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- Mar 10, 2018, 9:47am
- 🌧 10 °C
- Altitude: 77 m
EnglandRingwayManchester Airport53°21’59” N 2°16’47” W
Day 1
Airport Brekkie
March 10, 2018 in England ⋅ 🌧 10 °C
Eating/Waiting/Posing
EnglandRingwayManchester Airport53°21’59” N 2°16’47” W
Hong KongSham Wan TsuenChek Lap Kok Airport22°18’56” N 113°56’3” E
March 11, 2018 in Hong Kong ⋅ 🌙 15 °C
Never my favourite bit. More accurately my second-least-favourite bit, pipped to prominence only by the flight home. Gotta say though, speaking relatively to a prejudicially low base, our journey to Hong Kong was rather luxurious.
Planeophobia isn't the word and possibly isn't a word at all to describe my attitude to air-travel, but such fears are somewhat soothed when the magnificent flying contraption assigned the task exudes class and quality. From the svelte exterior to the neat contours of the cabin, by way of the massive back-of-the-seat entertainment system with an actual lag-free fully-functioning touch-screen (take note BA) to the personal plug socket and USB port and actual leg-room for actual legs and the multiple fold-out tray-tables to suit a myriad purposes and free peanuts the entire experience looked and felt futuristic. And as we all know, or at least did before Brexit/Trump, the future equals good.
Only minor foible, they'd run out of my preferred meal option by the time the food-cart reached us, but that's nothing a formal complaint/law-suit can't resolve. Fed and full-up with the aubergine-pasta thing nobody else wanted, we commenced consumption of the on-board entertainment selection.
The M-Dubyas both watched The Death of Stalin, but having seen it already I took in Alien Covenant. It's about as good as you'd expect an 8th instalment of a franchise to be that isn't produced by Marvel or starring pubescent wizards. Underwhelmed, I decided to stick with the b-movie vibe and watch 'Happy Death Day', which was fairly good mainly because it's a horror rip-off of Groundhog Day. I then decided to watch a bit of Groundhog Day itself, figuring my familiarity with it might help me drift off to sleep, but alas it kept me perky with it's ruddy entertaining perfect script, casting and direction. I considered watching Edge of Tomorrow, but determined such thematic repetition might instil the sensation I was enduring the underlying premise as opposed to simply observing it, so I put on some Family Guy instead. Farts lol.
Tried to get some shut-eye, but only achieved it in the purely literal sense. Whilst Mark enjoyed Paddington 2 : Paddington Strikes Back Reloaded With A Vengeance, I watched It, by which I don't mean an aforementioned something beimg latterly referenced as it but instead the film entitled It about something called It in lieu of It's actual moniker, it being unclear what It actually Is. It was alright.
I then tried to watch Kong: Skull Island, but it quickly felt more like Skull Island feat. Kong and I lost interest, so decided to begin chronicling our exciting adventures with a point-by-point re-telling of our flight. Then we had some noodles and I watched some Blackadder and we got breakfast and then I watched Young Sheldon and Woody watched Detectorists and I couldn't see what Mark was watching and I didn't ask.
We're starting our descent into Hong Kong now so have to put my phone away. Might post this, might not ; will decide later. If I don't, guess nobody will know. Unless I leave this bit in, which would be dumb.Read more
Hong KongWanchaiTsimshatsuiKowloon Park22°18’13” N 114°10’12” E
March 11, 2018 in Hong Kong ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C
Layovers can be a pain. Short ones mean you're rushing about, cautious not to miss your connecting flight and cursing that immigration won't just briefly abandon national security concerns to let you saunter through unimpeded. Several-hours ones can be just dull, resulting in aimless lingering in the airport whilst too many hours requires consideration of accommodation, sustainance and the acknowledgement your stopover is effectively a mini-break in itself.
I think we hit the sweet-spot with ten hours in Hong Kong. This was partly due to timing; we landed just before their 7am, perfectly synchronizing the commencement of our exploration with their morning cornflakes. As the city awoke we travelled on the ridiculously-nice-when-you-compare-it-to-literally-every-train-in-England Airport Express into the metropolis.
Though we were fairly tired, after all 'their' 7am was closer to our bodies' midnight, we also had an advantage. Woody had been to Hong Kong before so would know the most efficient way to navigate and experience the key sights. Granted command, we followed his lead and alighted at Kowloon station to head toward the harbour.
In Woody's defence we only spent an hour or so lost in the private accommodation complex / closed shopping-mall he took us too, only nearly died when we tried to escape by walking on the motorway and only slightly wasted 10% of our Hong Kong experience by the time we got back to the same station we'd arrived at, gotten back on the train and travelled the few stops to where we were supposed to be.
The views of the harbour were stunning and probably attached. Mark did his standard poses, I did my standard selfies and we progressed to the Star Ferry, apparently quite famous but I haven't gotten around to googling it yet. Once on Hong Kong island we traversed through the crowds of Filipinas folk socialising on cardboard boxes in the streets (a cultural weekly occurrence when the maids of Hong Kong have Sundays off) and stopped by for pictures at HSBC HQ to relieve my withdrawal symptoms.
We next queued, and boy did we queue, for the furnicular railway up to the peak, which the locals refer to simply The Peak and thusly I've forgotten the actual name for. We were the last ones aboard so didn't get seats, but that turned out to be dangerous/awesome as the tram undertook it's steep climb and as we could each stand angularly to the floor, messing about with our sense of gravity.
There was a vast visitors centre at the top and after a few escalator rides we were atop the highest 360 degree viewing platform in the city, looking up at the points higher than us unable to advertise a 360 degree viewing platform. Looking down we took-in more stunning views and took more obligatory pictures/selfies. It's easy to see why the platform is one of the more popular proposal locations in the city, with packages for such being heavily advertised by the venue. Neither Mark nor Woody popped the question.
