Hanoi to Nanning, China

We left Hanoi on a wet dull day.  We needed to cross a bridge over the river but bikes were not allowed on this part of the road, we rode around for a while trying to find a bridge we could use but to not avail, in the end we rode like the Vietnamese, disobeyed the signs and just crossed with the cars.  The road was terrible and the recent rains meant mud, lots of mud.  We rode through rice paddies and past large factories.  Our last night in Vietnam was at Long Son, we had our bikes cleaned by high pressure hose to get all the mud off the chains and the gears, but within half an hour of setting off they were just as bad. The scenery changed from flat fields to lovely rugged hills as we headed to the Chinese border.  The crossing into China went smoothly, our passports were stamped and a nice young official said "Welcome to China" and we rode through.  We were hoping for better roads, and we did get good surface for a while, but not for long, we soon encountered many roadworks and more mud which made our progress slow.  There was very little traffic, mainly cars with a few motor bikes.  China was such a nice change, rolling hills, trees, birds singing and sugar cane fields which were being cut by hand, then loaded into carts pulled by bullocks.  Our first overnight stop in China was a large town just over the border and our first experience of Chinese life.  The streets were clean, the footpaths were clear, there was a shopping centre, and no one hassling us to buy their goods.  For the next couple of days we rode through similar scenery, staying in small towns and eating great Chinese food along the way.  Accommodation was not as good as we have been used to and the humid weather made drying our clothes difficult, but we were happy to be in China with lovely scenery, polite and friendly people and great food.  One morning we stopped to buy a drink and the stall owner offered us some hot noodles which Mike gladly accepted, as he went into the back of the shop to eat them he was surprised to see about fifteen men sitting at tables gambling, they would not let him take a photo. We have been registered with Warmshowers, an organisation providing host homes for long distance cyclists, but had not used them until now.  We were to stay with a host in Nanning, the first major city for us in China.  We arrived  covered in mud and greeted warmly by Nancy, an American who works at Guangxi University and lives on campus.  We had planned to stay two nights but stayed for four.  Nancy was a great host and introduced us to some of her students and friends.  Tien Tien, a friend of Nancy, taught Mike to play Chines Chess so be bought a small travelling set. The university is very big, about 30,000 students and teaches live on campus which is like a small city with a market, restaurants and a hotel.  We enjoyed our stay here very much, we rested, the bikes had a little maintenance and enjoyed having company.

The lake in Hanoi

Inside the sleeping bus

The sleeping bus

Sunset over the river at Dong Ha

Mike mends his first puncture

Planting rice on a misty morning

Ploughing the fields

At the Purple Palace

Parts of the palace have been restored

The moat around the Purple Castle

A Dragon Boat on the river at Hue'

