Oct 2007

Hanoi will forever be synonymous in our minds with two things: great food and motorbikes. Having enjoyed a number of fine culinary experiences (Luna d'Autuno, Le Petit Bruxelles, Cyclo and – although somewhat disappointing – Vine), we decided we couldn’t really experience the city without seeing it from a motorbike. So, we spent our final afternoon being whisked about town on the back of motorbikes, playing chicken up close and personal. While we – of course – can’t recommend that anyone should ride a motorbike in a foreign country with an unknown driver and without a helmet, I have to admit that it was the most fun I had in Hanoi. As the bike following Lloyd’s lead bike, we had a couple of near misses as we tried to keep up, but in between the grimaces, I had an ear-to-ear grin for the entire duration as we weaved through every facet of street life. THIS is Hanoi.

We stopped at the infamous Hoa Lo Prison, which was opened by the French in 1896 and used by them until 1954 in order to detain troublesome locals. There was a guillotine here for French-style terminations (still visible, with charming pictures of heads-in-baskets). Torture methods at the prison were notoriously inhumane and, for the Vietnamese, this site highlights the struggle for independence, and commemorates important freedom fighters “who sacrificed their lives here to secure the independence and freedom of the nation”.

One large room housed as many as thirty prisoners in a communal setting. Prisoners sentenced to death were kept in solitary confinement in this corridor.

Doorway into Memorial Garden.

Of course, we know the prison better as the ‘Hanoi Hilton’, where captured American pilots were detained during the Vietnam War. The Vietnamese gratefully commemorate the lives of patriots such as Phan Boi Chau or Ho Tung Mau here, but the most famous western inmate was John McCain: former pilot and now a US Senator. As an aside rather than the main feature, a small exhibition goes to great lengths to demonstrate how well the American detainees were cared for. There’s another side to this story, we’re sure…

Lloyd checks into the Hanoi Hilton

Clothing and personal effects of John McCain at the time of capture.

On our way to the Hanoi Hilton, we found ourselves wandering through a Vietnamese street market selling everything from freshly cut meat to vegetables, dry goods and household paraphernalia. Even though we expected to see Roast Dog at some point during our time here, it was still something of a shock the first time, and it took me a few moments to prepare my mind and permit my eyes to look at it directly. We’d seen some freshly butchered dog meat during our trek but this was different. This was whole, roasted dog that still looked – well – like a dog.

How much is that doggy in the window?

After almost a week here, we are – of course – aware that the Vietnamese diet includes dog-meat and cat-meat. As delicacies, these are not eaten as frequently as – say – chicken or beef, but these meats are brought to the table on special occasions. Cat-meat, for example, is eaten during the first few days of the lunar cycle. During our hill-tribe trek, we encountered hundreds of puppies and kittens, along with the thousands of ducklings, calves and other cute ‘babies’ from the animal world. With this firmly in mind, we decided – even if we opted not to try it - it would be hypocritical to object to the consumption of dog and cat meat. The Vietnamese do not have pets in the same way that we do, and most animals are raised – and extraordinarily well cared for – for meat. It's a completely normal and un-interesting part of life for Vietnamese.

So we eat dog-meat..... Yawn.....

At the Army Museum, we caught up with a little of Vietnam’s colorful military history. From the Vietnamese perspective, the war we most strongly associate with the country is simply one of a series of occupations by the Chinese, the French, and most recently by the Americans. We’ve been struck by the overwhelming warmth of the Vietnamese welcome, particularly given that the Vietnam War – known here as the American War – is still fresh history. More than two million Vietnamese died during the conflict so – for us – it’s quite impressive that the country has embraced tourists – including Americans – as wholeheartedly and genuinely as they appear to have done.

Exhibits at the Army Museum included enough military equipment to keep Lloyd happily occupied for several hours: M-16's, mortars, an Army UH-1 Huey, and an Air Force A-1 Skyraider. But with the bikes at our disposal, we opted to race from the south of town towards the north-east to visit a wrecked B-52 whose tail is still famously protruding above the waters of Huu Tiep Lake. According to the Vietnamese, this B-52 was shot down in December 1972 as part of an important campaign believed to broadly turn the tide against the US, leading to a “complete victory” of the “Vietnamese people’s anti-US resistance for national salvation”.

