanting a smaller backpack. So after we pick up our finished clothes later today, Leanne and Miles and I are planning on finding a post office and mailing our new clothes and my existing bags back home, so that I too can have just one carry on size bag for the rest of my trip.

Today, M&L rented bikes to ride out to the beach, but my ridiculous sunburn has blistered a bit so I am taking it easy at the hotel and hoping it will fade better if I stay mostly inside today.

We weren’t able to book a trip to the Mekong Delta so we opted to head up to Dalat, a town in the central highlands of Vietnam that was popularized during the French colonization because of it’s significantly cooler, more pleasant weather and it’s closeness to the main agriculture belt of Vietnam.

We ended up getting an afternoon flight out of HCMC to Dalat for just $46, which saved us a 6 hour bus ride.

Dalat is beautiful. There was a 30 minute bus ride from the airport into town and the entire countryside was so green. There was an odd mix of banana trees, something that might have been coffee plants, wine grapes and evergreen trees (which looked kinda like redwoods).

We treked around what felt like half the town looking for a hotel last night, and settled on one with some seriously weird sheets. They were kind of silky, as were the pillow cases, so if you moved a pillow you ran the risk of having it slide right off the bed!

Despite the weird beds we were so tired that we slept close to 12 hours but we woke up in time to grab an early breakfast and take a couple hours long walk around some random neighborhoods and then out around the lake to the Dalat botanical gardens.

After that it was a very tasty lunch at a place not too far from our hotel followed by a quick hotel change in favor of some comfier beds.

We spent the afternoon touring first the Dalat Crazy House (which looks like something straight out of a Dali sculpture (Leanne and Miles said Gaudi)) and then the Summer Palace of King Dao, which is a gorgeous Art Deco era bulding.

Our new hotel (Dreams Hotel, highly recommended by Lonely Planet) has a rooftop jacuzzi with a bizarre view of the surrounding neighborhood (your typical mix of old slum sort of houses and newer hotels and businesses).

We’re about to go grab some dinner and I suspect that we’ll call it an early night. We’ve got a 9:30 bus to Nha Trang tomorrow morning, then we’ll head up the coast and check out the sights.

We arrived yesterday in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. For having traveled over 17 hours leanne and Miles and I all felt surprisingly good.

HCMC is insanely packed with motorbikes, if Vietnam didn’t already feel like an adventure, crossing the steer would for sure. There are no traffic lights to speak of so you just have to go and maintain a steady speed so the people on motorbikes will know which direction to go to avoid you.

We walked around a bunch yesterday, and went to the War Remnants museum, which had a patio full of old USAF planes, helicopters and artillery guns. The museum was full of photographs and items from the war. It was really sad to see documents from so many of the atrocities that were committed during the war, especially being so much closer to it here.

Today we’re going to try to get on a 2 day tour into the Mekong delta. We probably won’t luck out on a billion open wifi networks out there, but who knows!

(posted from iPhone, man does technology rock!)

My best friend Mike and I went to Las Vegas for a long weekend earlier this month. It was a great trip, the weather was gorgeous, we saw LOVE by Cirque du Soleil and Penn and Teller, and ate fabulous food all weekend. We stayed at the Bellagio, which was super fancy, and had a gorgeous flower garden and pool.

We flew out on my birthday, and spent the day relaxing (I went and read by the pool). The day after we got in, my cousin Marty and his wife Maria who live in Las Vegas, took us out to see the Hover Dam (enormous!)

We scored a great package deal for the trip through US airways vacations, and it was totally worth it to get away for a quick trip. Mike and I had fun taking pictures at every opportunity. Check out the full set here.