Phomn Penh

I arrived at the bus station in Phomn Penh at around 6pm and it was already quite dark. I'd met two English guys and three Swedish guys on the bus so we decided to find a place all together, which was a good thing because as soon as we got off the bus were practically mobbbed by guys going "tuk tuk, tuk tuk please". It was absolutely mad but we grabbed two tuk tuks (or rather the drivers grabbed us) and the one the Swedish lads had got insisted on taking them to his guest house so we just followed. Ended up at the Lakeside which is the real backpacker area of Phomn Penh and our guest house was called the 'Smile Lakeside' down a fairly dingy looking alley. It wasn't just on the lakeside, it was actually built over the lake. There was water beneath my room! The six of us sat out on the wooden deck for dinner and I was slightly put-off when they asked if I wanted my burger 'happy'. Oh yes, it was one of those places! I declined. The guest house's tuk tuk driver, Chang, drank a couple of beers with us and then passed out in a hammock which was hilarious.

I woke up insanely early the next morning so had breakfast with a lovely German lady who was also staying at Smile. She was 58 years old and stays here every time she comes to Phomn Penh. She's been travelling on and off ever since she was 18 so it was really fascinating to talk to her. The rest of the day was spent with Chang and the three Swedish guys (who's names I actually never caught and then was too embarrassed to ask as we'd been hanging around together too long!) around Phomn Penh. First we went to a shooting range because the guys wanted to fire some guns. There are lots of these rangers around run by the army so we turned up and they brought us a 'menu' of all the stuff we could use. It was insane. You could shoot anything from Colt 45.'s, AK47's, tommy guns, machine guns, RPG's, hand grenades, even a grenade launcher if you had $350 to spare. There are rumours you can buy a cow and blow it up, but thankfully that wasn't on the menu so how true it is I'm not sure. The guys opted for the AK's, but at $40 a go I was happy to just watch. Though 'happy' might be an overstatement as I was distinctly edgy the whole time. Too many weapons around for my liking! But I did get a photo of me with the AK. From there we started the proper tour where we were going to visit two of the most notorious places in Cambodia's history: the Killing Fields and the S21 Prison. We'd been warned they weren't nice but I think it was important to go and see them to understand some of this country's history. I'm glad I did it, but once is enough. I'm not sure I can put into words what these places were like but I'll try. Don't read the next paragraph if you don't want to know!

We headed out of the city to Choeung Ek (the 'Killing Fields') where thousands of people were executed under Pol Pot's communist regime between 1975-1979. I wasn't entirely sure what to expect but once I arrived through the main gates I saw a lovely Buddhist-style tower (the stupa) which I thought was really pretty, until I got closer and realised that there were hundreds of human skulls stored on the shelves staring out at me. These were the victims that had been exhumed from about ninety of the hundred and twenty mass graves in the early 1980s. But walking around you soon realise that the burials weren't limited to just the mass graves. There are bones just everywhere along with scraps of cloth - clothing remains. At one point I looked down and saw some remains just poking out of the ground. Quite disturbing and very very sad. I sort of wished I hadn't taken osteology at uni as I could have perhaps pretended they were just animal bone, but they were definitely human. It's been estimated that 1.7 million people (approximately one fifth of Cambodia's 1975 population) were either murdered, or died of malnutrition and disease under the Khmer Rouge. Anyone who was considered intelligent: doctors, lawyers, teachers, political opposition, even anyone who wore glasses (as that was a sign of cleverness apparently) and their families were imprisoned and killed. And one of the worst parts is that once they were ousted in 1979 the USA put a trade embargo on Cambodia as they would only recognise the Khmer Rouge as the official leaders of the country and gave them Cambodia's seat on the UN. How ridiculous! I have to say, between here and Saigon my opinion of the USA has gone down hill. From there it was even more depressing as we went to Tuol Sleng, also know as the S.21 Prison where the majority of the people executed at Choeung Ek were imprisoned and tortured. Again, not a very nice experience. All the cells were still there and some still had (I think) bloodstains on the floor. I can't think what else they'd be. Certainly not paint. >< There were hundreds of photographs of all the prisoners, including really young children, and they came with this statistic: of the 20,000 people known to have been held captive here only seven survived. Owch. I took some photos while walking around but I there are some I just cannot put online. I was so glad to leave to get back to the hostel for food.

All four of us needed some cheering up afterwards! Luckily Chang was quite funny. He's taken people around a lot so knew what we'd be like. I tried to chill out on the lakeside that afternoon but it was so humid. Just sitting there felt like I was melting. That evening the Swedish guys and me went to the Night Market. I got some food but I only picked at it as I wasn't particularly hungry. There were two little street kids hanging around and they were just about to be chased away by one of the stall owners so I gave them the rest of my food. Better them to have it than it to go to waste. They were so sweet! We ended up having a drink outside one of the cafes on the Riverside (the posher tourist area) and the funniest little boy selling books came to chat to us. His English was fantastic and he was really smart. He got one of the Swedish guys to buy a book off him and challenged another to a game of 'rock, paper, scissors'. If the Swedish guy won, the boy'd buy him a cake but if the boy won the guy had to buy him a cake. Well, it was the fastest game I've ever seen. The boy won in under ten seconds (best out of three) so he got a huge slice of chocolate cake. It was very funny. We watched 'Flags of our Fathers' back at the hostel later that night, which was a good movie but I was distracted by the gecko on the tv (it wanted to be in the film!) and the rat running across the walls!