My ring-finger bandless, we visited the gift-shop where I bought fridge magnets and Mark haggled a deal for the purchase of a pretty picture print. I wasn't clear on the specifics of the deal, but it apparently involved the handing-over of his travel card as he had to buy a new return ticket before we left. We descended the peak, finding the queue to go back up completely dissipated and proving we'd definitely come at the wrong time, further damning the day's Activities-Director.
We were hungry and, after introspective analysis of the situation, decided to find some food. Harnessing the power of Google, I assumed directorial duties and guided us toward the authentic (by which I mean how it looks in the movies) centre of Hong Kong island. Keen to locate some authentic (by which I mean how it looks in Chinese restaurants) local cuisine, our efforts were mildly hampered by the apparent local preference for foreign food. Akin to trying to find an English restaurant in central Manchester, it was exceedingly tricky to find a simple Chinese restaurant in the centre of a Chinese city however, after a little searching, we stumbled upon our Wetherspoons proxy. Unfortunately there was no kids menu, so Woody had to leave half of his perfectly standard adult meal uneaten.
By this point, circa 6am to us after a night without sleep but with extensive activity, we were pretty exhausted and headed back to the airport. We each intermittently though thankfully alternately fell asleep on the warm, comfortable, no-reason-they-shouldn't-be-this-nice-in-the-UK train and went through into the terminal.
We were quite early for our plane and expected to get bored, but we fortunately found an exciting mission to occupy ourselves. Mark's headphones had broken and, having forgotten to pack his spares, needed some new ones. Though the airport was vast we soon found an electronics dealer, but the headphones available were excessively priced so we moved on. Seeking a WH Smith equivalent, where headphones were positioned more as a point-of-sale convenience item than a business focus and priced accordingly, we trapsed through several other retailers in search of a decent set of earbuds costing the equivalent of around a fiver. We almost had a breakthrough when we found some Disney-branded versions at around a tenner, but these were considered unsuitable for reasons. We spied a 7-Eleven on a lower floor and tried to reach it by going down an escalator but overshot. In an attempt to course-correct upwards Mark suggested we go further down. This didn't work. We later took a lift to the correct floor but to a 'staff-only' section of said floor which we didn't enter because it's an airport and we might get shot. We never figured out how to get to the 7-Eleven floor or find Mark some suitable headphones, but at least we got this fantastic story out of the experience. Also I remembered I had a spare set of headphones and said Mark could have those.Read more
VietnamThành Phố Hà NộiXóm PhoRed River Delta21°2’1” N 105°50’51” E
March 12, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ 🌫 19 °C
Q. Why did the chicken cross the road?
A. It didn't
If there's one thing we learnt in our first 26-or-so hours in Hanoi, it's how to cross the road. This lesson transpired to be essential, lest we remain holed-up in our hotel for our entire stay as, whilst the door from our lodgings technically opened up onto a pavement, pedestrian walkways aren't really a 'thing'.
Instead, the 'pavement' as it were or would be were it a 'thing' is utilised as a combination seating area, barbecue pit or, most commonly of all, parking space for motorbikes. As such, one doesn't wander beside the street but instead on said street, aside said pavement and both alongside and in direct conflict with such things expressly designed for traversal on said streets most commonly, as I said, said motorbikes.
Walking parallel within isn't too tricky; just find a gap and join the traffic lane like any other vehicle, maintaining consistent speed and clearly indicating any sideways shifts. You don't have to emit 'brum-brum' sound effects, but it's fun.
Crossing perpendicular to traffic flow, however, is a teensy bit more perilous. With traffic lights functioning as mere suggestions and zebra-crossings simply exceedingly-neat graffiti, picking a suitable point to cross is both difficult and easy, insomuch as every potential choice is equally unsuitable.
You have to unlearn everything you learnt about crossing safely. Looking both ways is a sign of weakness. Traffic won't stop and the cacophony of blaring horns is mere background noise. You simply take a breath, shake hands with your compatriots whilst expressing fond sentiments for your time together (actually happened), then...walk. To misquote but ascribe rythmn from Dory of Nemo fame, and latterly of Dory fame, you 'Just keep walking, just keep walking...'
If it feels like you're going to die, you're doing it right. Bikes will swerve, cars will slow and I'm not sure what coaches do since we're not idiots and obviously don't step blindly in front of speeding coaches. In summary; be brave, don't hesitate, stay alive.
We first began honing this technique on our first night in Hanoi. Landing rather late in the evening and reeling from being awake for 40 hours we had intended to simply a) find hotel and b) sleep. But so invigorated were we by our taxi journey through the vehicular insanity and sensory onslaught of the Vietnamese backstreets, with the musical accompaniment of local pop hit 'Welcome to Vietnam' blaring from Airport-Pickup FM, that we resolved to go outside.
Informed by the helpful hotel probably-owner that our first night was the final one during our stay when the local night market was open, we decided to go. Amidst a vast row of stalls selling all manner of fake good we carefully examined the various street-food stalls, then picked one at random and feasted on things on sticks, different things that looked like they'd be on sticks but were in fact chopped-up and mixed in a cup and finally some frozen stuff, on a stick. We had a beer on some children's garden furniture across the road, then called it a night.
Next morning we discovered breakfast was not only included in our ridiculously-cheap room-rate, but was also really good, definitively putting Premier Inn Leicester City Centre to shame (see TripAdvisor review entitled 'Fucking Terrible' for more details). Scrambled-eggs/pancakes/toast consumed, we headed out into the city.
First we went to jail. The remains of the former Hoa Lo prison, somewhat entertainingly referred to as the 'Hanoi Hilton' by Americans during their relatively pleasant detainment there during the American/Vietnam war and less-entertainingly a harrowing historical incarceration centre for heroic Vietnamese political prisoners resisting against the oppressive and ruthless French colonialists. There was an informational/propaganda video set to the music of Pirates of the Caribbean. Or Pirates of the Caribbean cribbed it's soundtrack from a patriotic Vietnamese anthem.
