Sumner

Well today was our second day on the water. I woke up and was hoping to see the sunrise but since it was so hazy you couldn’t see the sun. We enjoyed the scenery that we could see and then went up for thirty miniutes. It was interesting, kinda like a cross betwene yoga and dancing and taekwondokarate (whatever you want to call it). After tai chi we went down to breakfast. It was a buffet breakfast with all sorts of bread and fruits and pancakes and french toast and egg and pho and noodles and fried rice. They had a good mix of western and Vietnamese food. Anyway we ate our breakfast and then sailed to Ti Top Island where the people on the boat who were only going for two days got off. By the way, there is a choice of a two of three day tour of Hallong bay. We went with the three day tour because we could really expeirience it. This is how it works. The big boats like the ones that we stayed in come out of dock each day. Do all the things that we did on the first day and then spend the night. In the morning the people going for a three day tour get onto a day-boat and do the things that I will write about in just a moment. The big ship goes back to port and gets more people and then comes back to meet up with the day boat and picks the people back up. Then the next day the three day people do what the tow day people did the day before and the cycle starts over again. That way they can two and three day people all on one boat. So because Te Top was what we were going to do on the third day we didn’t go this time. After we dropped them off we got into the tender and were taken to a day boat. It wasn’t anything special, just six tables lined up along the sides with wood benches on the fron and the back of them. The boat had life jackets which is always a good sign. In the back there was a little kitchen/nap room for the crew and if you went around that you would be at the bathroom. All that I have described so far has been on the first level so I will move to the top level and telll you what is up there. Basicly it is just the captian’s area and a deck with a few chairs. Anyway we sailed for a while at a good clip but about half way through our journey to Cat Ba Island the engine had troubles and we slowed down allot. We saw ships that were over the horison come and slowly overtake us. We made it to Cat Ba island safely though. We got out of the boat and were given a choice of going on a motorcycle or a bike. We went with the bike because we could enjoy the scenery better. Then we biked to a village. It wasn’t very big but we saw some activity. It was basicly just three streets. One leading into the village and a road leading off of that to another road. All around the village were rice patties. Anyway we got to the end of the trail/road we got off our bikes and went on a hike through the forest. It was almost as if we flew back to Colorado in an instant and were hiking thorugh the forest. The only diference was that it was very hot and had more exotic plants. It was wierd but there were no birds! We didn’t see them flying of hear them sining, there was absolutely no sign that there were any birds. We asked the guide and hea said that they are hunted for food and that’s why there aren’t any birds. We hiked up for a while and then got to a cave. It wasn’t very big but it was still dark. After the cave we went back down to our bikes and went back to the dock. Lunch was readdy for us so we ate. The food was very good and we even got brave enough to eat some squid! Dad tasted it and said it was like cucumber. I tried it and I guess that I can see why he compaired it to cucumber because it is sorta cruchy at the beginning. After the crunch though feels like you are eating rubber. After lunch we sailed to a protected cove and got off to kyak. Mom and I went togather and dad and Hannah went together. We went to a big opening that led us to another open area. The tide was obdviously going out bacause we had to paddle upstream to get to the second area for kyaking. We paddled in the cove for a while looking at the beautiful scenery . Mom and I even went into a fishing net on accident! After we paddled for a while we went back through the tunnel and to the day boat. We managed to get on safely without falling in but one person in the group fell in. We then went back to the big boat and then sailed to the docking place for the night. Then we had dinner which was a set meal of all sorts of different seafoods. It was very fancy everything was presented nicely, they never just plopped it on the plate. It was also the first time that I was served a meal in courses like that. We had many apitizers, a main meal and a desert. After dinner we flopped into bed.

Sumner

Today we woke up ate breakfast and then started to get ready for going to Hallong Bay. Let me tell you what Hallong Bay is. Hallong Bay is located on the east coast of Vietnam in the big part at the top. It is a huge bay filled with big rocks called carsts which means that the sides of the rocks go almost straight down. Anyway I’ll tell you more about it later. We had organised the tour with the hotel so a hotel driver came to pick us up. Then we drove to Hallong Bay, a four hour trip if I remember corectly. We had decided to go with a company called Paridie Cruises because the hotel had recomended it and it had it’s own dock so it is much easier to goet on the boat. Anyway we got to the dock and waited in the loby until we were called to go onto the boat. We walked down the gangplank and then entered the boat. We walked in and were greted by flowers falling on our heads! Then we were directed upstairs to the eating room where the manager (his name is Jonas {pronounced yo-nus}) introduced to the staff. Then we were given our keys and went to our cabins. We had two cabins one for mom and dad and one for me and Hannah. I’ll tell you more about them later. After settling into our rooms we went back up tp the eating room for a buffet lunch. While we had lunch we departed from the dock and sailed out into HallongBay. Once lunch was done we went back down to the room for a miniute.

