Thursday 26 April 2012

Luang Prabang Day 18

So we decided to skip the 26hour bus journey from Hanoi to Luang Prabang and flew instead. Our flight was slightly delayed by Vietnam Air, but they let us know the day before the flight that they time had changed and it suited us better so we weren't complaining. And when we got to the airport we were given a free lunch, so we were pretty happy about the time change. We are never going to say no to some free pho :)
Flying into LP you get to see the beautiful mountains of Laos and even from the plane you can see that Laos is going to be a lot more relaxed than Vietnam was. Flying into HCMC was like flying into an ants nest with all the bikes and people but flying into LP it's more mountains and green spaces. This is exactly what we want to see after 2 weeks of crazy Vietnam and I could already see that I'm going to love it.
As we arrived in LP and went through passport control I had the immigration officer staring at me for about a minute not saying anything. I started getting nervous that something was wrong with my visa only for him to say "you are very beautiful!!" lol first time I have ever been picked up in passport control. A pretty interesting place to pick up men, but hey.
We didn't have anywhere to stay in LP but had read that there are tons of places behind Joma bakery so we decided to make our way there. Once we got the bakery the aircon and fruit shakes sounded to good to miss so we decided to sit down for a bit. Little did we know we will be visiting Joma quite a bit in the trip....They are pretty much like a Laos starbucks, the food was good and they were about 2 mins from our hotel so it was a convenient breakfast stop!
Anyway we eventually ended up at Somjith guesthouse the main selling point being the balconies...although LP was so hot that I don't think we used it once. But the room was good and cheap and the place is family run so it was a good choice.
After settling in we headed out for something to eat and ended up at Saffron cafe. One thing about LP is the number of bakeries/cafes around. Because it was a french colony at one point there is still quite a strong french presence which means a number of cafes, good coffee and loads of baguettes. I suppose it's not really a true reflection of Laos but they are awesome after a couple of weeks of Asian food. We got a great salad and wrap which was exactly what we needed. Jeremy even went as far as to say its one of the best salads he has ever had...but I think that might just be the lack of salads talking ;)
We headed off for a walk around town and happened across a temple with some monks doing their prayers. It was a pretty awe inspiring thing to hear, about 20 or so voices chanting in a temple in front of you that is glistening and glowing in the sun that is setting over the mekong behind you.
We couldn't miss the sunset so headed over to the river for a sundowner, a sight we saw quite a bit in LP but one I never tired of.
We then decided to walk around the town a bit and check out the Laos new year celebrations. Unfortunately for us we had just missed the main bit of the new year where everyone is out on the streets spraying each other with water. It sounds like it would be an amazing thing to have seen and I wish we had planned that a bit better! But oh well. We went to the main temple where they have a buddha statue. Everyone then takes water and pours it in big gutters which then pours the water over the buddha statue. There are also monks around the temple that have bracelets and flowers etc that people seem to buy. All the while there are monks chanting, and people praying. The mixture of the incense,chanting and perfumed water makes for a very spiritual atmosphere. It made me really interested in the religion as there are so many symbolic rituals and customs which makes it fascinating.
After seeing this I did some research and found here:
Water is for washing homes, Buddha images, monks, and soaking friends and passers-by. Students first respectfully pour water on their elders, then monks for blessings of long life and peace, and last of all they throw water on each other. The water is perfumed with flowers or natural perfumes. Some people prefer flowers in the water to give a pleasant smell, as well as adding cologne/perfume. The idea of watering came from the legend of King Kabinlaphom, whose seven daughters kept his severed head in a cave. The daughters would visit their father's head every year and perform a ritual to bring happiness and good weather.
In late afternoon or evening of the last day, in the temples, the Buddha images are moved back to their permanent homes. On that same evening devotees go to wats to listen to the monks chanting as an act to ask for forgiveness from the monks as well as from the Buddha images for what they did (pouring water on them) in this past few days that might have accidentally touched them (monks and Buddha are not to be touched). After that, a vien tien – a candlelight procession – takes place around the wat and that is the end of the Lao New Year celebration.
One thing we did notice straight off is that Laos is a lot more conservative than Thailand and Vietnam. They request the ladies not to walk around in Bikini tops and men can't walk barechested. It is also frowned upon to show affection in public. I think this is probably due to the strong religious presence.
I ended up buying a longer skirt as I felt uncomfortable at the temples, especially during the new year rituals, in my shorts.
It definitely makes for a change from Thailand and Vietnam's sex industries and girls in short skirts...but its definitely not a bad thing! Although all that goes out the window once you get to Vang Vieng, but that we will talk about in another post.
Candice




Little boy outside the temple while the monks are chanting




Temple in the sunset








New year celebrations - washing the buddha




Sunset over the mekong
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Location:Luang Prabang

Halong Bay Day 15,16 & 17

We decided to do the 2 nights 3 days ha long bay tour. Most people that do the South East Asia route and go through Vietnam will tell you to stay at Hanoi Backpackers. It also comes with great recommendations so we decided to stay there for our time in Hanoi. We stayed at the original hostel. Sadly they were doing reservations so the rooftop bar was not open so we missed out on that front. They did have happy hour at 5 in the street. The nice thing about the backpackers is the English guides who work there who can tell you about the good places to eat and places to go out. We also found out later that the new Hanoi backpackers 15 minutes walk from the old one was fully operational so we went to check it out. It's really cool built over a couple floors and has a great vibe.