Mark, the exalted organised-one of our trio, guided us on a walking tour of Hanoi's Old Town. The streets of Hanoi appear largely segregated by the nature of goods for sale; there are streets dedicated to tin, some to knock-off toy brands, an odd cluster dealing exclusively in television remote-controls and others solely concerned with the prolonged suffering, torture and meticulous murder of marine life. We visited the 'Memorial House'; a preserved, traditional house that hadn't been actively lived-in since the late 90s, granting it equal historical credence as pictures from my 14th birthday party. We also ventured into a covered market billed as stocking 'anything you could possibly think of', which was true, so long as you limited your free-thought to stationary, confectionary and dried fish products. Should your imagination apropos retail possibilities be so restricted, check out amazon.com and thank me later.
During our tour we would intermittently pop-in to numerous small Buddhist temples and visited one very large Catholic cathedral. Like most people visiting such places, I couldn't help but be reminded of the evolving design philosophy of the Legend of Zelda video game franchise. The juxtaposition here of the many-but-small Breath of the Wild approach against the fewer-but-bigger LTTP through Twilight-Princess structure (discounting the obvious anomaly of Skyward Sword) helped me, in common I'm sure with most tourists, once again conclude that Ocarina of Time remains the definitive entry in the series.
At Hoan Kiem lake we visited possibly the most famous temple in Hanoi, Ngoc Son, dedicated to a legend about a sword of the lake and a Turtle God or something I'm not really sure it wasn't all translated. Nearby in the middle of the lake was a structure known as 'Turtle Tower', in memory of the legend or the turtles or towers. There was a resident hero-in-a-half-shell by way of a preserved giant turtle specimen that was either dead, bronze or dead and bronzed depending on who you asked.
From the makers of 'The Eiffel Tower' came the penultimate instalment of our tour, a bridge that we saw almost 75% of from a distance. Finally we experienced the Ceramic Road which, whilst admittedly an impressive four-kilometre mural carefully constructed and depicting beautiful cultural imagery, is in fact a wall next to a road and not technically a road so reportable under the Vietnam equivalent of the Trade Descriptions Act (Articles 103/106, 1992 Constitution of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, fact fans!)
We returned to the hotel for a brief rest before heading out for dinner. On the suggestion of the hotel probably-owner we went to a local street-food venue, selected a few things off the menu and received at least 40% of what we ordered. What we had was delicious once coated in chilli sauce, following which we walked a few streets to an upmarket craft beer venue which we'd spotted earlier in the day. Turns out it's an outlet for a brewery we'll be visiting in a couple of weeks in Saigon, so functioned as something of a preview. They had a mix of delicious dark stouts and IPAs for people into that sort of thing. It was relatively expensive, but the 'relatively' aspect is key here since for five drinks each, several of which fell into the premium 'ultra-strong' category, total bill for the evening was just over a million dong; approximately a tenner a head. Or, to translate into a more relatable metric, around three pints of Kronenberg at the Trafford Centre Namco Station circa 2002.Read more
VietnamThành Phố Hà NộiXóm PhoRed River Delta21°2’1” N 105°50’51” E
March 13, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ 🌫 19 °C
After a busy first day in Hanoi and after an evening of alcoholic indulgence, we opted for a more sedate Day 2, setting the alarm for five minutes later, visiting seven or eight cultural sites and walking only a measly thirteen kilometres.
Much of our initial distance was achieved via periodic shuffling whilst queuing to see the body of Uncle Ho, not the friendly neighbourhood pimp but the affectionate nickname of the reverex revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh.
When first approaching the mausoleum from the road we spied a particularly long queue that Mark remarked made the queue for the Reichstag in Berlin, our to-date point of reference for exceptionally long queues within the context of the three of us holidaying together, look short. Alas, on rounding the corner to join this really long line we noted that this was the line for people with appointments to see Ho Chi Minh, which we didn't have.
Unable to fathom how to secure a spot in a dead man's diary, we continued walking round the complex to find the queue for people with a more spontaneous attitude toward cadaver ogling. We soon found the end of the queue, only it was the end at the end of the queue, as opposed to the start of the queue we could join. We followed the queue through the designated queuing space, out of the designated queuing space, out of the complex, onto the street, across six-or-seven other street, restraining our remarks that this actual queue made the queue we thought was the queue that made the Reichstag queue look short look short until we found the back.
We never actually found the back of the queue. In an astounding breach of ethics and Englishness, Mark surreptitiously found a gap into which we could queue-jump and myself and Woody, abiding sheep/accomplices that we are, followed. The woman in front of whom we jumped yelled some choice words at us, but she chose them in foreign so didn't sting too much. After much, though unfairly curtailed, queuing we reached the impressive mausoleum and walked through the viewing chamber, kept cool for freshness.
Uncle Ho has been dead for nearly fifty years. Still is. I've never seen an almost fifty-year post-human human before, but it's honestly not a good look. I think it's fair, and only possibly very slightly offensive, to say that yesterday's preserved giant turtle looks more like a turtle than Uncle Ho looks like a person. To each their own, but family/friends note when I die I don't wish to be placed in a cooled glass case in the centre of a tourism complex with visitor's centre, museum and gift shops. Just the museum will suffice.
After a brief walk round the museum, wherein limited translations required us to interpret ourselves the meaning of the various esoteric displays, and a quick climb/descent of the single-stilted pagoda the complex closed for lunch. We left and headed toward a temple, though the sheer abundance of temples in Hanoi render such statement meaningless. The temple was nice, though the sheer abundance of nice temples in Hanoi make etc.
We then walked, and I checked this afterward for accuracy, a billion miles north to visit another temple that was slightly nicer than the previous temple but didn't really satisfy the effort/reward ratio. We then took a taxi back, in which I left my bag containing my passport and so my holiday was over and we'd have to find the embassy and plead for my passage back home, until about five minutes later when the driver returned. We tend not to dwell on epic fails unless committed by persons other than myself, but still God bless that man, and his descendants, and his descendants' descendants, but that'll do.