Hannah

So, today was dad’s first day in Vietnam. But thank goodness he made it to Hanoi safe and sound. This morning we decided to do a walking tour around the old quarter in Hanoi. (Without the crowds, Sumner was our guide.) We started at Yen Thai. ( That is where our hotel is, 3 Yen Thai.) and ended at the Ngoc Son Temple. (In the middle of a BIG lake. During the tour around Hanoi, We stopped for lunch at a place called Quan An Ngon. It is a place featuring various traditional Vietnamese food. Me and mom ordered some Vegetarian Dumplings, but they turned out to be basically hot steaming rolls. They were good though. Dad ordered Shrimp with Lemongrass and Chilies. He was I guess expecting the nice small shrimp that we Westerners eat. But instead, they were HUMUNGOUSLY large shrimp, and they still had their skin,and feet, and so forth. After lunch we went to the lake. WE were going to have a cyclo ride. (That is were you go in basically a cart where the oldish men drive you by peddling their bicycles.) But we never got to it. We are resting now in our hotel room, waiting for the time that we will get dinner. (Well at least me.) Sumner and I were going to really go right around the corner to go pick up the stamps that we had ordered. But dad will not let us. Now since dad is here, we have to be more cautious.  I just finished packing for the 2 day boat trip at Halong Bay. I am excited because we get to go kayaking. For the first time!!!
Boo Hoo, We only have basicly one more day in Hanoi! AND Sumner, Mom, and I have been here for 3 weeks! (half of our trip!) I think I have gotten too used to Hanoi. I have also met some really nice people here, so I wish I could live here. (For a little time.)
 We just finished a scrumptiously yummy dinner. We all did not have anything special, so I don’t need to tell you what we had for dinner. Dad made it through the day without taking a nap.

~Hannah~

Guess what? We went to church today. We went to a international church. It felt I was in God’s family because there were people from more than 30 DIFFERENT nations attending church! Wow that is a lot of different people. Church there was a lot different to  our church at home. (Foothills Bible Church.) It was an  A LOT  smaller group, and the pastors seem to switch of every Sunday! Today their was a guest speaker who I think was from the Philippines, but I am not 100% sure. But I am sure that I did not fully understand the sermon, because his English was hard to understand at times. Also they did not have a certain building for the church. The sanctuary was a  ballroom from a BIG hotel. After we sang a lot of beautiful hymns, we did the offering. After the offering we had the sermon of something. I did not fully understand the topic of the sermon. Soon after the sermon, we finished church. We tried to hail a taxi, but the first driver said we could not go to our destination.( Which was to have lunch.)We finally hailed a taxi that would take us to lunch. We had lunch at a place called KOTO’s ( Which means Know One Teach One.) It was a school/restaurant that took in 30 students each year. Those students were either street kids, or disadvantaged kids. Such as the kid lived in a very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very poor family, and could not afford for the kids to get education. When we were at the H’mong Mountain Retreat, we did a cooking class with a guy who came from a really, really, really, etc. And went to KOTO’s. And now, he is the Master Chef at Sapa Rooms. (The place we stayed a in Sapa.) We all had yummy lunches. Then we wandered our way to our hotel. After 3 seconds in the hotel, we headed out to go see if we could go get tickets at the Water Puppet Theatre. But when we got to the place where you order your tickets, the lady at the desk just said NO in the most rudest way. So finally we got her to give us some tickets for 9:00 tonight. I am really excited. Now we headed back to our hotel. But then I remembered that we had ordered some beautiful hand carved stamps. We got those back and finally went back to the hotel. now we are just hanging out in room. AND Dad  is on his way to Hanoi. I am SO excited. But he comes in the hotel at 11-12:00 at night! Surely we will be asleep! (hopefully!)

Hannah

Today we did a cooking class. It was fun, but I only had fun for a little bit. Why? Because We were making yummy fried spring rolls, when our cooking extraordinaire was trying to flip the spring rolls, she accidentally dropped them in the very hot (to me) cooking oil. It  splattered on my hand. It was not a very bad burn, but it still hurt very much. But I also learned how to treat a burn, with out ice, and the pain goes away pretty quickly. You need half of a lime or lemon. Then you simply squirt the lime juice on the places where you got burned and you are good. Also you can use some white light vinegar. After a while the pain will go way and you just have to be careful about where you put your hand.

