Here's to Hanoi
Greetings from Hanoi. I'm pleased to report that the group I've been traveling with since Luang Prabang in northern Laos - two Canadians from Toronto and an Italian from Florence with whom I've been practicing my Italian and he his English - has successfully made it to Hanoi over land through a northern border crossing that only opened to foreign tourists in April 2004 (Na Meo on the Vietnam side).
I ended up spending nine days in Laos, four more than originally intended, mostly because it's scenery was more spectacular than expected and there were plenty of things to do than I never knew about beforehand. The most significant of these were the Pathet Lao caves we explored in the northeastern border town of Vieng Xai two days ago. It's a network of tunnels and meeting rooms spread over a number of different caves surrounding the small and almost untouched (by tourists) town of Vieng Xai, the city in which the Laotion Communist forces (Pathet Lao) based and planned all of their activities during the Vietnam War. With today's "bunker buster" bombs used by the Americans in Afghanistan and Iraq, this underground cave network wouldn't have stood up for long, but back then their reinforced steel doors and protection from B-52 bombings by massive limestone walls was enough. Much of the original furniture is still there, making the tour even more surreal.
Having seen the caves, the four of us left Vieng Xai yesterday morning at 7am for a 2hr ride in the back of a pickup truck to the border town of Nam Heua, a frontier border with a small immigration desk and a single gate across the wide road - a gate that certainly doesn't stop all the Vietnamese and Laotians walking in and out of the country from either side, as we did after getting our exit stamps. After a five minute walk through Vietnamese/Laotian no man's land, we arrived at the series of huts that constitute this newly opened border crossing and proceeded to fill out the necessary paperwork asked of us by the kind and relaxed Vietnamese border officials. A quick search of our backpacks and declaration that we weren't bringing any dangerous diseases into the country preceeded the stamping of our passports, an incredibly relieving act as I'd been worried ever since Luang Prabang that for some reason I wouldn't be able to access Vietnam from the north.
This also marked the resumption of our overland trek towards Hanoi, a destination each of us were intent on reaching no matter how long it might take. Though we didn't know it at the time, it would be another 13 hours before we got there. Most of this was spent on the once-weekly local bus from the Vietnamese border to the nearest city 200 km away, while the remaining 150 km from there to Hanoi was enjoyed in a much more comfortable (though far more sterilized and less interesting) mini-bus that makes the route to and from Hanoi on a half-hourly basis. It was a bit of a challenge to track down this mini-bus because there was no central bus station where we could wait for the next shuttle. Instead, we were dropped off on the side of a busy thoroughfare and told to flag down the bus we wanted. About twenty minutes later we spotted the words 'Ha Noi', and waved frantically with the remaining energy we had left (not much at all) to ensure it wouldn't pass us by like the first one had, unknowingly, fifteen minutes earlier.
We reached Hanoi at around 11pm after a brief rain shower, the first I've experienced since leaving Dhaka, and were dropped off (after considerable haggling and negotiating fares with the Kip, Baht and US dollars we possessed) in the city's Old Quarter next to a great hostel offering clean singles with hot water for $5 USD per night. Not having any Vietnamese Dong at our disposal, and with me $20 in debt to my Canadian traveling mates from Toronto, we forced the bus to pull over at the first ATM we had seen since Vientiane to stock up on well needed funds - 1 million Dong, about 75 USD, in my case.
I forgot to mention our visit to the mysterious Plain of Jars outside Ponsavanh before traveling to Vieng Xai. It's a collection of stone jars (think giant sized shot glasses in various shapes and sizes) spread over three sights and a few hundred hectares on the bone-dry, brown hills surrounding the otherwise non-descript town. They have a similar allure to the statues of Easter Island, but by the time we reached the third of three official sights - an area being cleared of unexploded ordinance (UXOs) by specially trained staff with metal detectors the same time we were there - one jar began to resemble the next.
Either way, listening to the interesting stories from our local guide, coming up with personal theories on what the heck they were actually used for so many years ago and breathing in the fresh and and dramatic but desolate scenery of the surrounding countryside provided more than enough stimulation to prevent the Jars tour from becoming anything close to monotonous. The destroyed Soviet-made tank used by the Pathet Lao in the late 60s that we passed on the way back to town only added yet another layer of intrigue and interest to the experience.
Skipping forward to the present, I'm extremely relieved to have finally reached Hanoi. The European style coffee is strong and extraordinarily good, and even though all I've seen of the town so far are the two blocks surrounding my hostel, I know it's a city I'll have no trouble exploring for the next few days. I'll then be meeting up with a friend from McGill, who's here volunteering with the International Organization for Migration, with whom I'll likely travel eastwards to Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island to enjoy all the South China Sea coast has to offer. My only responsibilites aside from meeting up with her once she returns from Sapa near the Chinese border is to book my flight back to Bangkok on the 19th or 20th, something I don't think I'll have too much difficulty doing with so many travel agencies in this part of town.
Without further ado, I'm off to wander the streets of the Old Quarter, try to find the Revolution Museum to soak up some Communist propaganda, visit Ho Chi Minh in his mausoleum and stroll around the two lakes in the middle of town.