The Ho Chi Minh complex reopened, we went for a stroll round Uncle Ho's former home and grounds, including Uncle Ho's fishing hole, Uncle Ho's stilt house and Uncle Ho's classic car collection. Being leader of a nationalist movement for more than three decades, fighting against the Japanese then French colonial powers and then the US-backed South Vietnamese and being President of North Vietnam for fifteen years clearly brings home the bacon.
Tired and with aching feet we returned hotelwards, coincidentally also in the direction of a temple, for a rest before our planned evening excursion. Walking back past the turtle-tower-temple we'd visited on Day One, now all lit up and pretty at night and likely one of the pictures I'll attach to this post, we went to a Water Puppets performance. It was genuinely very entertaining, even the parts I could only see through the conduit of some dickhead's phone who'd dickheadedly decided to film the first third of the show. It's hard to describe, but closest approximation would be Punch & Judy meets The Muppets on Ice, only the ice has melted due to global warming. A bit like Waterworld. Only good.
We had steak sandwiches for dinner then tried to find a new bar, but failed and went to the one over the road from the hotel. We had a few beers and eventually remembered probably all the rules to play blackjack. I invented a brand new game called Blackjack Extreme with all-new special rules and cards that we only played once because it was so great.Read more
VietnamThành Phố Hà NộiXóm PhoRed River Delta21°2’1” N 105°50’51” E
March 14, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C
Hanoi puns are hard. Recognising the pun as my favourite tool when titling blog entries, we all sat down a couple of days ago to think of some. Brainstorming reaping little, we collectively concurred that the incompatibility of Hanoi with basic wordplay was rather Hanoi-ing...
Such is the nature of writing in arrears, today's title in fact references the after-effects of the day under review. Whilst far from an Albuquerque Incident II situation, we did drink a fair bit on the evening of Day 3 and, coupled with some exhaustion and dehydration and the heat and the pollution and the persistent honking of horns for literally no reason at all, here in the far-flung future of Day 4 my faculties are a mite subdued.
So, just time for a quick recap of the day's activities. We started out by visiting the Citadel. The former seat of Imperial power, the site has undergone numerous transformations over the years and been utilised for a great many purposes, from royal palace to military command centre to tourist attraction. The venue's current claim to fame is its Guinness World Record for Loudest Loudspeaker in the 'tour-guide belt-clip' category. Most commonly witnessed delivering a Chinese translated tour for about seven people through quiet rooms where even raising one's voice would be redundant, the skilled operator is famed for their ability to progress through exhibits at precisely the same pace as western tourists so as to completely disable capacity to concentrate and render any reading of artefact descriptions completely impossible. It's ability to incite the instinct to grab the device and crush it in bare hands then chuckle as the debris sprinkles to the ground in a beautiful silence aside from the aforementioned chuckle makes it's persistent existence all the more incredible.
We then went to the Lenin statue so Mark could do his Lenin pose, as you do, then popped to KFC for a drink. As the Colonel's Secret Recipe appeared disappointingly unchanged for the Vietnamese market, we didn't eat. Also we weren't hungry. In fact we skipped lunch entirely on Day 3, recognising we'd been eating out of habit rather than necessity. Though on reflection that decision may have been a contributor to my present weariness.
We then went to the Temple of Literature, a Confucion Temple containing the National Academy, Vietnam's first national university. There were some robed graduates there throwing their mortar boards in the air, after which they came down again, definitive proof of gravity's stranglehold on Vietnamese society.
Next we went to the Fine Arts museum. It was fine.
We wandered next to the Military Museum, firstly part-ascending the Flag Tower, a square structure taller than it was wide with a stick at the top bearing rectangular cloth emblazoned with the Vietnam country emblem. Whilst Woody and I were fairly certain it was identical from all angles, Mark took photos from every corner just to be sure. This was permitted as we'd purchased a special 'camera ticket' on the way in; presumably a canny way of ensuring national defence secrets can only be committed to film by those able to stump up the 47 pence fee.
There were numerous military aircraft for us to view and Mark to photograph and some tanks for Mark to photograph and a genuinely impressive sculpture in the courtyard constructed from several war wrecks from combat in the French Indochina War as well as the Vietnam War for Mark to photograph. Not dissimilar to the international killing spree upon which Bond embarked once granted his permission slip, Mark made thorough use of his License to Snap.
We returned to the hotel, stopping only briefly to drip hot oil down my t-shirt via a fried banana conduit, then had a chat with Phillip, the hotel owner. We told him where we going next and he booked the train tickets for us, gave us a free beer whilst we waited for the email confirmation to arrive and then gave us a discount voucher for a recommended restaurant nearby. In the vast Venn diagram of 'Nam, Phillip most definitely occupies the crossover between 'friendly' and 'cannot do enough for you', whilst intersecting the smaller 'hotel owner' circle and the relatively exclusive 'named Phillip' set. In fact, most everyone we've met or transacted with since we've gotten here has satisfied those first two qualities, rocketing the Vietnamese people right into the Acceptable Foreigners Top 10 list. We later found out Phillip was from Germany, but he can retain an honorary position.
After unsuccessfully attempting to find me a spare pair of trousers (I'm too tall for literally any garment worn by anybody here ever), we went to the recommended eatery and were met by Phillip's little brother at the door as Phillip had phoned ahead for us because of course he had. For a change we each had portions of carbs and protein with some veg before heading to the nearby bar district, also recommended by Phillip.
This was by far the most 'touristy' region of Hanoi's Old Quarter we'd witnessed, with the patrons predominantly Chinese or Western. But whilst you'd expect things to be priced at a premium, and technically they were, a circa 25% increase on next-to-nothing remains practically nothing. We had a beer at a street-bar, then were guided to a second-floor bar and greeted by a woman so scantily glad we were momentarily concerned it was something seedier. Turned out to be a normal and very nice bar where we enjoyed a private balcony with stunning views of the balconies and rooftop extensions of the building opposite.
