I can officially drive anywhere

We rented motorcycles and headed out into the countryside, taking the backroads at first, driving through small communities with roads that resemble paths through the woods. Lots of concentration and plenty of bouncing around (thank god for sports bras!). As we drive through some of the villages you get a real taste for the life in Vietnam. Lots of hard physical labour, a sense of real community and smiles everywhere. We were constantly greeted by children running out into their yards screaming "hello, hello..what your name?" Occasionally that is followed by an outstretched hand and the word 'money', but here in Ninh Bihn that is the exception not the rule.

Mostly they are just happy to see you, practice the few words of english they know and move on their way. We wound our way through the back roads, no real destination in mind. The countryside is breathtaking so there were many pit stops so that we could take photos or just sit and admire the countryside.

We ended up on highway 1 for about 14km and that is where the real excitement begins. Dust is flying everywhere, buses drive past blaring their horns, bikes merge onto the highway without looking expecting you to accommodate them. Oncoming traffic in your lane does not budge but expects you to move further over (into the ditch if required) to make room for them. It took about 20 minutes to get where we were going and I am certain that I aged about 3 years in that amount of time. We returned to the guesthouse covered in a thick layer of dust but still with smiles plastered on our faces.

At one point driving past a field we stopped to take pictures of some people working in the fields. I decided to go out and visit with them. From the moment I arrived, I was greeted with smiles and the man proceeded to speak rapidly in Vietnamese explaining what they were doing in the field. He, his wife and their daughter were crouched down with knives, cutting away. I borrowed his wife's knife and proceeded to work for a while. They sat there smiling and laughing. They were clearing the field (by hand) in preparation for the next harvest of rice. Hard work..in the hot sun. We have such an easy life in comparison. Gave them all Canada pins and they smiled and waved at us until we were just dots on the horizon to them.

Yesterday we rented bicycles and bounced our way down more backroads. Today we plan on making the long hard climb up Bich Dong Pagoda. Not sure how many steps there are...but from the bottom it looks endless.

more and more

more odds and ends

Some odds and ends of photos

The real Vietnam (or more real than some of the places we have been)

Instead of travelling to Ninh Binh as we had planned after the rains of Hue sent us running as quickly as possible...we decided to take a mini bus to a place called Ha Tinh. What is there you might ask? Not much that is oriented to tourists. Perhaps that is why we chose it. After Hoi An where every 2 steps someone is pulling at your arm and saying "my friend, come to my shop'...it would be a nice change of pace. Our books said there were a couple of nice beaches, so we said why hell not.

The bus was filled with Vietnamese and dropped us off in the middle of nowhere, where no one spoke English and all spoke to us like we should completely understand Vietnamese. After getting completely taken to the cleaners by some moto drivers, we got to a hotel and checked in. Ate some lunch and went out exploring the streets. Watching the faces of the locals as we walked past was worth the stop in Ha Tinh on its own. First they would register shock, perhaps followed by disbelief. They would completely stop what they were doing, call their friends over to stare at us. The children would scream hello and then when we responded they would bend over in laughter. It was quite fun actually.

This man came up to our friend Lee, rubbed the blonde hair on his arms, patted his stomach and then proceeded to lift him up. For no apparent reason and offering no explanation at all for his actions. Ha.

We met some lovely guys at the hotel we were at...a bunch of Americans from the army, navy, etc who are here in Vietnam searching for the soldiers that have been missing since the war. Pretty fascinating sitting and talking with them about their jobs and what they do in a day.

Today we travelled onwards to Ninh Binh. Getting here was a little bit of a challenge. It included standing on the side of the road and trying to flag down a bus headed in our direction. After about 30 minutes and several failed attempts (the entire time we had a group of people yelling at us and pointing...I am sure trying to be helpful but we had no idea what they were saying). In the end it turned out we had to be outside town limits to flag down a bus. So in a taxi we got, the driver stayed with us and helped flag down a local bus headed in our direction. The guy working on the bus (we nicknamed Hitler for his charming personality) crammed Lee and I into the back row of the bus where the bench seat wasn't even attached to the floor of the bus and slid around every time he touched the brakes.

Deb had an admirer on the bus. An old man (76 yrs old) came down the aisle to chat her up, told her she was beautiful and then got yelled at by Hitler and promptly returned to his seat. We got dumped off on the side of the road, not entirely certain where we were. Made some friends on the bus who were teaching us the correct pronunciation of names of places in Vietnam and seemed thrilled with the Canadian pins we left them with. All in all...a long day but a good day.