THE END OF VIETNAM

Hoi An was the next stop on our journey. This was probably not a good place for us considering it is where everyone goes to get clothes made! We spent too much money but had some really cute clothes designed and tailored to fit us perfectly...very exciting! It was a really cute town, located right on a river. One night we decided to go out and ended up at this beach bar that everyone went to once all the bars closed. We had read in Lonely Planet that you haven't done SE Asia right if you haven't had at least one near-death experience....and it was here that it happened!! When we decided it was time to head home we hopped on the back of a motorbike for about a 10 minute drive back. We were both crammed on the back seat together and it was the scariest 10 minutes ever! He took off and was going sooo fast we were both screaming at him to slow down! It was so late, there was no one on the street and we were flying past everything. We were screaming "Oh my God!! Slow down!!" He would just mimic us and say "Oh my God!" in a really high pitch voice. This, of course made us laugh so I don't think he realized how scared we really were. But basically, we were happy to have made it home after being convinced the entire time we were going to crash or simply fly off the back of the bike!

In Hue we had a few days of culture. We spent a day exploring the Citadel and the next on a boat ride down the river, stopping at a tomb and pagoda along the way. The pagada was the home of a Buddhist monk who publicly burnt himself alive, sitting in the lotus position, to protest the government's oppresion of religious freedom. We had also seen the memorial in Ho Chi Minh where he had done it. Both days were about a million degrees so it was a little hard to enjoy the sites, sweat was literally dripping off us.

After another night sleeping (or at least attempting to sleep) on the bus we made it to Hanoi. We spent the first day exploring the city sites. We went to Hoa Lo Prison which was where John McCain and other American pilots were held prisoner during the war. They had his pilot suit and some of his things on display. The interesting thing about it for us was that despite the fact that they were in fact held captive, they were made to seem like they pretty much enjoyed themselves there. All of the pictures showed them playing chess, decorating for Christmas, cooking for each other, smiling, etc. They even had a display of all of the games they played, the gifts they were given when they were released, and so on. Prior to this, the prison was used by the French to imprison the Vietnamese. But, in this circumstance the prison was portrayed as being awful. Prisoners were constantly chained to cement by their ankles and basically tortured. It was very interesting to see.


From HoiAn we booked a two day trip to Halong Bay. It was absolutely gorgeous. We spent the night on this big, old wooden boat with a group of people. We toured around the Bay where there were thousands of limestone islands of all different sizes. Some of the islands are hollow and we were able to walk through the caves. It looked like we were in outer space. After, we went kayaking through some of the islands where we were surrounded by the islands. It felt like we were in a scene from Jurrasic Park and we were waiting for a Teradactyl to fly over us. We were very impressed with our kayaking skills-basically, that we didn't tip over! It was such an amazingly beautiful place. Spending the night on the boat with everyone was really fun, too.

Next, we took an overnight train to Sapa, our last stop on Vietnam (a much better experience than our bus rides as we were actually able to sleep)! This actually ended up being our favorite town in Vietnam. The town is adorable and surrounded with beautiful, green mountains. All of the women are in traditional dress and very talkative and sweet. I think we were asked about a thousand times "What's your name? Where do you live? How old are you? How many brothers and sisters do you have? What are their names?" This was ALWAYS followed by "Do you want to buy a purse? bracelet? earrings?" (which we ended up buying too many of because they were just so sweet!) The first day we went trekking to a local village. The views are incredible and women of all ages offer to walk you around-with hopes that you will buy something from them after. It is great, though, because we were able to talk for hours to the people that live there and learn all about their lifestyle (and, of course, ended up with bracelets and wallets that we really didn't need!) The next day we hired a local guide that took us trekking to 3 more local villages. Instantly, we were followed by groups of women and little girls who did the whole tour with us, asking us questions about our lives and telling us all about theirs. They were so cute, they would grab our hands and walk with us and they made us crowns made of flowers. Yes, we ended up with more bracelets! It was a really great experience for both of us!