After a few we went back to Prague Bar, which we'd visited a couple of days earlier by chance and had tables that faced right onto a busy junction - a mesmerising spot to sit and watch the traffic go by. An actual, honestly not sarcastic, fascinating spectacle to observe.
We ordered beers from the menu we hadn't yet tried, only to be informed by the apologetic waitress that they were out of stock. I jokingly expressed chagrin at this mild inconvenience, but I don't think my humorous tone translated as they rushed out to a different bar to purchase our selected tipple and sell-on to us. Feeling a bit bad about this, we drank up and left a nice tip, which would have been insulting from a monetary perspective in the UK and is apparently insulting from a cultural perspective in Vietnam unless they've done something particularly surplus to requirement, which we felt they had so it was probably okay.
We then went to another bar where they gave us free shots along with another three beers each. We put our names on the 'winner-stays-on' list for the pool table, on which we all played but didn't stay on. Moderately drunk, we wandered back the hotel and so this morning had the titular Han'goi-ver.
But since this is written intermittently through the day in 20-30 second bursts, mainly when Mark is taking pictures, I'm feeling quite a lot better now and can likely stomach the Egg Coffee we're walking to try. Will we like it? Find out in tomorrow's thrilling instalment if we have wi-fi on the boat, which is unlikely.Read more
VietnamThành Phố Hà NộiXóm PhoRed River Delta21°2’1” N 105°50’51” E
March 15, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C
We began Day 4 in Hanoi with disappointment.
Upon arriving at breakfast at our semi-regular table at our regular Hanoi hotel, my regular order was unavailable. Toast would be fine they said, no problem whatsoever with the toasting me some bread (aside from their persistent problem of not actually toasting the toast, instead only introducing the bread to a heat-source momentarily then swiftly yanking it away lest it get a sweat on), but they were out of the ingredients to concoct scrambled eggs. Fortunately however they were able to root around in the cupboards to find the completely different required ingredients for fried eggs, so I had those instead. This culinary inventiveness however, per some cognitive one-in-one-out policy, did require them to forget how to make even their own 'interpretation' of toast and so they came served with a crusty roll of bread.
Fortunately the day quickly recovered from this extremely mild annoyance, though clearly didn't generate sufficient wordage to remove the breakfast bit in the edit.
Realising it had been almost eighteen hours since we last visited a temple, we first rushed out to a temple. The distinguishing feature for this one, Bach Ma Temple, was it was dedicated to or inspired by a white horse and so had a decorated artificial white horse in the main worshippy section. This was different as, generally, the animals portrayed have been one of the four key spiritual animals: the dragon, the unicorn, the turtle and the fourth one.
Before Mark told us this one was the white horse temple we momentarily considered that the white horse was a unicorn. In retrospect that was a stupid consideration, though not because the horse was horn-less; a bee without it's stinger remains simply a very safe very dead bee. Turns out unicorns native to Vietnam look quite dissimilar to their western genetic cousins, something we learnt at our next stop, the National History Museum.
The journey there was quite fascinating as it involved walking through the French Quarter, an area of the city we'd heard rumours was now dilapidated as the result of some dastardly scheme to revenge historical repressive transgressions with subdued real-estate prices. This transpired to be fake news as instead it was the fanciest, most up-market district of the city, home to a Prada store, a Rolls Royce garage and a Hilton hotel no-doubt peeved about their ranking in the Google search results. It was still Hanoi so the streets were as perilous to cross as ever, but it was the sort of area where you felt if you got struck the emergency services might actually attend the scene.
Near the one and only and very busy petrol station in Hanoi (that we saw during our brief stay) we found the museum. We learnt things aside from the weird-unicorn tidbit, which I'm yet to fully verify, but that's the only thing that really stuck - still had a bit of a han'goi-ver at this point. I learnt something about the Mongols I hadn't known previously, but that was something Woody told me so doesn't count.
After being kicked-out so the museum staff could go for lunch, we headed to the Women's Museum, where we finally learnt about women. There were exhibits on marriage traditions, birthing rituals and some very sombre displays telling the stories of female rebels killed whilst fighting for freedom. There was also space dedicated to the Mother Goddess, an important deity to many Vietnamese people whom they thank when things go well, pray to when things go badly and are just text once-or-twice a week when things are fine. She likes beer and Mother Goddess shrines usually contain stacks of beer cans gifted to her. It is in honour of the Mother Goddess that we have been sure to consume a beer every evening since arriving.
For lunch we stopped at a roadside outlet and indulged in another Vietnamese specialty, pho. A couple of us had tried pho before, at Pho no less, and I can say with confidence that Pho restaurant in the UK nails the taste absolutely, if not the rough-and-ready ambience ours and therefore presumably all genuine pho is served.
After lunch we headed to the Ambassadors Pagoda, in my view the most impressive pagoda we've yet seen. Discussion regarding this assessment raised the valid concern as to whether the grounds surrounding a pagoda should be factored into it's overall aesthetic merit, in which case the Confucian temple wins the gold star. We agreed that the best outcome would be to put the Ambassadors Pagoda in the Temple of Literature grounds and so filed the appropriate planning applications to make it happen. We also found some guy apparently asleep on the floor one of the shrine rooms so, mature thirty-somethings that we are, took a sneaky selfie with him in lieu of checking for a pulse.
We stopped by Lenin park, entry to which is free for locals but a gouging 60p for tourists, which we were racially-profiled to be. Whilst beautifully kept, it looked as though it had once tried to be a rudimentary amusement park but hadn't removed the tired attractions and rides once the attempt had failed/ceased. There was also a serious lack of Lenin, 100% less in fact than where we'd seen the Lenin statue a couple of days back. We postulated that the statue might be better placed here so as to more efficiently consolidate the Lenin experience into a convenient singular locale for Lenin-heads to congregate and collectively get their Lenin-on, but had filed enough paperwork for one day.
We visited yet another temple (I'm not souring on the experience, but there's only so much you can say). This one felt akin to a community centre, with kids playing football in the courtyard. We got told off for sitting on the steps with our back to the shrine and were pointed toward the designated seating area, but left in shame.
