Lunar New Year on Valentine's Day

Kevin and I are now in Cambodia. Our 3rd day.
I was stuck in bed with a sickness for 1 day, but this is our 2nd day of active site seeing.


It is the New Year for China and Vietnam. Not Cambodia.
We sadly, specifically fled Vietnam to avoid being stuck anywhere during the new year which they call "Tet."
Cambodia has similar problems that arise this day. So many hotels were booked and we carry on very spur of the moment so, thankfully we found a VERY nice hotel.

For lunar new year we were awakened by the dragon dance and the street parade filled with loud drumming as early as 8 am.
We started our day with an annoying haggling scene for a Tuc tuc (local transport). They were trying to charge us 10$ for a 2$ ride!!!!!! So irritating. The only way out of this is lining up places for one driver to take us and wait for a total of 5$. This is the poorest country we have been to and the tuc tuc drivers have created some inflated prices for tourists. They simply use excuses like gas is expensive but it is $1 a liter and their vehicles get 25 kilometers per liter. It's all so confusing because when haggling we RARELY win and they walk away!

Another Day, in yes, Hue (Vietnam)

This was a day on an organized tour through Sinh Cafe. This "cafe" is located in MANY cities across Vietnam and has reasonably priced organized tours. Because they are now in "The Lonely Planet," the book we use in south east Asia, they are now well-known. They have grown so big, the office in SaiGon (Ho Chi Minh City) is impressive with air conditioning. The more customers, in this case, the cheaper the tours. hooray!

This tour included:
Visiting a small river village
Visiting a martial arts/karate performance (optional)
Thien Mu Pagoda (free)
Hon Chen Temple (22,000 Dong per person/$1.1911)
Minh Mang Tomb and Site (55,000 Dong per person/$2.9778)
Khai Dinh Tomb (55,000 Dong per person/$2.9778)
Tu Duc Tomb (55,000 Dong per person/$2.9778)
Visiting an area where they make incense (for alters) and Conical hats

The river villages are always still so fascinating to see. They have such long bosta with a small covered area. Sometimes they are carrying large amounts of dirt, grass, or goods to the other side of the river. You can often see them hanging clothes across their narrow boats and you may also see them cooking.

No WAY! Yes Hue/ Another town in Vietnam

Hue was a surprising town in Vietnam. Surprisingly, a lot to do there.

I think we spent the most time in the Citadel also known as the Purple Forbidden City, The Forbidden city, or as I like to call it the Forbidden Purple City. On the tourist maps it is known as the Citadel and we spent 3 hours exploring what once was a whole town separated by a moat. Around the whole Citadel was a moat. This site is actually being voted on to be added to the UNESCO World Heritage sites. It was huge with many different pavilions, thrones, worship halls and even a library. The only thing I found sad about this place were two elephants we saw in an open field. The space was green and very open, but the elephants were chained with only 1 foot of chain and absolutely NO moving space. The ONLY time we saw the elephant move around was when 2 Westerners paid money to dress up in colorful silk robes with some shiny headdress and pretend they were royalty! I can't pin-point why exactly I felt this way, but this looked ridiculous to me. Why was I one of so few who actually felt sorry for these elephants? Why do people find pleasure in sitting on abused elephants and waving to strangers?

Well here are some pictures from the Forbidden City in Hue:

This same day, after our cyclo ride to the Citadel


..... we took a taxi to Dao Quoc Pagoda.
This pagoda, like many, was free. There are monks who live here and their belief is to not be obsessed with money and power. This means that most of these pagodas are free. Immediately after entering the pagoda I saw monks playing hacky sack. The sport they play in Vietnam is not actually with a hacky sack but what is known as a birdie (for badminton). It was a calm environment but still some fun for the monks.
As we explored this small area, we found a back area where studying monks were reading and sitting with friends.






That's not it!
after the pagoda we found the same taxi guy (who was apparently waiting for us (at no cost/ no meter running). We went to the Notre Dame Cathedral in Hue. This cathedral was an impressive modern building, VERY simplistic in nature. Yet it seemed to combine the functional aspects of a European cathedral with traditional Vietnamese spire. At first glance it looked like a typical Cathedral, once we viewed this church from another angle we could see the Vietnamese influenced steeple usually on pagodas.





Then, we finally called it a night.

Sa Pa: Ý Linh Hồ, Lao Chải, Tả Van Village Exploration

The train we took to Sapa

Fog coming into town. This was our view from the 5th floor at our hotel.
Sapa Church
Snack with Delicious Vietnamese Coffee
In front of the tourist office in Sapa
Two Black H'Mong women looking for tourists. View from the cafe'.

Today was our short one day trek for a total of 10km.
It was raining and the visibility was low, but once we got closer to the village we could see the rice patty terraces.

Yesterday, I had no tolerance for the women selling things. Today was different. I heard stories that the women follow you on your trek. They did. 10 women deep. At first, I was very quiet and said no thank you when they persistently asked "What's your name?" "Where you from?" "How old are you" "How long you stay in Sapa?" ETC. Then I slowly answered and asked them the same questions. They continued with "How many brothers and sister do you have?" And I realized their English was pretty impressive. They answered all my questions and told me we were walking to their village called Lao Chải. They became human. I couldn't ignore them anymore. One woman I walked with named Lang had a baby on her back all bundled up and covered. For 1 hour I didn't even realized she had a baby she was carrying. Her baby Zao was a girl and very quiet, until she became hungry 10 minutes later. Lang has 5 daughters and sells textiles for work. The rice fields are only worked on once a year since the town is in the mountains.

After lunch I bought a wallet, little purse and scarf from Lang and her friend. Lang was so grateful she took us to her house where we met 2 of her daughters. One was sleeping and the fifth was 4 years old at "school."

Our trek was booked through Sapa Pathfinder Tours or SP tours. It was only 10USD per person and I was pleased. We began passing Ý Linh Hồ which was the foggiest part of the trek. We could not see much. We continued to Lao Chải. Lao Chải is where all the women (who were following us) were from. We saw grazing water buffalo. Families of pigs. We stopped by a primary school where 40 children were dancing for exercise. We visited the local hospital. This is where we ate lunch.
We visited a "home-stay" and watched women weaving hemp.


After lunch we continued to Tả Van Village. We saw more roosters, chickens, buffalo, rice fields, locals and another home stay house.

Such an easy trek and I am so happy with the pictures I was able to take.
The locals were so nice.

The tour:

The beautiful locals from Lao Chai and Ta Van Villages.

Our trek

First stop, a little house who's residence are making rice wine.

Kevin buying a walking stick (bamboo) from one of the local boys.

river under the bridge.

new bridge next to the old bridge.

We stopped by the primary school in Lao Chai Village and they were dancing outside for exercise.


The boys weren't dancing, they were eating snacks.

water buffalo hanging out by the rice terraces

We Bought souvenires from Lang and she was so appreciative she showed us her house and introduced us to her daughters:

Lang and her baby Zao

Baby Zao

Her kitchen
Lang and I.

People working on the rice fields in Ta Van Village