I was up quite early the next morning to have a quick look around the city before I got my bus to Siem Reap. I visited the Wat Phomh temple (where there was an elephant!) and the nightmare that was Central Market. Ended up getting a motorbike taxi back to the hostel as I'd ended up walking miles! My bus was at 12.30pm and I thought I'd booked on the tourist bus... I was wrong. Ended up on the local bus and, apart from one Japanese man who used to live in Cambodia (he was an anthropologist from Kyoto University) I was the only foreigner on there! It wasn't the most comfortable of journeys - no air con, bumpy roads and it took almost seven hours. It kept stopping to drop people off and pick them up from the roadside. I arrived in Siem Reap in the dark and amazingly was not mobbed by tuk tuk drivers, possibly because I arrived on the local bus. Found one who knew where the hostel I wanted to stay at was thank goodness and, even though I had to swap tuk tuk's halfway there for some unknown reason, I did get to where I wanted to be!!

Saigon

... and the Moc Bai border crossing

I arrived in Saigon (or Ho Chi Minh City as it's meant to be known) at around 4pm on the 13th February (New Years Eve). The bus journey wasn't great although driving through the jungle was pretty awesome. I met an American girl on the bus called Katie so we chatted for a while at the lunch stop. The bus dropped us off outside their offices right in the backpacker district so it was only a very short walk to my hostel. Katie came with me but there was no room for her due to Tet. I was lucky to have booked ahead. We agreed to meet up for dinner and then I met my dorm-mates. Thank goodness the dorm has air conditioning as it's so hot and humid down here. It doesn't help our dorm is on the top floor and there's no lift... Owch! My leg muscles get a workout every time I want to get up to my room. A group of us went out for food that evening - two Americans (San Francisco and Detroit), a Canadian, a Dutch guy, two English guys and an Irish guy as well as a girl from the Netherlands. We found some food and then headed down towards the waterfront for the New Year fireworks. It was absolutely packed with hundreds if not thousands of people and motorbikes. One of the streets had been shut off for a flower display and that was as far down as we got as there was just too many people. The flowers were pretty and they'd turned off the street lights in favour of paper lanterns which were lovely. At midnight they set of the fireworks and they went on for ages! But although pretty we ended up showered in what I think must have been the gunpowder in them. Very gritty. The walk home was a nightmare as the roads were at a standstill, motorbikes packed in like a can of sardines so trying to the cross the roads was a mission.

The next morning I met Katie downstairs and four of us went for a walk around the city. We weren't too sure what would be open and most of the shops and restaurants were shut. The flower street however was packed with people all dressed up in their new clothes and taking photos of each other. Walked passed a posh hotel and they had a Chinese dragon dance going on so we snuck in and watched that in the air conditioning. Had a quick look at the Notre Dame Cathedral and the Post Office before going back to our hostel to hide from the heat. It is unbelievable. I though I was ok with hot weather but this is crazy. I think it's the humidity more than anything. That evening we had food in a little street kitchen and then went to the local bar where we sat on plastic stools in the road. We nicknamed a cockroach 'Frothy' and I got freaked out by a guy that had a little live snake through his mouth and up his nose. So so horrible. I went and stood on the other side of the street with Frothy until him and his snake was gone.

In the morning I went to the War Remnants Museum with French Julien and Swedish Linda. There were lots of American aircraft outside the building and inside the museum was very interesting if more than a little depressing. There were hundreds of photographs of the war, showing the fighting as well as the massacres and torture done by American soldiers. A lot of the photographers that took them also died in the conflict. There was an interesting but horrible exhibition on the use of a chemical called Agent Orange and its aftereffects, including a couple of preserved mutated foetus'. Really not nice. I have never been so glad not to be American in my whole life. Admittedly the museum is very biased with lots of propaganda on the brilliance of the Communists and the evils of the Americans without showing what the Viet Cong did back to them but it's still horrific. The museum shut at 12pm so we were kicked out and went back to the hostel. On the way we found a milkshake place that was really good and just what was needed as we were so hot. Got lunch from the bakery next to our hostel and retreated to our room to "chill" out. We were going to walk to the Ben Thanh market but it's still shut because of Tet. New Year here officially lasts from the 14th to the 16th but the rumours are it goes on for almost a week! Oh dear. That evening after watching Terminator 3 we went for food at a restaurant called Stella and gave in to the temptation of Western food.