If anyone wants a postcard, send your postal address to my McGill account and I'll be happy to send off a quick note. As for pictures, I burned my first memory card onto CD in Luang Prabang but don't see a CD drive on these computers. I'll try to post a few if I get the chance sometime soon, and that's quite likely given how ridiculously cheap internet time is here.
I ended up spending nine days in Laos, four more than originally intended, mostly because it's scenery was more spectacular than expected and there were plenty of things to do than I never knew about beforehand. The most significant of these were the Pathet Lao caves we explored in the northeastern border town of Vieng Xai two days ago. It's a network of tunnels and meeting rooms spread over a number of different caves surrounding the small and almost untouched (by tourists) town of Vieng Xai, the city in which the Laotion Communist forces (Pathet Lao) based and planned all of their activities during the Vietnam War. With today's "bunker buster" bombs used by the Americans in Afghanistan and Iraq, this underground cave network wouldn't have stood up for long, but back then their reinforced steel doors and protection from B-52 bombings by massive limestone walls was enough. Much of the original furniture is still there, making the tour even more surreal.
Having seen the caves, the four of us left Vieng Xai yesterday morning at 7am for a 2hr ride in the back of a pickup truck to the border town of Nam Heua, a frontier border with a small immigration desk and a single gate across the wide road - a gate that certainly doesn't stop all the Vietnamese and Laotians walking in and out of the country from either side, as we did after getting our exit stamps. After a five minute walk through Vietnamese/Laotian no man's land, we arrived at the series of huts that constitute this newly opened border crossing and proceeded to fill out the necessary paperwork asked of us by the kind and relaxed Vietnamese border officials. A quick search of our backpacks and declaration that we weren't bringing any dangerous diseases into the country preceeded the stamping of our passports, an incredibly relieving act as I'd been worried ever since Luang Prabang that for some reason I wouldn't be able to access Vietnam from the north.
This also marked the resumption of our overland trek towards Hanoi, a destination each of us were intent on reaching no matter how long it might take. Though we didn't know it at the time, it would be another 13 hours before we got there. Most of this was spent on the once-weekly local bus from the Vietnamese border to the nearest city 200 km away, while the remaining 150 km from there to Hanoi was enjoyed in a much more comfortable (though far more sterilized and less interesting) mini-bus that makes the route to and from Hanoi on a half-hourly basis. It was a bit of a challenge to track down this mini-bus because there was no central bus station where we could wait for the next shuttle. Instead, we were dropped off on the side of a busy thoroughfare and told to flag down the bus we wanted. About twenty minutes later we spotted the words 'Ha Noi', and waved frantically with the remaining energy we had left (not much at all) to ensure it wouldn't pass us by like the first one had, unknowingly, fifteen minutes earlier.
We reached Hanoi at around 11pm after a brief rain shower, the first I've experienced since leaving Dhaka, and were dropped off (after considerable haggling and negotiating fares with the Kip, Baht and US dollars we possessed) in the city's Old Quarter next to a great hostel offering clean singles with hot water for $5 USD per night. Not having any Vietnamese Dong at our disposal, and with me $20 in debt to my Canadian traveling mates from Toronto, we forced the bus to pull over at the first ATM we had seen since Vientiane to stock up on well needed funds - 1 million Dong, about 75 USD, in my case.
I forgot to mention our visit to the mysterious Plain of Jars outside Ponsavanh before traveling to Vieng Xai. It's a collection of stone jars (think giant sized shot glasses in various shapes and sizes) spread over three sights and a few hundred hectares on the bone-dry, brown hills surrounding the otherwise non-descript town. They have a similar allure to the statues of Easter Island, but by the time we reached the third of three official sights - an area being cleared of unexploded ordinance (UXOs) by specially trained staff with metal detectors the same time we were there - one jar began to resemble the next.
Either way, listening to the interesting stories from our local guide, coming up with personal theories on what the heck they were actually used for so many years ago and breathing in the fresh and and dramatic but desolate scenery of the surrounding countryside provided more than enough stimulation to prevent the Jars tour from becoming anything close to monotonous. The destroyed Soviet-made tank used by the Pathet Lao in the late 60s that we passed on the way back to town only added yet another layer of intrigue and interest to the experience.
Skipping forward to the present, I'm extremely relieved to have finally reached Hanoi. The European style coffee is strong and extraordinarily good, and even though all I've seen of the town so far are the two blocks surrounding my hostel, I know it's a city I'll have no trouble exploring for the next few days. I'll then be meeting up with a friend from McGill, who's here volunteering with the International Organization for Migration, with whom I'll likely travel eastwards to Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island to enjoy all the South China Sea coast has to offer. My only responsibilites aside from meeting up with her once she returns from Sapa near the Chinese border is to book my flight back to Bangkok on the 19th or 20th, something I don't think I'll have too much difficulty doing with so many travel agencies in this part of town.
Without further ado, I'm off to wander the streets of the Old Quarter, try to find the Revolution Museum to soak up some Communist propaganda, visit Ho Chi Minh in his mausoleum and stroll around the two lakes in the middle of town.
If anyone wants a postcard, send your postal address to my McGill account and I'll be happy to send off a quick note. As for pictures, I burned my first memory card onto CD in Luang Prabang but don't see a CD drive on these computers. I'll try to post a few if I get the chance sometime soon, and that's quite likely given how ridiculously cheap internet time is here.
posted by Per at 10:49 p.m.
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