Lloyd observing remains of crashed B-52

On the way back to the hotel, we stopped briefly at Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum, set – as you would expect in a Communist country – in a generously sized and perfectly manicured square. Ho Chi Minh is preserved Lenin-style and displayed here, but he is currently out of town getting a few touch-ups, so we weren’t able to visit with him this time.

No-one's home....

Our motorbike drivers literally raced each other back to the Old Quarter, where we had time for an excellent meal at Cyclo before heading out in the rain to the train station to catch our overnight train to Hue. Hanoi flies straight to the top of our list of favourite cities: plenty to do, both in town or – relatively - near-by; great food, local and international; warm people and sales people who are not too aggressive; a bustling, lively atmosphere; and finally a fantastic base in the Hong Ngoc Hotel. In summary, we can’t recommend Hanoi highly enough, and are extremely excited to see what the rest of Vietnam has to offer.

After hiking 20 kilometers in 6 hours through pouring rain, sloshing through deep, thick, red mud, I felt like I could eat anything. And then the plate of grasshoppers appeared. I am always game for trying the unusual and offbeat, so six scrawny legs attached to a little locust with disproportionately large eyes seemed no big deal.

In the event, it was a little disappointing. The grasshoppers ended up tasting like any number of other things deep-fried: they taste like what you put on them, or what they are fried in. In this case, I suspect the oil used to fry the tiny insects was a couple of years past its ‘use-by’ date, so the resulting taste was even more off-putting than being left with tiny legs stuck between your teeth. The locals were digging in, though. Perhaps this is some form of community service, as harvesting the insect also keeps them off the rice, in addition to serving as a low-cost beer snack.

Crunchy treats!

In addition to the tasty treats, our time in the mountainous northern highlands of Vietnam introduced us to two of the more than fifty ethnic minority peoples (Thai, Hmong) and amazing terrain that melds mountain, jungle and farmland.

Our trek was to start from a remote village, but heavy rains having made roads impassable (for trucks, cars, motorbikes and apparently Jacquie who managed to slip just a few minutes into our trek!), so our first day’s walk gained more than three kilometers. Luckily with no fresh rain, our first day was an enjoyable, albeit fast, hike to our initial home-stay, at a Black-Thai household. In this area, women use beetlenut over several years to deliberately stain their teeth a deep black color that is – surprisingly – pleasing to the eye. Younger women don’t seem to be following the tradition, so this may be something that disappears from their culture in the near future. Kids these days…

After a little trip in the mud

After our first damp night, the second day’s trek was probably one of the most miserable experiences we’ve had. It wasn’t so much the rain – we were already damp through anyway – but the mile after mile of thick, almost clay-like, mud that made every step precarious. We slipped. Boots threatened to be sucked into the mud. But mostly we just got absolutely filthy. And so we continued for hours, much of it uphill.

Making our way through the toughest parts of terrain and mud was made worthwhile by three things: stunning landscape, the warm reception of people as we passed, and the reaction of children. While it may have taken a smile of our own, or a simple “Hello” to win a grin from adults, the mere sight of our group of westerners walking by would bring the kids running and screaming, “Hello, hallo, heee-llo, hi-lo!” As with so many other places, I find the easy smiles of kids to be the universal common denominator of humanity.

Nothing compares to the reaction of kids wherever we go

Sleeping on bamboo wood floors, eating local cuisine and taking in the scenery gave us an appreciation for the local life, but the one thing I think we gained most from our days in the hills was the centrality and scale of the work that growing rice involves. Beyond the staple food, it is the primary export for the country, and Vietnam is 2nd only to China in its production. Seeing the harvest of rice in the paddies has definitely changed our perspective on something we have previously taken for granted.

New and old methods for moving the rice from the fields

Rounding out our home-stay, we enjoyed an evening of rice-wine (which tastes like a very mildly alcoholic apple juice) and a performance of traditional minority group entertainment by a local dance troupe. As you can see in the picture, the main living area is raised ten feet or so above the ground, and the floor is formed from flattened bamboo over wooden slats eight to ten inches apart. Essentially, the floor – as well as the walls! – are see through, so it’s a little nerve-wracking to walk on, so we needed the rice-wine to comfort us during the rather thunderous performance of the male dancers!

Rice wine for 7?