Tuesday morning an Australian guy called Andy and I went to see the Revolutionary Museum and the Independence Palace. Both were interesting if a little random. The palace has been hardly touched since the 1970s so it still has all the old furniture and command post with maps in the basement. For lunch that day I had pancakes with bacon and maple syrup. Bad I know but they were needed! That afternoon Andy and I tried to find a tour for the next day to the Cu Chi tunnels. Despite all the tour agencies around it was actually harder than it seemed as a lot had put their prices up because of Tet (yeah, yeah, that old excuse!). One tried to charge us $12 for a tour that they normally run for $5. In the end we found one for $7 and signed up for it.

The tour left at 8.30am so it was a fairly early start to get breakfast first. Took us almost two hours to get to the tunnels but our guide was very interesting. He was in his 30s so he's lived under the proper Communist regime that didn't change until 1995 when the trade embargo with the USA was ended. His father had been a marine fighting for the South Vietnamese Government with the Americans. It was interesting to hear his views on the "American" war and how people think of it now. Arrived at the tunnels and watched a short, 1960s Vietnamese government propaganda film on the villagers of Cu Chi and then saw the booby traps for the dogs as well as humans. Not very nice at all. Lots of sharp spikes and that sort of thing. I fitted into one of the fox holes (very small - one larger man got stuck!) and saw the munition bunkers. Walked passed the shooting range where you could fire an AK47 but I didn't see the point. They then took us to the 'real' tunnels. They have some there that have been widened to allow tourists down them comfortably but they have kept some un-widened ones open also and those were the ones we went down. Andy went first so I followed second. It was really cramped, you had to squat or crawl to move along. And they weren't straight either, it turned and sloped down and then we came to a hole in the floor of the tunnel so we had to climb down further. It was really hot and there wasn't many lights so at some points it was pitch black. It was only 50m long but felt so much longer. Very claustrophobic but I managed not to freak out and arrived in the bunker at the other side. People used to live in these! For 20 years!!! All underground - there were hundreds of kilometers of these tunnels. It's amazing. I couldn't have done it. We were back in Saigon in time for lunch and I tried some tomato soup but it was more like tomato mush. Not good. Finally got to the Ben Thanh market and I bought some really cool chopsticks! I've got so used to using them now I figured I'd carry it on at home :D That evening we were going to go to Cholon (China Town) but it was too far away. Had a burger instead. Afterwards I booked my bus to go to Phomh Penh for the next day. Went for drinks at the local bar. It's 12.000 VD for a jug of bia hoa (local beer) which gives you four glasses! Isn't too bad either.

Had a final walk around the backpacker area with Andy the next morning before I got my bus to Phomh Penh. It was two and a half hours to the Moc Bai/Bavet border crossing and I refused to give the man on the bus my passport, insisting on getting my own visa at the border. He was saying that there would be huge queues and he'd get us the fast track visa for $25. I ignored him, but I was the only one. Arrived at the border and I went through immigration first with my bags. Walked across to the Cambodian border and I was the only person there! Straight to the visa man and filled out the form and paid... $20 :D Hee hee. Straight through passport control and then had to sit and wait on the other side for almost an hour for the rest of my bus to get through. So much for fast track! Was feeling quite smug actually. The Vietnamese lady that was sitting next to me on the bus also got through quite quickly so we sat together and she had a look at my passport. Once on the bus she insisted on feeding me fruit! She didn't speak any English so I've no idea what these things were. They were red and bell-shaped and very tasty. We arrived in Phomh Penh at 6pm absolutely exhausted. In Cambodia now! Woop!

Nha Trang and Da Lat

I cannot really say much about Nha Trang. The bus there was absolutely dreadful. Nothing like the one between Hanoi and Hue. It certainly didn't help that I was beginning to feel really ill and ended up throwing up as soon as we arrived. Were taxied to our hotel and I spend pretty much the whole day in my room. By the evening I was still no better so the lady at the front desk called a doctor for me and I had to go to a Vietnamese clinic. Not very nice but the doctor spoke good English and they were very good with me. I was very dehydrated so they stuck me on a drip - the most old-fashioned one I've ever seen! They ran some tests, including an ultrasound that was very bizarre and finally gave me some antibiotics. Heh fun times. The final verdict? Seriously bad food poisoning (something had got into my blood or something like that) >< Spent most of the next day running around sorting out insurance and my bus to Da Lat but I did make it onto the beach that afternoon for an hour or so just to relax. The boys moved hotel as our one was so far out of the centre it was ridiculous and they are staying in Nha Trang for Tet (New Year). There was no point me moving so I spent the evening with them before saying our goodbyes. My only impression of Nha Trang is as a beach resort. It's lovely, but it could be anywhere in the world. There was nothing particularly Vietnamese about it, even the food.