To conclude the day part of the day we trekked to the venue claiming to produce the original Hanoi 'egg coffee', situated in a narrow alley nestled between tens of imitators. Basically a cappuccino with the milk replaced with a whipped egg-whites/butter/cheese mixture and was far more delicious than Mark and I anticipated. Woody, disliking coffee and egg and with a very finite tolerance for hot drinks in general, decided it probably wasn't for him.
In the evening we decided to bypass the traditional 'seated dinner' for a true street-food experience, ordering steak butties from a roadside vendor before being directed to a table in hitherto unseen seating area. Determined to eat on our feet we finished our tasty sandwiches and found somebody grilling skewers at the side of the road for seconds. Failing to find a sufficiently grubby-looking dessert purveyor on the streets, we settled for a blended ice-cream dessert in a place sufficiently clean to be labelled a 'parlour', then headed to the hotel for an early night ahead of our boat trip tomorrow where, as expected, I've no Wi-Fi so haven't been able to post this until Saturday. Call off the rescue squads - we're alive!Read more
VietnamTỉnh Quảng NinhHa Long20°56’1” N 107°6’16” E
March 17, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C
After working fairly hard so far this holiday, we decided to go on holiday.
For our mini-break we went for a 24-hour cruise into then back out of Ha Long Bay. We had to wake early to get to the travel office by 7:45 ; not even enough time for the hotel to tell me they don't have the ingredients for what I would usually order, so we each had quick untoasted 'toast' instead.
(Disclaimer : our hotel in Hanoi was and is fantastic, digs are affectionate and my TripAdvisor review confirms this stance)
Our journey from Hanoi to Ha Long harbour felt swifter than it was, on a reasonably comfortable bus with interesting scenery and a brief bathroom-break stop at a shop selling imported goods at imported prices, presumably mainly to tourists making the same journey we were.
The harbour was organised chaos, with much an abundance of the latter diluting any hint of the former. Finally reaching the waterside we were vaguely shepherded toward a small boat labelled 'Treasure Junk', the name of the boat we'd booked. After putting on our lifejackets, taking a seat on hard wooden benches and wondering where we were supposed to plug in our essential smart-appliances, also sleep, it became clear that this was a smaller shuttle boat to take us to the main boat.
(Disclaimer : this was clear way before this moment, but portrayed as it happened would be less narratively satisfying)
The main boat, the actual Treasure Junk, looked slightly worn from the exterior, but was stunning on the inside. Like a floating 4-ish star hotel, we knew instantly that this would be the most luxurious accommodation we'd be experiencing during our trip.
The rooms were immaculate, with beautifully kept furnishings, waterfall shower facilities, stunning sea views (which, fair enough, not too admirable an accomplishment for a room on a boat) and, having strategically outplayed my compatriots in a heated match of rock-paper-scissors, I had won the added benefit of a room all to myself. It was almost a shame that our itinerary was so jam-packed, we'd be spending little-to-no time in them.
First they fed us. We were seated to a table with menus listing seven listed meals we naturally assumed would either be options on a buffet or from which we could select our preferences. Instead we were each brought all seven courses of perfectly cooked and flavoured seafood in succession. The dessert course included a mysterious fruit, white with black spots that when tasted conveyed neither texture nor taste, rendering it both unique and utterly un-noteworthy. On reflection, I'm not entirely sure there was any fruit, perhaps my limited perception of it was a hallucination caused by some poorly-cooked seafood, my assessment of it as being perfectly cooked itself a symptom, or maybe some sort of magic-eye placemat. Woody said it was dragon-fruit, which is appropriate as dragons don't exist either.
Next we went kayaking. Each kayak held two people and, following a team rock-paper-scissors performance to rival our lunchtime doubles kickabout days, Woody and I were paired. Weight distribution is important in a kayak and, my natural height and strict regime of unhealthy food and minimal exercise paying-off, my bulk had to be seated at the back and Woody at the front. To use completely accurate kayaking terminology used by the crew, I was the King and Woody my Queen. Just like in that dream I once had.
We kayaked to a nearby beach, taking in the gorgeous scenery as we went. We quickly achieved a good rowing rythmn, our years at the gym together rotating through every apparatus aside from the rowing machine reaping reward. Upon reaching the beach, Mark was overjoyed to find the first cave of the holiday, which was like this concave chamber in the cliffside that you could walk into and everything. More, way way more, on the caves front to come.
In the evening we attended a spring roll rolling demonstration, then got to roll ones for ourselves. They were the same dish we'd tried constructing at Woody's birthday/housewarming party last month but had found difficult to wrap due to the stickiness of the rice paper. Turns out the trick is to make the rice paper less sticky.
We had some beer on deck as the sun set then went for our predictably-by-now fancy dinner. We then tried our hand at squid fishing. This involved them turning on some bright lamps over the water, theoretically to attract squid, and having us hold poles supporting un-baited hooks over the side of the boat. That there appeared to be no plan in place as to what we'd do if we caught a squid suggests they didn't expect us to, and these expectations were met. We stood there for quite a while and, though we couldn't find the hidden cameras, I'm convinced the activity was being filmed for idiot-tourists-look-what-we-made-them-do.com
We had an early start on the second day, assembling on the deck for a Tai Chi lesson before a light breakfast then sailing to the floating village. This was, and still is presuming no typhoon has struck in the past day, a community living in floating shacks in Hanoi bay, their economy centred around the cultivation of pearls. We were first taken on a boat tour of the village, rowed through by a slight Vietnamese woman with incredible shoulder strength, culminating at workshop where we were taught how pearls were made before they tried to sell us the pearls they, or more accurately the oysters, made. The jewellery was very nice, laid out for tourists and for sale at tourist prices, but I was totally about to drop a few grand on a necklace before realising my girlfriend is vegan so mightn't appreciate it.