Home cooking

After another wonderful selection of Vietnamese dishes, including vegetable spring rolls, fried pork and catfish, we readied for sleep. Our clothes, damp from sweat associated with the day’s exertion, had little-to-no hope of drying overnight in the humid climate, but we hung them up as hopefully as Christmas stockings, and crawled under our mosquito net onto our one-inch thick mattress pads. With such thin walls and floors, the noise from our hosts and neighbours was considerable, but we were exhausted from the day’s activities, and sleep found us quickly. We’ll drive back to Hanoi tomorrow morning and stay overnight before catching the late night train on Saturday night, headed to Hue.

We set off from Hanoi on Monday morning and drive the hundred miles or so to Halong Bay, well known for its dramatic rock formations set in the beautiful emerald waters of the Gulf of Tonkin. The bay covers more than 600 square miles, and comprises almost 3,000 islands. Legend has it that the bay's dramatic landscape was created by dragons sent by the Gods to help the Vietnamese defend themselves from Chinese invaders.

While the dragons were allegedly successful in keeping the invaders out, the Gods apparently failed to foresee that their actions would - many years later - attract an even more aggressive and numerous invader. Tourists today flock to the UNESCO World Heritage site en masse and it's easy to see why. Our overnight experience on the Bay easily moved into our World Trip Top Ten, probably within the first hour of getting on the boat!

The pier was simply groaning with tour groups. We weren't quite climbing over each other to find our charter, but we did have to make our way across two other boats in order to board! The harbour was a hive of activity with fruit, vegetable and junk food vendors in tiny row boats weaving their way ominously between large junks that could crush them like matchsticks at any moment. This isn't a harbour where you wait for a space. You simply rev your engine and push everything else out of the way until you're where you want to be.

My picture of two crew members before we all fell asleep. Separately, of course!

After an hour of either waiting for crew or waiting to be released from the crush of boats at the pier, we headed out into the bay. It was an overcast morning, and although we could see the karst formations, they were distant and therefore more like ghosts than reality. We lunched on some really rather good and fresh Vietnamese food, and then - lulled by the engine - I fell asleep on the dining room couches along with three of the crew! When Lloyd woke me up, not an hour later, the landscape had been transformed. The sky was just beginning to turn blue as the sun burned off the morning's haze. In turn, the water was becoming more and more green. All around us, the most splendid big, dark brown junks ferried tourists. Anywhere else, the volume of boats might be unappealing, but the boats themselves are just so damn attractive. And they fit the scenery perfectly. How could you complain?

We passed between huge limestone stacks that towered hundreds of feet above us. In some places, the rock was sheer and shiny. In others, trees and bushes clung to life on the rockface and within birds and monkeys and other animals made their presence known. With the towers all around, we passed floating fishing villages where inhabitants might spend their entire lives on the water.

With the addition of tourism to the local economy, many fishing villages now do a healthy trade in kayak rental or junk food sales (choco-pie anyone?), but fishing is still an essential activity, and we watched a number of fishermen and women in action.

On Monday afternoon, we headed out on kayaks for a closer examination of some of the bays. We'd wanted to swim here, too, but the water was a little murkier than we expected. Emerald green, sure. Crystal clear it is not. Nonetheless, we really enjoyed kayaking, especially passing underneath one of the giant karsts and emerging to a simply spectacular view as sunset approached.

All in all, it was an excellent experience that we would highly recommend. We're told that - as a UNESCO Heritage site - the number of boats with access is limited, but the fact is our 14 person boat carried only five passengers, and nearly every other boat we saw was operating far below capacity too. Having so much space on board was great for us, but we wondered about the diesel-chugging junks' impact on this area of outstanding natural beauty. Clearly there has to be a better way to minimize the impact of tourism here, and it has to be done quickly in order to counterbalance the growth in tourist volume - from about half a million in 2003 to perhaps more than a million last year.

Back off the soap-box, we headed back into Halong City harbour on Tuesday morning, after a sweaty, non-AC night on board our otherwise comfortable boat. A quick stop at 'Surprise Cave', discovered by the French in 1901 and allegedly used by the Viet Cong as a hideout during the Vietnam War, revealed some impressively large cave systems, but perhaps more importantly offered a beatiful vista over the surrounding area.

All too soon, we were back in the harbour, this time forcing our way into dock rather than out. How long until we get back to Halong? Too long.