The next morning I caught the bus to the mountain town of Da Lat. The two British girls - Helen and Charlie - who I biked to Hoi An with were on the same bus which was a surprise! The bus broke down a couple of times and the road up the mountains was dreadful. Looks like they're trying to redo it but so far have only achieved in digging it up. We finally arrived in Da Lat to find the huge lake that's on all the photos was dried up! They dropped us off outside a fairly expensive hotel so Helen, Charlie and I grabbed our bags and walked into town. Despite warnings we wouldn't find anywhere (or at least, anywhere cheap) because of Tet we found a lovely little hotel that did us a three-person room for $9 a night. We went for lunch in the 'Peace Cafe' and met a guy on a motorbike who worked for the Da Lat EasyRiders. You get 'easyriders' everywhere but these guys are apparently the real ones. They had some very good recommendations so we agreed to do a day tour with them tomorrow. We took a walk to the market which was absolutely crazy and tried some aloe vera sweets (very odd). We walked back to the hotel via a lovely temple. We were the only ones there and just wandered about almost into the monks quarters! But they were very friendly. Tried to find food that evening and ended up at Tu Anh's restaurant, run by the craziest Vietnamese woman I've ever met. She was wonderful and so so funny. The food was also really delicious - chicken with cooked mango and rice.

The next day we met up with our EasyRider guides and jumped on the back of their bikes for a tour of the area surrounding Da Lat. Our first stop was at a gorgeous Buddhist temple, apparently the oldest pagoda in Da Lat. It had the most enormous dragon statue I've ever seen! My guide, Trung, had spent three years living in a pagoda so he gave us a Buddhist philosophy lesson! It felt like being back at school as he kept asking us questions, but it was incredibly interesting. Throughout the day he kept calling us girls the 'three princesses' and was very very flirty (which did begin to get a bit annoying). We also visited a flower farm, a coffee plantation and a rice wine making factory. They had us taste a little of the 65% proof stuff - it came out of what looked like a plastic jerry can! Our next stop was at Elephant waterfall which was amazing. Quite a difficult way down to it but was really worth it. Stood behind the water and had a nice shower :D After a look around another temple we had lunch with the guides and they ordered us some of the local foods. They also had us try some snake wine and I really wish they hadn't shown us the bottle first. It was a huge glass jar with at least three dead snakes curled up in it. I'm sure there were bits of dead snake floating in my glass so I only had the smallest sip but it was quite enough. Ew! Did not taste good at all, but at least the food was yummy. In the afternoon we went to a silk factory and an orchid farm before visiting the 'Crazy House'. It is almost impossible to describe this place in words - an Alice-in-Wonderland style tree house that could have easily belonged in Disneyland, albeit a Disneyland without health-and-safety! You could climb almost anywhere and some of the walkways were incredibly narrow, high up and with 'barriers' that only came up to mid-calf! Some of the stairs in the bedrooms were almost as bad - just high stepping stones. Mad, but it operates as a hotel so you can actually stay there in any of the ten themed rooms! We got back to the hotel at around 4pm exhausted but happy. All of the guides were lovely, very friendly, knowlegable and spoke fantastic English. Was definitely worth it. Ended back at Tu Anh's that evening as we couldn't find anywhere else and the meal was as hilarious and yummy as before. This time I tried the pineapple chicken and we tried her apple crumble. She was so proud of it and it was really good.

We left the next morning - the girls to Mui Ne and me to Saigon.

Hoi An

On my first day in Hoi An I woke to find the power was off for the entire street, and despite being reassured it would be on 'soon'it didn't reappear again until 5pm that night. There wasn't much point spending any time in the hotel as my room didn't even have a window so it was lovely and dark. Hoi An is renowned for its Old Town - lots of old buildings and tiny streets leading down to the river. The majority of these shops are tailors and as two of the boys wanted some clothes made we went for a look around. They can make anything here! Absolutely anything... shirts, shorts, dresses, suits, even custom-made shoes! I left Tom and Jimmy debating over watches and headed back to the restaurant we were at the night before to meet up with Danny and Andy to hire bikes. It is cheaper to hire a motorbike here for 24 hours than it is to hire a bicycle! Madness. We drove to a temple and then found the beach. It was gorgeous! White sand, palm trees with coconuts and people selling the nicest mangos! Unfortunately my sunburn from the bike ride down to Hoi An was still pretty bad so I sat in the shade but I did stick my feet in the sea. We got back to the hotel that evening to find the power still off so cold showers only. We were also told as we hadn't rented the bikes from the hotel we couldn't keep them there overnight so had to take them back down the road. Riding a motorbike in a dress is not easy let me tell you! That night we found a bar on the other side of the river that seemed so happy to have customers they gave us all a free 'bucket' drink.