~Hannah~

                                                                      Ba Be
Well, I have had a lot of adventures at Babe lake and in Phu Tho. We had to drive about… EIGHT HOURS! that was a long trip  just to get to Babe Lake. That was a very long trip for me. I luckily slept a lot on the way there. AND we had a driver that did not know how to drive the car. It was his first day on the job! ALSO they gave him a very bad car that barely went up those mountain roads! When we got into a pretty good sized town,our driver asked someone something in Vietnamese.  My mom asked if we were lost, but our guide just said that we were not lost, he was just
asking for directions. After a LONG time we finally arrived at our home stay. But unlike our Home stay in Ta Phin, you were separated from the family, you did not get to befriend the family members. So we went with our guide to other home stays, (which were more like guest houses) but they were all full.We finally found one that had only four other people ( instead of maybe…11-14 people, counting us.) Also the people were nice at our new home stay. Mom,Sumner, Our guide ( Mr. Phong,) and I went on a pleasant bike ride around the area. We went to a place where some people were working in the rice field. Sumner and I got to cut some rice. It is pretty hard work, but yet fun,( at least for the few seconds I did it.) Then we headed back to the house ( not my house though,) for a delicious dinner. It included rice ( duh) pork, chicken,and some greens. Then we went to bed.
   I think the roosters are a little confused ( and crazy),because they started crowing at 1:00 in the morning instead of at the crack of dawn. and kept on crowing for a long time.
   The next morning we had those pancakes again. ( I told you before, they taste and feel like you are eating rubber!) So the Lady of the House asked if we wanted some fried rice. Sumner and I answered yes very enthusiastically. After breakfast we went on a boat ride on the lake with our guide. It was very pretty, so I think Sumner will put the pictures on the blog. ( At least i hope so.) First we went to a cave that had a million bats, and they dropped waste on us. I had to dig out my hat so that I would not get hit by it. After that we went to a very dangerous waterfall. Because they blocked of the dangerous part with a big wall of cement, bur tourists go past the cement another way, so they slip on the moss and fall in the water. People can not find their bodies because there is too much foam.Then we ate lunch at a local restaurant, and then headed back to the house. Before the meal Sumner and I played with the feather thing. Our driver joined in as well. He is  very good at the game, better than us at least! Finally after we got tired of playing, we went back to the house and got ready for dinner. We had a special dinner that night because we were going to eat with the family. Again we had a very good meal again, so I ate my fill and went to beddddd Sorry I am tired right now, so I probably should go to bed.
     
                                                           GOOD NIGHT!!!

Today we woke up and got ready to go back to Hanoi. Once packed we met Phong outside and got into the Jeep. It wasn’t nearly as long as the drive to Ba Be but it still was pretty long. Just outside of Hanoi we stopped on the side of the highway where some stalls were set up selling corn and shuggar cane trees. We got out of the car and Phong bought some corn. Hannah had been wanting some shugar cane to chew on. So we went over to one of the ladys and asked for just a little piece. There were some miscomunications and we ended up with the entire tree. It was an interesting experience, being on the side of the road buying shuggar cane. One that I will never forget. We tried to chew it, mom liked it and Hannah liked it but I wasn’t a fan of it. We got back into the car and drove on. Finally we made it to the hotel checked in and went to our room and sighed a shgh of releif. It was nice to be back in a western hotel with clean rooms and soft beds (This is where Hannah’s song comes in). We relaxed in our room for a while and then went out to walk around Hanoi. Then we went back to the hotel and tried to catch up on our blog. We went out for dinner and then went back to the hotel. Ok now for the bed.

Well today we woke up with another driver in our midst. The one who owned our car. He had come in the night on a bus from Hanoi to try to fix it. He arrived at about twelve o’clock and then towed the car to a spot where there was more light. He worked on it but when we got up in the morning it was still not fixed. And that’s were my day began, with waking up. For breakfast again we had those pancakes but today Hannah and I had fried rice. After yesterday’s breakfast Phong had asked if we wanted to have fried rice instead of the pancakes. We accepted so mom ate some pancakes and we ate the fried rice. After breakfast, which was delicious, we got ready to go to Phu Tho (pronounced: fu taw, the taw sound ends abruptly). The car had to be towed to be started but it did start and we were on our way. This new driver was like a race car driver on a one lane road, that to the Vietnamese is a two lane highway. He was passing people on blind curves and on the straight parts if there was a gap of two yards he went through it. Mom was scared to death and even Phong who was leaning slightly out the window was going, ohhhh, made it oh oh oh, phew! that gave me a scare. In fact I don’t think that we ever stopped until we got to a gas station. Where we stopped to stretch our legs he had to leave the car on because it he turned it off it would not be able to start back up again. After we got gas we went on to a town were we said goodbye to the first driver who was catching a bus to Hanoi. We felt sorry for the guy, it wasn’t a good car and he was nervous because it was his first time to driving it. We stopped in a town for lunch. We ate at a street-food place but the food was good. But the weird thing is that once we were served our food they pulled up chairs and watched us eat. And afterwards they touched mom and pinched her and talked about her. Phong said that they were feeling if she was real. I truly think that we were the first westerners they had ever seen! Then we got back in the car went on to Phu Tho. We wandered around the town and went to a square where we walked around. You could tell you were off the beaten tourist path in Phu Tho because wherever you went people stared at you. Just like to people at lunch, well maybe not as bad as them but we were the center of attention. Phu Tho, though small, is actually a university town. We saw that on our little walk.