Just after Danang we climbed a long hill up into the clouds

Many older woman smoke cigars

A pagoda with it's very own elevator

Hoi An Beach

The River at Hoi An

An elaborate dragon (in the back ground) at a pagoda in Hoi An

One of the large murals at a pagoda in Hoi An

One of the very old houses in Hoi An

Pagoda in Hoi An

Hanoi and Ha Long Bay

We were again back on Highway 1 but this section was better than further South, wider and not as much traffic.  It was hot again, 34 degrees, but the road was flat and we made good times until Mike had his first puncture for the trip which he mended by the side of the road. We passed a roadside bus stop café, our signal to have lunch, we use these as often as we can, then on to Dang Ha.  We were about to stop at Dang Ha when Heather had a fall, luckily onto a pile of roadside rubbish which broke the fall. Unfortunately the right brake lever was damaged which Mike managed to get back into place and it is now held together with duck tape.  A trip to the local medical centre, a bit like a small public hospital emergency room, where there was an English speaking doctor who examined the sore arm in the waiting room and then sent his patient off for an X ray upstairs, the results came back, no break but some nerve damage, three prescriptions which were filled at the clinic -  within an hour we were out of there, total cost about $11 Aust.  The arm needed to rest for a week, but after a couple of days at Dang Ha,  a dusty industrial city which Highway 1 passes through, we decided to catch a bus to Hanoi.  Dang Ha we will remember for two things, the injury and seeing dog meat on the menu for the first time.  The bus was a ‘sleeping bus’, these buses travel at night and instead of a seat passengers have a bed to lie on with a pillow, blanket and a bottle of water supplied.  We rode through the night and arrived in Hanoi at 6.3o in the morning.  It was cold and raining, a bit of a shock coming from 34 degrees to 13 degrees in a just a few hundred kilometres .   Hanoi is the capital of  Vietname but not as big as Ho Chi Minh City, and is like any Asian city, polluted, noisy with lots of motor bikes and cheap eats, though not as cheap as down south. We did find a very good place to eat, the Kangaroo Club, where else, who served large meals so Mike did not have to order two, and they had things live pumpkin soup and fish and chips, with real chips, on the menu. We went to see the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum but it was closed but we did get  to the Ho Chi Minh Museum which was very interesting, he is revered  throughout  Vietnam as a great person who overthrew the rich and nobility to make life better for the poor.  It is winter with an overcast sky ,we did not see the sun once while we were there.   We applied for our visas for China, expecting them to be back when we return from our trip to Ha Long Bag.  We calculated it will take us at least three months to ride to Beijing but we can only get a one month visa, which gives us only 20 days in  China within that month.  Other people, and books we have read, tell us not to worry, that we will be able to get extensions easily, but we are a bit nervous about entering a country without everything in place before we go.  We booked our trip to Ha Long Bay, a bus trip from Hanoi then cruising in the bay to marvel at the beautiful islands, 3,000 in all.  We had the opportunity to go kayaking and explored a couple of caves and saw the people, about 400, who live permanently on the water here.  We spent the night on the boat, then went to Cat Ba Island where we did a walk to the highest peak, but the view was nonexistent because of the low cloud it was very muddy and most people decided to have a coffee rather than do the walk.  We left the tour then and spent a couple of extra days on Cat Ba Island away from the hustle and bustle of Hanoi, it was very quiet there as it was the low tourist season and we spent the time relaxing away from honking horns and traffic. There are no seagulls in Vietnam, we find it quite strange not to see them at the beaches, especially the fishing villages, but on Ha Long Bay there are sea eagles which glide through the sky looking for a meal and dive for fish. The trip back on the boat took us to an incredible cave with stalagmites like we have never seen before, we could have spent a lot longer there but we were on a tour and time was limited so we took lots of photos to look back on.  Our last day in Hanoi was St Patricks Day so in the evening we went to the Irish Wolfhound Pub where we had a couple of drinks and dinner as well as a chat to a father and son from Queensland who were travelling together and Fergus, the very drunk manage of the pub who gave Mike a souvenir Guinness T Shirt, this will match his Guinness hat that he got last year and the Irish pub in Frankston.  Tomorrow we leave Hanoi for a two to three day ride to the Chinese border.

Water Buffalo working

Nha Trang to Hoi An and Hue'

Nha Trang to Hoi An and Hue’

Nha Trang was a tourist destination with a lovely beach and good food. We met an English couple who spend six months every year in Asia to escape the English winter and the heating costs.  We went with them to a Vietnamese restaurant where the beer was brought to the table in a large thermos so it stayed cold.  We rode out of Nga Trang along a scenic stretch of coastline for about 20 klms, until we met up with Highway 1, our route all the way to Hanoi about 1.200 klms away.  This highway is very busy and noisy with honking horns but there is a lane for motor bikes and cyclist but becomes monotonous as we pass dusty towns which line the road, in the end they all look the same.  We marvel at what people carry on a motor bike, including a coffin, we wondered if there was anyone in it. After an overnight stay at a small fishing village Song Cau we had an 11 klm climb up out of a pass and it was raining, we caught up with an old truck chugging up, billowing out exhaust fumes, it was struggling very slowly and at one stage thought we might even pass it. Traffic was building up behind so we stopped for a while until the congestion cleared then set off again, and blow me if we didn’t meet the same truck on the way down, having just as much difficulty going down as coming up – there are number of truck mechanics who have set up businesses on these hills. We got off the highway for a while and followed the coast road until we came to a lovely coastal town Quy Nhan, with a great beach and very few tourists, where we had a rest day and Mike did some maintenance on the bikes.   We had not seen any other cyclists for a long time but while we were here we met a Swiss couple, Patrick and Chantelle who had been away for almost two years following a similar route to ours but in reverse.   As we travelled north back on Highway 1 the road flattened out and the temperature dropped and we were able to achieve greater kilometers per day, it was along this stretch that we met Ronnie and Meiki from Germany, seasoned touring cyclists, we had dinner with them.  We turned off the highway to visit Hoi An and have a rest day.  Hoi An is World Heritage listed in an area where 16 century architecture is intact, very touristy and all the old building are now housing businesses selling souvenirs but it has a nice atmosphere and we enjoyed walking around sightseeing looking at the river, the temples and some very old houses open to the public and still lived in, they were originally owned by merchants trading along the river, once a busy port. We joined in a game of paddle bingo, played in the street at night where you buy a paddle with three symbols, with much singing and showmanship, symbols are drawn and if you get three right you win a Chinese lantern – we didn’t win but the man sitting next to us did and was very excited. We were able to follow a coastal road to Danang, the amount of building along this 30 kilometer stretch is amazing, resorts and exclusive villas, even a Greg Norman estate, Hoi An and Danang are almost joined.  Danang is a big city and has lovely beaches, it also has a mountain pass that we rode over, up in the clouds at the summit and most of the way down where we came to a small seaside town and met up with Highway 1 again which we followed all the way to Hue’, another ancient town which is  UNESCO World Heritage listed where we visited the Forbidden Purple City formerly reserved for the private life of the emperor before he abdicated to allow communist rule.  This was once a splendid palace but has been damaged through wars and neglected and is now being restored by funding from the German government. We made use of the good restaurants here as we suspect they will be light on during the next stage of our trip, we found one of the very supermarkets in Vietnam and bought a few things as reserves.