The next morning everyone else was still asleep (or as I later found out, passed out as they ended up at a beach bar and didn't get back until 6am. Oh dear.) so I picked up my bike and had a lovely morning just pootling around the town. Finding somewhere to park was the hardest bit but a cyclo driver took pity on me and had me park in what looked like a temple! That threw me a bit but apparently it was ok. I acquired a Vietnamese boyfriend in the riverside market - well, a guy grabbed my hand, insisted I was his girlfriend and had me sit with him and his friends for a bit. It was actually very funny and they were really nice people. Managed to leave without causing insult and found a French-style pattisserie which did fairly good crossaints. I then decided to be clever and try and find the beach by myself. It's a straight road from the town so I didn't think I could get it wrong.... Well somehow I found myself on a motorway (nice road, pretty deserted) which I really didn't remember from yesterday and then two Vietnamese women on a motorbike rode us beside me to have a conversation, as we were still driving along, and told me I was heading back towards Danang. Ooops! Turned around and found my way back to the town. Also found the road to the beach but I was seriously low on fuel by that stage so I admitted defeat. Also, the bike had to be handed back by 1pm and it was getting on for that. Sadly handed the bike back and then met up with Tom and Jimmy as they had a fitting for their shirts. I went with them and gave in to temptation by ordering a pair of shorts. They are very thorough with their measuring! I was more than a little taken back. Went onto the main street in Hoi An - Le Loi Street - for lunch at a little street cafe. Noodles and a lump of pork. With baguettes :D That evening we had an impulsive boat trip on the river for an hour. The sunset from the water was breath-taking. Really beautiful. We ate that night in an Indian restaurant. We let Jimmy take charge and order a variety of curries for us, including a spicy chicken madras, extra hot. It was bright red and is the hottest thing I think I've ever eaten. We were all sweating after just a couple of bites and my lips stung so much! But it was very good food. Went into a bar on the main street that was opposite a tailors so Charlie and I popped in there to get linen shirts made. We'd seen Tom and Jimmy's and had been very jealous. Had an early(ish) night that night as we had plans for the morning!

Charlie, Andy and I were up bright and early to hire motorbikes as our plan for this day was to get to the Cham ruins at My Son, about 50km away from Hoi An. I had the directions(!) and we set off. Took us about an hour and a half to get there, though at the first fuel stop I realised neither my spedometer or my fuel gauge worked on my bike so I had to take my lead from the guys. The roads weren't too bad and the closer we got to My Son the more rural it was. It was fantastic to be able to stop where we wanted and actually see the country we were passing through. Most tourists only see these areas from their air-conditioned buses while we were actually experiencing and interacting with the locals. We left our bikes for free at a crazy man's restaurant just outside My Son as he'd waved us down saying we couldn't take them into the ruins. Walked to the ticket booth and found out that we could actually take our bikes up to the proper entrance but it was too late by then. Ended up getting a rickety, 1960s American army jeep up to the entrance and then spent two hours walking around the ruins. They're known as the 'Angkor Wat' of Vietnam but, while nice, they are no where near as complete or big as the Cambodian ones. They are however right in the jungle and it was incredibly hot and humid! We'd arrived just before lunch, when all the tour groups were leaving so we had the ruins almost completely to ourselves, so it was worth the heat. Drank so much water! Also saw a huge yellow spider (yuck) and hundreds of lizards - one of which gave me a fright by sticking his head at me and I thought he was a snake. Jumped so badly, silly thing. On the way back down, Charlie and I had a quick look in the souvenir shop which ended up quite embarrassing. The sales assistant came over to talk to Charlie and he said he wasn't going to buy anything but she should talk to me. She replied that first she would talk to him "so you buy for your wife"... Us: "We're not married"... She looked puzzled and then rallied "Your soon-to-be-wife"... "No no no, just friends"... "Just friends? But you look good together. Very suitable!" At that point we legged it. Note to anyone travelling around with a male friend, be prepared for in-depth questioning about your 'relationship'. Oh dear. Made it back to the bikes and then headed back to Hoi An. Somehow we missed a turning along the route and ended up at a toll booth that we hadn't passed on the way here. Luckily after asking for directions and driving over a rather dodgy-looking bridge (it was actually closed off but bikes just went around the blocks so we did too) we eventually got back to town. We booked the bus down to Nha Trang for the next evening and then went to find food. We all went to the 'Before and Now' bar which has a real hippy feel (Che Guevara pictures up everywhere, quite old fashioned but nice) and played pool. A rule is in use here that if your opponent pots all their balls before you pot one of yours you have to run around the table 'sans clothes'... Thank goodness I'm not that appauling at pool (though it did come close). There was also a really old-school foosball table :D At 1am the bar ran a free bus to the beach bar so four of us headed out for that. It was a really nice little bar, right on the sand so naturally we just had to stick our feet in the sea. But that meant we were all sandy so the logical thing to do was jump in the swimming pool! Really good fun. Charlie and I lost Danny and Tom soon after we arrived but we were entertained by a very drunk British guy and his Canadian friend who fell asleep on each other. Got the bus back at 4am and stopped at the little bakery near our hotel to grab a fresh baguette. Better than kebab!