Sixteenth Day - Homesay at Ba Be Lake 11/17/10

Today we woke up and had breakfast. Breakfast was those “rubbery pancakes” but this time it was more crepe-ish. It was allot better but we went to the kitchen and they asked if we wanted to have some of their fried rice. We accepted the offer and ate the rice. It was much better than the pancakes. After breakfast we got ready for a boat trip on Ba Be Lake. But the car would not start! So we had to walk to the dock. We go on to a boat that was about  two yards wide and about ten yards wide. The seats were wooden planks across the boat. The engine which was in the back was really loud but the trip was nice. First we cruised around in the lake. It was very interesting but the weird thing was that the water was surprisingly warm. After we had cruised around for a while we came to a river which we went upstream to a cave that the river went right through. We got off and walked on a path through the cave. On the way we went under a big crevasse that the bats lived in, The path was covered with their droppings and some fell on mom’s and Hannah’s heads! I was lucky enough to have kept my hat on so it didn’t get me. We got out from under that crevasse quickly and to another part of the cave. It wasn’t really very big but it was a good sized cave. When we go to the end of the path we went back through the cave and to where the boat was docked. Then we headed in the other direction on the river which led to a little village when we stopped and walked on a path to a gorgeous water fall. On the way we had to walk down a lot of stairs. Going down was fine but mom had a little trouble on the way up. The water fall spanned two kilometers (why did they make up the metric system?) which is about one mile. We looked at it from a look out and then went back up the hill and to the town where we stopped for lunch. Lunch was much to big for us and our guide didn’t eat with us. I would have liked to have more food but my mouth is hurting because some teeth are coming in in the wrong places. After lunch we went back to the lake and sailed back to the dock. When we got back to the homestay there were two drivers under the hood. They tried to tow the car up the incline that it was parked on, with the other driver’s car. They had tied a rope to the the front of the Forerunner (that was our car). Then they tied another rope to the other car’s front end where it had a hook. Then they put the other car in reverse and backed that car up and tried to pull the Forerunner up the incline in reverse. That was definitely not a good thing for the other car. Then Hannah went to go get the feathered thing and we played with that for a little while. After that we decided to go on a walk. We turned left and went down a small hill. Then the road evened out and we waked on to a bridge. We crossed over and a policeman was there at the other side. He came out and said something in Vietnamese to us that we didn’t understand. We think that he was asking where we were going so we decided that maybe we shouldn’t go that way. We turned around and went across the bridge. When we got across our car was rolling down the hill and stopped at right at the bridge. Then we made our way up the hill .We saw them again beside the other car discussing what to do. When we got back we played more of that feather thingy and the driver of our car played too. We went down to the “park” which was just an open field full of weeds and stuff with one torn up volleyball net in one corner with a little bit of sand. We played for a while and then went back for dinner which we had with the family, the driver who tried to help us, Phong, and our driver. It was about the same as last night with rice some vegetables and some meats. It was very interesting because mom was asked how old she was. The reason for this is that in Vietnamese what you call someone is relational the age of the person. For example, if I was older that you I would call you “em” but you would call me “anh” and if I was a girl I would call my self something else. So back to my point, when they asked her age it was more a thing of respect than disrespect. Once we finished dinner we were offered tea.We declined because of the caffeine. Then we went to bed.

So, today we checked out of our hotel early and had breakfast. Then our guide came and we got into the car that would take us to Ba Be Lake. The car was about one hundred years old and didn’t have any shocks left. There were no seat belts in the back seat and hand crank windows. OK maybe it wasn’t one hundred years old but it was very old. I wasn’t joking about the shocks though. The car was so bad that when we hadn’t even gotten out of Hanoi mom had to pull out the Dramamine!
Well we made it out of Hanoi and then kept on going until we go to the mountains. We were able to do most of the hills but the ten percent grades were difficult. Once we went up part of the way and then the car couldn’t go any further. So, we had to roll down the hill and then use the emergency brake and then hit the clutch to change the gear. We revved the motor and then let the emergency brake go. The car inched up the hill and then finally made it to the top. There were a few hills where we had to do this but we made it safely to Ba Be Lake. We stopped at one homestay but we decided to go to another homestay. We found a different one that was more satisfactory.