(Disclaimer: I wasn't, but actually now wouldn't. Creating and harvesting pearls is sadistically clever but needlessly brutal and nobody should buy them or wear them for any reason, ever)
After this we went for a 9:45am lunch then sailed back toward the harbour for a bus back to Hanoi to walk to collect our bags from the ever-helpful Phillip at the highly-recommended Hanoi Brother Inn & Travel hotel (tell 'em Nick sent ya and you'll get the same deal as everybody else) then walk to the station to catch a sleeper train to Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park, our next destination, where Mark promises there'll be caves. Which I'm really really looking forward to...
(Disclaimer: the rule-of-three dictates that this is one-to-many disclaimers)Read more
VietnamTỉnh Quảng BìnhPhong Nha17°36’38” N 106°18’32” E
March 19, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 24 °C
(Featuring our special caves correspondent, Mark!)
Caves are cool.
They did it with Westworld. They did it with Star Trek. They tried to do it with Power Rangers and they failed miserably with The Mummy. And now somehow Mark has managed to take something dreary, dormant and rocky (they also did it with Rocky) and successfully reboot it into actual entertainment.
I can't give Mark all the credit however. I gave him full credit for our last group caving excursion to Carlsbad Caverns someplace in the USA (I forget exactly where, my repression techniques are working), and it was a consequence of this experience that I approached the caves at Phong Nha-ke Bang with trepidation.
Credit here though must also go to Phong Nha Discovery Tours, the facilitators of our tour of the Paradise and Dark caves on Day 1. There's a certain ambience to organised tours in Vietnam; an enjoyable, ramshackle mania that makes it feel as though they just discovered these caves last week and so quickly cobbled together a visitors centre from banana leaves and bamboo and diverted the local bus service to ferry people to it. If we could actually understand the words the guides are frequently yelling at one other, perhaps comparing their running tallies of tourist fatalities, it would certainly take something away from the experience.
Also want to give props to our main man Kris, the assigned guide for the day, who maintained an exiteable aura throughout the day, snapping pictures of the group and mixing jokes with fact (edutainment?) as he taught us some Vietnamese geography and history.
As we travelled in our bus through the jungle on Victory Road, a key transport route during the American war, he explained to us how Vietnam was shaped like a letter S (debatable, but I see it) or, alternatively, like a woman (perhaps, after you've had a few drinks and imagining the woman doing a particularly painful yoga pose). Expanding upon his analogy further, Kris explained how as we were now in the approximate middle of the country, Phong Nha-ke Bang could be considered the 'sexy bits'.
Keen to capture Vietnam's sexy bits on film, Mark had ensured his camera was thoroughly charged, fitted his other Go-Pro-like action-cam into its waterproof casing and ensured memory card capacity by uploading all previous pictures to his portable hard drive. In fairness, he did this every day, but feels most pertinent to mention here.
We briefly stopped for the pre-show that was Eight Ladies Cave, less a cave more a shrine built into a naturally-formed cubby-hole, which Mark attended cosplaying as one of the titular ladies. We then proceeded to the first feature presentation; Paradise Cave. Whilst a respectable effort, this cave was very much from the 2001 Tim Burton Planet of the Apes school of reboots; too similar to the original in some ways (flashbacks of Carlsbad), too different in others (had to ascend a winding slippery slope to get there) and with an ending that was somehow both a retread and frustrating in it's own right (back up the stairs we came down).
For some genuine geological commentary, I pass you to our special caves-correspondent, Mark:
"It was aethetically very pleasing, well illuminated, and not garish. The variations of stalactites and stalacmites, their shape and sculpture, particularly notable. The overall scale of the place was breathtaking. There aren't many geology jokes."
Thank-you Mark.
We then travelled fifteen minutes to the Dark Cave, where we were first given lunch. This consisted of piles of meat and rice in massive wicker baskets that brought to mind the dustbin-lid presentation style of Reds Barbecue, and contained similar quantities of food. Having consumed a heavy meal, we recalled the rule that you should only swim within two hours of eating, so headed to the waterside without delay.
The fastest route was via zipline. I was nervous as I'm not a fan of jumping off ledges at heights that would kill me were it not for apparatus I haven't fitted myself, don't fully comprehend and haven't examined the warranty for, but Woody was in the queue in front of me and his survival of the experience gave me faith. Mark slightly exceeded the weight requirements for the zipline, invalidating both the attraction's insurance policy, his personal travel insurance policy and endangering both his life and all those that might follow him, so I made sure he was in the queue behind me.
Upon touchdown I agreed the zipline had been exhilerating, safe in the knowledge we wouldn't have to go on one again. We walked to the water where there were some boats waiting to be told we would have to swim. We swam toward a nearby cave mouth and a small jetty poking out the front. Woody enjoyed ascending the jetty ladder so much he decided to slip and fall back into the water just so he could have a second go.
We then walked single-file into the Dark Cave, named genuinely for its darkness. We were each wearing helmets with lights attached, these being our only source of illumination. As the passageway became gradually narrower the floor underfoot became muddier, eventually culminating in a large pool of mud that we all waded into. It was doing that Dead Sea shtick where you could naturally float on the surface and we were told the mud was good for our skin, but then they always say and I've yet to see Boots start stocking big tubs of mud in place of Oil of Olay.
After walking through mud to mud and coating ourselves in said mud, we were rather muddy. On our exit from the cave we were invited to go down a mudslide, with the promise this would make us briefly muddier but conclude in a clean water pool in which we could wash-off the magic regenerative exfoliating goop.
Once outside we had the opportunity to kayak once more, this time in a three-way arrangement whereby Woody and I ruled as co-Kings with Mark as our shared Queen. Basically we rowed, whilst Mark took pictures. We ended up back at the visitors centre, where Mark & Woody raced on a mini-zipline (I'd had quite enough of that) followed by a few rum & cokes in the bar and Mark had a staring contest with a fire-ant. In all, an excellent afternoon that thoroughly restored 'cave' from its standing as an occasional curse-word to that which invokes open-minded intrigue. This was Rise of The Planet of the Apes style rebootery ; I would queue-up for the sequel and even buy the Blu-ray.