The next morning there was slight worry as Tom was nowhere to be found. Turned out Danny and him had actually stayed at the bar until 5am and then Danny had left him with a girl... He didn't reappear until 1pm looking more than a little worse for wear. Cue some serious teasing. Tried a baguette for lunch at a little cafe but there were ants all through the bread which was seriously off-putting, so ended up at the market to try the local Cao Loa (noodles). Had a final walk through the Old Town before grabbing our bags from the hostel to get the night bus to Nha Trang. Hoi An is one of the best places I've been to so far! I think I'm going to miss it.

Hue

Another spare moment as I'm waiting for people to get ready so we can go eat! So here's an update of my past couple of days.

The bus arrived in Hue at 8.30am and we were met by a lady from the hostel who took us there, got us booked in and gave us breakfast while we waited for our room to be ready. The hostel is absolutely gorgeous! It's all open fronted with our rooms leading straight onto the veranda/balcony thing. There's deck chairs and sunshine and it was just bliss! We all practically jumped at the opportunity just to sit out in the sun. Tom pulled out his guitar (which everyone including me has now signed) so we had music to doze to. We really didn't do much that day, but it was needed!

We went for lunch at this little cafe and the waitress gave us an English menu where the prices were more expensive than the Vietnamese on the wall. When we pointed this out she straight away agreed to give us the 'local' price. This happens everywhere but she was lovely and wanted to practice her English with us. She showed us a book called 'Instant English for School Learners' - an English text book which contained the fantastic phrases "Hello, I am Tom Cruise. Is Mr. Bush at home? I would like to see him" and, under the food section, "It looks like you are gaining weight"!! The food was also delicious and the waitress tried to teach us 'thank you' and 'goodbye' in Vietnamese (cam on and cam bien).

Between 5pm and 6pm at the hostel it was free beer. Some lovely ice cold bottles from the cool box were just what was needed. I couldn't believe they just give away beer but the Australian guy who owns the hostel is very cool. We asked him if this Backpackers was better than the one we'd stayed at in Hanoi. His response? "Yep, the bar is open an hour and a half longer"!! It was really good to just chill out in the sun. We were told the temperature was 29 degrees. Woo! We met up with some Auzzies who thought they knew where some good food for dinner was so we followed them across the river and into the Citadel, but it seemed too far away so our group turned back. We went into the first cafe we found and sat down, expecting a menu but they just started bringing us food. Turns out the only food they serve there is a local speciality called bahn khoai, which are meant to be a bit like tacos stuffed with pork and shrimp. I gave my shrimp away but the rest of it was nice. The lady in the cafe took pity on us as we were not sure how to eat it so she showed us the correct way. All the women kept laughing at us and we're not sure why! It might have been because two of the boys tried to go into the bathroom at the same time, or it might have been because we were making a mess of the food. Either way, it was a little disconcerting. That evening we sat in the bar and Tom brought down his guitar so we could all have a sing-a-long (and he could get a free drink!).

Our second day in Hue was spent chilling out in the morning and then going on an afternoon tour of the Citadel and Imperial City, and visiting the Thien Mu Pagoda. There were real monks! There was also the blue Austin car that Thich Quang Duc drove (the monk that burned himself to death in Saigon in 1963 to protest against the treatment of Buddhists in Vietnam). We caught a boat back down the Perfume River to our hostel, just in time for free beer! ;) That evening me, Charlie boy and a Kiwi girl called Sylvia ended up back at the restaurant we ate lunch at the day before and we had the same waitress. Her name is Quynh and she was lovely! She came and sat with us through dinner to chat. We exchanged email addresses and I promised her I'd email her some of the photos we took. Charlie proposed to her, so it was a really funny meal. Later that evening a group of us went to a very bizzarre club called "Browneyes" just around the corner from our hostel. It reminded me of an empty Jesters. Funnily enough we didn't stay long!

At lunch the next day we went back to see Quynh and had a very entertaining meal. The boys got their hair cut at a Vietnamese salon. I went along to laugh. That evening Quynh showed up on her motorbike and took first Charlie and then me around the city. We were gone about an hour. Had a look at the Citadel and she took me to meet her friend, which was lovely. Spent the evening chilling back at the hostel. I've learned a couple of chords of guitar. Well, mostly just 'c' :D

The next morning we left our bags at the hostel and checked out. We decided to motorbike it down the 160km from Hue to Hoi An Top Gear-style so have got some little automatic motorbikes and a guide - Mr. Ty. We had a quick practice up and down the street outside the hostel, figuring out how to start it and (importantly) stop it. Is actually not as hard as I thought. No gears to worry about, just twist the handle to go and use the brakes to stop! At 9am we set off. There was eight of us in total - the four Londoners, Swiss Andy and two English girls called Helen and another Charlie!!!