Anyways back to Ha Long Bay. We were picked up at 7:30am. Our guide Steve an Irishman was an absolute legend.
I got chatting to him quite a bit. A qualified Actuary he worked in Australia for 11 months before going backpacking through asia. He decided that he liked Vietnam and Hanoi so got a job through the hostel.
He does the tours 6 days a week but then also gets a chance to stay on castaway island which i will talk more about later. He is not the only guide I met about I met 3 others and their stories are all pretty similar. They were backpacking through Asia went to Hanoi and the Hanoi backpackers did a trip to Ha Long Bay and enjoyed it do decided to stay. None of the are employed legally they are simply on tourist visas.

The trip from Hanoi to Ha long bay takes about 4 hours. The road is really bad and busy which makes for an interesting bus ride. I've mentioned it before but the rules of the road are non existent in Vietnam and we had a few near misses. It was raining when we arrived which was a break from the overwhelming heat. We got on a small long tail type boat which takes you out to a bigger boat waiting in the bay. We got onto the big boat were given our rooms. After that we were served lunch on the boat which was really good. Most meal times inI Vietnam involve rice. We had crispy pork some veg, potato chips. After that we were summoned to the deck of the boat to begin playing drinking games. The Hanoi Bacpacker tours have a reputation of having a party atmosphere and we were not to be disappointed. Steve said he had 4 drinking games he would teach us. The first one was really simply it involved heads and tails with a coin toss and depending on if you get the call correct or not you drink. Suffice to say you end of consuming quite a bit of beer fast. After a bit of drinking we all went for a swim in the bay which was good. It was then time for kayaking. We hopped into our kayaks and paddle through the bay and ended up on a hong with a cave. Quite interesting paddling in a kayak a bit tipsy. One guy had to much to drink and had to be taken back to the boat. Another game that applied right throughout was Buffalo. For those that don't know you aren't allowed to drink with your right hand. If you drink with your right hand and some catches you and says buffalo you have to down your drink. Whilst we were paddling some people were caught buffalo by Steve which was quite funny. Steve was very strong about this rule and would hassle you till your drink was done. From the cave we went to a small fishing village. By this time it was getting Dark so we left our kayaks at the village and got a boat back to our big boat in the bay. After a shower and a nice dinner it was time for drinking games again. The boat had happy hour on the cocktails with by two get one free. We played a game with a couple packs of cards where each card had a certain rule with people having to do different things. After all the stiff drinks it got pretty wild. We were broken up into two teams so when you picked a certain card it meant that you could challenge the other team. Steve obviously had played this game a couple times so made suggestions to each team about what we should dare the other team to do. Some of the dares involved thinks like drink fish sauce out the other teams belly buttons, Sadly I was captain I the team so ended up doing this. Not a pleasant experience but being spurred on by 15 other drink people I couldn't exactly say no. One dare was ludicrous which was to sniff salt out someone's else's bum which some guy ended up doing. Another one of the cards I think 8 meant the whole game stoppe d. You had to stand on your chair and tell one of your most embarrassing moments to everyone. Their we're a couple Americans aboard the boat and needless to say some of the stories were quite interesting. One guy told how he was caught having sex in a park by a granny. I had a good chuckle at a Spanish girl who in her broken English said " I like sex on beach. Once I get caught having sex on beach". What was remarkable about this was that on the Saturday night she ended up with a Dutch guy in full view of everyone having sex in the water. Clearly she was not lying.
Anyways after the drinking games the music was turned up a big party erupted on the boat. We all ended up at about 1 in the morning on there deck of the boat.

We were woken up early on the second day at 7:30am. Needless to say everyone had a massive hangover. Breakfast on the boat was not great eggs which looked like rubber and bacon which was so crunchy it had been so deep fried. There were some bananas so I opte for those. Time to change boats onto another boat which would take us to castaway island. Castaway island from my understanding is owned by Hanoi Backpackers. Its really just a beach with some huts, a bar and eating area, toilets and showers literally in the middle of nowhere in Ha log bay. The great thing about the day is that there are loads of activities organised. You can choose between wake boarding or tubing, do rock climbing, play volleyball, kayaking or just generally relax. It was really a good day on the island and everyone had a good time. lunch and dinner were served again which with both were 10 times better than the breakfast. Candice and I did the tubing which good fun although we were flung from the tube quite a few times an had some nasty wipeouts. Candice has a massive bruise on her leg and I ended up with a couple myself. All the time whilst you are on the boats in Ha long bay you spot the Jelly fish which are massive. Literally bigger than anything I have seen. My only worry after coming off the tube is that one would get hold of me but fortunately I was lucky enough not to.

During dinner in the evening I was not feeling great quite queasy and nauseas so went and had a lie down from 6:30 till about 9pm. After waking up I went back to the main area an drinking games were in full swing. The good thing is that our group had joined up with another group so some people were playing the games and others had opted out and were just having a quiet drink. I personally was still a bit worse for wear from the previous night so just took it easy. The next morning we were woken early again to make the long trip back through Ha long Bay and then another 4 hour bus journey back. We were essentially away for 3 days two nights and it was really good and we met a lot of people during our stay. I added a couple of them on Facebook an hope to stay in touch when we are back in London.

The party boat aside Ha long bay is also dubbed the 8th Natural wonder of the world. To be honest it's an extremely scenic place. I had seen lots of pictures online but actually being on the boats in the bay was a brilliant experience the place has a surreal kind of feel to it. I would highly recommend the rock hard rock long tour through Hanoi backpackers but if you dont do it do go to ha long bay as it worth seeing.





Halong bay crew



Ha long bay



Kayaking



Chilli sauce out the belly buttons



Party time




Castaway island


View from our beds at castaway island




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Location:Ha long bay