Nha Trang was a tourist destination with a lovely beach and good food. We met an English couple who spend six months every year in Asia to escape the English winter and the heating costs.  We went with them to a Vietnamese restaurant where the beer was brought to the table in a large thermos so it stayed cold.  We rode out of Nga Trang along a scenic stretch of coastline for about 20 klms, until we met up with Highway 1, our route all the way to Hanoi about 1.200 klms away.  This highway is very busy and noisy with honking horns but there is a lane for motor bikes and cyclist but becomes monotonous as we pass dusty towns which line the road, in the end they all look the same.  We marvel at what people carry on a motor bike, including a coffin, we wondered if there was anyone in it. After an overnight stay at a small fishing village Song Cau we had an 11 klm climb up out of a pass and it was raining, we caught up with an old truck chugging up, billowing out exhaust fumes, it was struggling very slowly and at one stage thought we might even pass it. Traffic was building up behind so we stopped for a while until the congestion cleared then set off again, and blow me if we didn’t meet the same truck on the way down, having just as much difficulty going down as coming up – there are number of truck mechanics who have set up businesses on these hills. We got off the highway for a while and followed the coast road until we came to a lovely coastal town Quy Nhan, with a great beach and very few tourists, where we had a rest day and Mike did some maintenance on the bikes.   We had not seen any other cyclists for a long time but while we were here we met a Swiss couple, Patrick and Chantal who had been away for almost two years following a similar route to ours but in reverse.   As we travelled north back on Highway 1 the road flattened out and the temperature dropped and we were able to achieve greater kilometers per day, it was along this stretch that we met Ronnie and Meiki from Germany, seasoned touring cyclists, we had dinner with them.  We turned off the highway to visit Hoi An and have a rest day.  Hoi An is World Heritage listed in an area where 16 century architecture is intact, very touristy and all the old building are now housing businesses selling souvenirs but it has a nice atmosphere and we enjoyed walking around sightseeing looking at the river, the temples and some very old houses open to the public and still lived in, they were originally owned by merchants trading along the river, once a busy port. We joined in a game of paddle bingo, played in the street at night where you buy a paddle with three symbols, with much singing and showmanship, symbols are drawn and if you get three right you win a Chinese lantern – we didn’t win but the man sitting next to us did and was very excited. We were able to follow a coastal road to Danang, the amount of building along this 30 kilometer stretch is amazing, resorts and exclusive villas, even a Greg Norman estate, Hoi An and Danang are almost joined.  Danang is a big city and has lovely beaches, it also has a mountain pass that we rode over, up in the clouds at the summit and most of the way down where we came to a small seaside town and met up with Highway 1 again which we followed all the way to Hue’, another ancient town which is  UNESCO World Heritage listed where we visited the Forbidden Purple City formerly reserved for the private life of the emperor before he abdicated to allow communist rule.  This was once a splendid palace but has been damaged through wars and neglected and is now being restored by funding from the German government. We made use of the good restaurants here as we suspect they will be light on during the next stage of our trip, we found one of the very supermarkets in Vietnam and bought a few things as reserves.