Our first challenge was getting out of Hue, which really was a challenge as the main crossroads have no lights or directions, just a free-for-all. But once we were on the main road, apart from the occasional large trucks and buses it was fine. Oh and the animals. Charlie (boy) almost hit a chicken and I had to do an emergency stop as a stupid dog ran back into the road after nearly being hit by the bike in front of me. Luckily I didn't hit it but it gave me a very disapproving look. Crazy animal. We stopped off at a fishing village and then at a gorgeous waterfall for a properly needed swim as we were all super hot and sweaty! We also stopped off at some American outpost in the mountains along the coastal road where we were swamped by women trying to sell stuff. Not so fun, but the road itself was beautiful! Drove through Danang and had a brief break on the beach and at the marble carving centre.

In total the journey took us eight hours, arriving in Hoi An around 5pm. Ended up rather sunburned so we were all glowing nicely! It was amazing fun, though we wished our guide had been a little better. He stopped somewhere (fairly) expensive for lunch so none of us ate there. Our meal that evening was fantastic as a result though! Plus they did 600ml bottles of Tiger beer for 20.000VD (66p). :D And we all have the motorbike bug so chances are we're going to hire them again!

Hanoi and Halong Bay

I meant to update this sooner but I haven't had time! Now I have a free afternoon in Hue so I figured I should use it to let y'all know what I've been up to this past week. It's a lot so I apologise now for the length!

Well I arrived in Vietnam after two rather long flights. The first to Singapore was actually not too bad as I had two seats on the upper deck of the huge Airbus to myself which meant I could spread out a little. And they kept feeding me so all was good. The second flight to Hanoi was cramped and hot and by the time I arrived at the airport and collected my luggage I was exhausted. Couldn't find the bus from the airport so ended up getting a taxi instead. Took me to the wrong hostel first (Backpackers Hotel instead of Backpackers Hostel) - I think that was a genuine mistake as I'd told him I was meeting someone at my hostel. Did end up having to argue about the price at the end as he tried to put it up, but I won.

After a snooze at the hostel I found out I'd arrived on Australia Day and as the guys that run the hostel are Auzzies it was packed with them, especially as they were offering free beer. They were also doing frog racing - with live frogs - and a vegemite eating contest which was funny to watch. Sadly jetlag caught up with me so I disappeared early to bed.

At breakfast on Wednesday I met a Swiss guy so we ended up spending the day roaming Hanoi. The city is rather polluted and very dusty, but the weather wasn't cold so it wasn't that bad. Walked around the Hoam Koam Lake and down to the south. Got lost around the streets but nothing serious. Had lunch at a little cafe that had a menu that included snake, civit cat, porcupine, pangdolin(?) and tortoise. I ended up going for chicken and corn soup which has the consistency of wallpaper paste and tasted pretty much like it too! They brought us beer which we had to politely decline and swap for coca cola. In the afternoon visited Hoa Lo Prison (aka the "Hanoi Hilton" as it was called by American POWs during the war). Was quite interesting although it was mostly concerned with political prisoners during the French occupation. Lots of pro-Vietnam propaganda. Walking around the city is pretty dangerous. There are just hundreds of motorcycles/motorbikes and they don't really stick to the road. The pavements are covered in stalls and parked bikes most of the time so you have to walk on the roads anyway. And the ONLY way to cross the road is to just walk and keep walking, slowly. You avoid the cars and then trust that the motorcycles will avoid you! I saw so many near misses, it's unbelievable. And the things they carry on them - flatscreen tvs, boxes, poles three times longer than the bike, beer, live pigs and cows... The list is unending.

The next day was an early start as I'd booked on the tour to Halong Bay. It was a four hour minibus ride to the port and the weather wasn't looking good, but our English guide Henry reckoned it would clear up... We were boated to our "junk" for the trip, fed lunch as it left the port and were showed into our cabins, which were really nice. We dropped anchor off some of the islands and some of the guys jumped off the top deck into the water. Brrr! It was too cold for me! But I did get into a kayak - me and an English guy called Danny and off we paddled. We weren't very good. I was in the front so I suppose I was meant to steer but I lost track of the times we went around in circles! Made it through a cave and saw the monkeys on an island, then followed the guide to a floating village. I swear we saw the floating bar that Top Gear visited! The village was amazing. I saw a little boy about seven years old happily rowing his little sister around in a boat completely unsupervised. We also almost got run over by another large junk as it began to reverse... Oops. Made it safely back to the boat ok, unlike the crazy Isreali Eitan ("already eaten" - does the best Borat impressions ever!) who lost his paddle not once but twice! Dinner was fresh seafood (oh dear) but I did try the fish. It had teeth!!! Ah! Sat up on the deck after dinner with the other guys on the trip. There's four London lads who I'm now travelling south with who Grant would just love. Proper cockneys :) Tried teaching me rhyming slang but I've forgotten it. Shh! Ended up not going to bed until 2am after watching some of the drunken people throw themselves off the deck again.

