Vietnam, so far.

We landed safely in Hanoi, jumped on a shuttle and met Rik and Rach at the train station. We headed immediately for somewhere serving food, luckily we found a small cheap eatery a minute away. On the menu, a fine selection of foods, ranging from Chickens Stomach, Beef Penis, Steamed Dog, Pigs Trotters and a few other options like Fish, Noodles and some more 'normal' cuts of meat. An hour later, we were on a sleeper train heading to Lao Cai. It was definitely good to see some familiar faces, and enjoy some boy humour [I'm sure Miranda will share the same view], catch up, and enjoy a beer together.

The train itself was fine, not quite up there with the Orient Express, but the beds were comfortable, and we all slept reasonably well after knocking back some Hanoi beer [and Oreo's]. We all woke up to a knock on the cabin door, which meant we'd arrived in Lao Cai, and from there a short 40Km hop on a mini-van to our final destination, Sapa.

Sa Pa is famed for it's location in the hills [altitude of around 1,600M], and the ease of access for meeting the rural hill tribe folk and their villages. We only spent one night there, which is definitely all you need, and having hired some mopeds, we went about our discovery of several villages via some long windy roads/tracks, which was frequently interesting. We passed though the villages of Hau Thao [H'Mong tribe], Su Fan [School photos] and finally into Ban Ho [Zay and Tay tribes]. The highlight I think for all, was visiting a local school, unannounced and armed with sweets for the kids, we got some good pictures, poor things needed a wash. Another thing that did strike us, was how friendly they all were, and certainly got the feeling not many tourists penetrate as far as we got away from Sa Pa, highly rewarding, and very much an inspiring experience.   

Reaching Ban Ho with a bit of a thirst and hunger, we decided the settle for lunch [it's the end of the road], and thanks for a language barrier were forced to communicate our wishes by [me alone, ahem] performing a number of drawings, and farm animal movements and noises... *Snoooort*. Soon, we'd communicated we wanted Chicken, and a couple of minutes later, a girl came back with a Chicken, which at this point I wasn't sure if it served purely as clarification, buying a live Chicken to take home, or witnessing a sacrifice. On questioning, I managed to work out this Chicken was going to be putting it's neck on the line for us, and me being somewhat curious, in need of education, or perverse [delete as appropriate] decided to go and witness our lunch being slaughtered - fear not, I have it in glorious HD video. Actually, I think it's something everyone should see, if only to appreciate that meat doesn't grow on tree's, and that it doesn't grow with cling film and a price sticker on it. The Chicken [and associated rice] cost us £6 to feed the four of us.

The reality however was different from my expectations. My thinking was that this would be the freshest Chicken we'd ever eaten, and that it would be a fantastic eat. Wrong. It was awful, on so many levels. Not only was the Chicken basically quartered [minus the Breast, which mysteriously disappeared], therefore, two people had feet in their bowls, one beak and head, 2 kidneys, a liver, some unidentified pieces of meat, and some other typical pieces like wings, drumsticks... pick out the bits we want and man up, right? Wrong. Either they switched our freshly slaughtered Chicken, for something akin to a 2 week old carcass, that had been reheated a dozen times, or it was simply the worst Chicken I [actually all of us] had ever tasted, tough, bland, atrocious.

Throughout my life, I'd always disliked animals around the table during a meal time, however on this occasion, it was an absolutely wonderful, a godsend. The dogs ate well, very well, and we managed to [successfully, I think] pass off our almost unprecedented hunger off with a beaming smile on our face, before promptly leaving. It sounds awful, and the food was, but it sure made for an enjoyable meal, never have I laughed so much in the face of misfortune.

With that out of the way, we headed to a nearby waterfall, where we were told there was a pool for swimming. It was rather spontaneous, and sadly the girls didn't fancy dressing down to their lingerie for a dip.  Rik [sporting his UK winter tan] and I however were game, and promptly went about discovering just how cold Vietnamese water can be... breathtaking. This came after trying to scale a wall, and build a bridge to gain access to the upper pool and slide down the waterfall... on reflection, it's probably a good job we failed, it was pretty powerful, albeit small. Rik also performed his signature 'walking on water' miracle, see pics. Did I mention how cold it was?!

That night we headed to a restaurant, grabbed our first decent [mine, average] meal in Vietnam, and basically got a little merry. The following day was spent on another moped road trip, finishing with another local village, called Cat Cat. This one was significantly different, and very disappointing after our experience the previous day. Cat Cat suffers from tourism as much as it probably profits from it, basically here they see so many tourist that nobody is openly friendly [unless they want money for something], and it just feels like an organised tour over an above a discovery of something special. For instance, there's a lovely stone path that would put Jacobs Ladder [it shares the same incline as well] to shame which intricately weaves and meanders it's way through the village and into the next... overall, just disappointing, but to be expected I guess given the proximity to Sa Pa town, which is easily walking distance. Map HERE if you're interested.

Right, I have to dash, we're getting a flight to Saigon tonight [more on that later], and Miranda is giving me the cross-eyed look!

Finally, there's also stacks of photos that I've been uploaded in the last day or so, enjoy.

[probably full of errors, but I have no time to re-read it now]