Then the next day happened. We went on a lovely boat trip into a huge cave and all was well and epic and wow but then Mark said we'd be going up a mountain to a temple. 'Brilliant' we thought, so did. The climb was tough-going, steep and in sweltering heat but the views were phenomenal. Alas, however, when we reached the summit there was no temple, only cave. An okay cave, but hardly a good cave. Think War for the Planet of the Apes; acceptable I guess, but that'll do.
This sort of duplicitous ploy is precisely what gives caves a bad name and Mark's mislead why the world looks down on geological professions with scorn. With only the descent then a late, hot, 90-minute bus journey then 4-hour train journey to look forward to today, this was a monumental letdown. Still I'll say one thing for caves, after a humid sweaty climb in the baking Vietnamese climate they have a singular redeeming feature:
Caves are cool.Read more
VietnamTỉnh Thừa Thiên-HuếThôn Kim LongNorth Central Coast16°28’12” N 107°35’50” E
March 20, 2018 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C
There were no seats available on our train from Dong Hoi so we had to book beds for the journey to Hué. It being late afternoon and only three-ish hours away, we didn't get much shut-eye, but the lie-down proved beneficial when we reached Hué and, after barging our way through a throng of Vietnamese offering us ludicrously inexpensive taxi deals, discovered it was a thirty-five minute walk to the hotel.
But it was good to stretch our legs, see a bit of the city and having only walked about 12km so far that day, most of it up-hill to see a temple that turned out to be a cave, the prospect of an additional 3km with 15kg strapped to our backs was too tantalising to miss.
First impressions of Hué are that it feels like a far more modern city than Hanoi. By which I don't mean Hanoi isn't modern, by definition everything that literally exists now is modern, but I mean Hué feels more modern than some other places. Except for the ancient ruins, which feel old but not really all that ancient. I mean it's not the future like Tokyo or the past like Amish Country but closer to the middle than you might expect. I don't know what I mean.
The city economy is most definitely driven by tourism, with Hué being positioned as the perfect halfway destination for people travelling North-to-South or South-to-North and the only destination of note for those undertaking the very short and far less popular East-West route. There are an abundance of bars, restaurants, tour-operators, mini-marts and hotels, all of which we made use of in our first day (categorically, not literally). Our chosen hotel was down a narrow dark alley close to the wide, well-lit tourist streets.
'Chosen' is a somewhat grandiose descriptor for the process of selecting amongst the tiny percentage of hotels offering rooms to accommodate three adult males without infringing our night-time intimacy boundaries. But our hotel, 'The Times', is a lovely place with great facilities that I'm assured is in no way affiliated with the Murdoch empire.
After dropping off our laundry to be processed for the princely sum of a quid a kilo, we ventured out via a tour-operator, to book our following day's excursion, then on toward the former Imperial Citadel. En route, it began to rain so we popped into a shop to buy some umbrellas.
The umbrellas were of equivalent build-quality to a primary school kid's art project. You would tell them 'well done' and possibly hang on the handle of the fridge door, but wouldn't use outside lest the rain dissolve the papier-mâché canopy and weaken the lollypop-stick spokes, condensing the apparatus to a PVA-soaked mound atop a resistant yoghurt-pot handle.
But some form of portable sheltering was certainly required, most essentially for Mark so he could perform his visual documentation duties. In our tight role-based group structure it has evolved that Mark is our Planner, Co-ordinator and Photographer, I'm our Scribe and occasional Navigator and Woody is here too. Alas, the need to both hold his camera and umbrella in such a way that the umbrella also protected the camera proved difficult. This repeated reconfiguration of equipment, coupled with the frustration of idle tourists wandering into his perfectly framed shots at the very point of perfect shelter/shutter alignment, pushed our photographer to peak perturbation before we'd even entered the Imperial City gates.
Mark. Was. Furious. The anger eminating from his being only intensified when he noticed an interloper blotching his viewfinder in the form of a tiny dust-mite. Much as the Southern Vietnam troops occupying the citadel must have felt in January 1968 when, as part of the Tet Offensive, a Division-sized force of the People's Army of Vietnam and Viet Cong soldiers invaded, Mark was incensed by the intrusion and found it troublesome to extract. However, a quick Google search clarified this to in fact be an intentional in-built system designed to keep the aperture dust-free, confirming the mite to be a feature, not a bug.
The rain soon ceased and we wandered through the Citadel and Imperial City calm and dry. Outside the city walls we found two clusters of cannons. One set of five represented the different elements, smartly conserving bronze by eschewing the periodic table quantities for a more Captain Planet inspired approach. The remaining four cannons represented spring, summer, autumn and winter; whilst the capital city may have the Hanoi Hilton, Hué has the Four-Seasons Cannons (DID-YOU-SEE-WHAT-I-DID-THERE!?!)
There was much to see in the Imperial City: the ornate Throne Room, the former Forbidden City (patch of grass), nine dynastic urns opposite ten shrines for eight out of the thirteen emperors, the Reading Room, the Long Corridor, the Flag Tower, the Pavilion, the other Pavilion, gates, gates, more gates and gates being restored to their former gateness, several gardens, numerous courtyards, we fed some fish, had some ice-cream and for reasons hummed the A-Team theme-tune in harmonious adagio tempo. It was a full day, and took up most of it.
After walking over the river to the Dieu De National Pagoda it was surprisingly late in the day so we headed back toward the hotel. We stopped-off at the first supermarket we've seen to buy some interesting hot-dog pizza-breads for a late lunch which we followed with a round of not-sure-whats a lady was making on the street outside. They were like deep-fried sweet-bread doughnuts with sesame seeds and delicious. We also finally found some Dark Choco-Pies, which since I've not explained the ubiquity of the brand nor previously chronicled the quest to locate this particular variant will mean little to anybody except us.
In the evening we went out for food, accompanied by several good-quality beers that cost 30 pence each. We like Vietnam.Read more