I'd only booked myself onto the two day/one night trip but I made a deal with the guys that I would stay for the extra night if they would travel down south with me. Seemed fair. So I got all that sorted after breakfast the next morning and those of us that were staying the extra night - nineteen in all - switched to another boat... in the middle of the sea... that was a little hair-raising! We then had over an hours boat journey through the islands right out to the outer edges of the bay where we had our own private island. In fact, island is a little excessive. It was a stretch of beach perhaps 100m wide at the most. 20m cliff to the back and sides and the sea to the front. It was gorgeous - a real castaway island! Literally in the middle of nowhere. Hardly saw another boat let alone tourists! The only way to land on it was for this (fairly large) boat to practically ground itself on the beach for us to hop off into the water.

We were staying in hut things. Basically a wooden pallet with a grass roof and that was it. No walls, just a thin mattress with a duvet and mosquito net. We played volleyball on the beach and ate lunch overlooking the sea. It was quite warm and a little sunny. There were kayaks there that we could take out whenever we wanted so me and another Charlie (boy) went out and managed not to crash. Then I went wake-boarding that afternoon. Took us out and had us jump in the water. It was FREEZING! I actually thought my lungs had gone into shock. But managed to get my feet strapped to the board without drowning and almost got up on my first try. Got on my feet every time after that but the longest I managed to stay up was about 20 seconds. Still brilliant fun! The two instructors (from America and the UK) ended up showing off, backflips, the lot. Found the only hot shower on the island to warm up in and felt much better after that.

That evening we played poker with shells for chips and someone had got their hands on some green zinc sunblock so all nineteen of us, plus the two wakeboard guys plus the three Vietnamese men all ended up with weird designs all over our faces. At midnight it became Eitan's birthday so we all signed a piece of paper for him and sang happy birthday. Played 'Around the World' ping pong which started off quite sensibly but ended with fourteen of us playing with anything but bats - pringles tin, plates, trays, bowls, flippers... From that we moved onto volleyball again but it was too dark.

The next morning it was raining but not cold. The boat arrived at 8am and we travelled back to join up with our original junk, most of us looking slightly worse for wear and still covered in green stuff. We got some funny looks from the other people on the boat! Had lunch on board and then got a minibus again for the four hour trip back to Hanoi. The sun came out on the way back which was nice but most of us dozed. Once back at the hostel in Hanoi I sorted out my bus pass for the trip down Vietnam - five stops which came to $40 (sleeper buses). That night three of the four London lads and me went for a dinner in the most expensive place I've eaten so far. It came to 120,000 dong, so about four pounds. That night all of us that were on the island went out again as it was Eitan's birthday this day and Mikey's (a fireman from Sussex) birthday the next day. Went to a Vietnamese Jazz club and then to an Irish bar. Apparently it was meant to shut at ten but it was still open just after midnight - until the police turned up anyway. According to Henry (the guide from the island) it's a fairly common occurrence and they normally just turn a blind eye to it but they're cracking down at the moment due to Tet. We did find another bar *somewhere* in Hanoi so stayed there for a while. A group of us left and almost walked into a scene straight out of The Fast and the Furious - a group of about 50 or so Vietnamese lads with their motorbikes racing around the streets!! We tried to avoid them but needed to cross their street to get back to our hostel. They were actually lovely and waved us across no worries.

It's odd, despite the people hassling you for buying stuff/cyclo trips/motorcycle taxis I haven't felt threatened once.

The next morning was my last day in Hanoi so I went with a couple of Danish girls and an Australian girl to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum. Dead guy. Looked like something out of Madam Tussuad's. But it was an experience just to be shepherded around by all the Vietnamese soldiers in shiny uniforms and told to hush while walking around the body. From there we got a little lost trying to find the Temple of Literature and ended up getting a taxi. We always made sure it was on the meter as otherwise they'd try and rip you off. That afternoon I had a walk around a market with the Londoners as we were all catching the night but later that evening. There was all sorts of live food there - mostly seafood. Fish, eels, shellfish, crabs, frogs and something that looked suspiciously like snakes but probably was just a different type of eel. We watched one lady kill this huge catfish - slit all around its neck then snapped its back and pulled its head off... while it was alive. The head kept twitching in the bowl afterwards! Wandered back to the hostel via a chemist as someone needed some paracetamol and I was horrified to find you can buy antibiotics and prescription drugs just over the counter! Madness.

Tom, Jimmy and I went out for food and had the best food I have eaten so far in Vietnam. It was at a street kitchen down this really dingy looking alley. The woman cooked it in a pot on the street and we were sitting on the road on teeny tiny plastic stools. The food was really simple - pho ga which is noodles and chicken soup but it was so so good. It was a huge bowl and I couldn't eat it all. The boys added chilli to theirs which was hilarious as it was very spicy! To top it off it cost 20,000 dong which is 66p.

Got a transfer from the hostel to out sleeper bus. There were bunk beds! On the bus! That's what our seats were. I cannot describe in words what it looked like but it was amazing! We got comfy and, with the bus driver playing loud Vietnamese pop music we set off for Hue!