Stray - Tam Coc to Hanoi

As it was only 100km to Hanoi from Tam Coc we visited the nearby Cuc Phoung National Park and its Primate Rescue Centre. The centre rescues and protects endangered monkeys and gibbons, some of whom have been hunted to near extinction for their profit as speciality food and medicine, particularly in the Chinese market.

Wu left us at the main gate to wander down a lonely path with the hiss of the breathing rainforest around us. As we neared the centre the silence was broken by the rising calls of gibbons echoing through the trees, like the repeating whistling boom of a strange alarm.

The centre's guide, Hom, smartly dressed in shirt and trousers with a Viet Cong helmet, led us along moss speckled brick paths and past cages of the different species. Dark inset eyes on small faces watched us intently as long tails hung down from perches and powerful fingers gripped the cages' mesh.

Hom explained that the centre's goal was to rehabilitate the primates back into the wild and showed us a 'semi-independent' area of forest adjacent to the cages, which acted as a stepping stone to complete rehabilitation. Different vegetation was also grown at the centre so the primates had the variety in their diet that they would in the wild.

At a time when some of the species' total populations are as low as 45 and reproduction is only once every 2 years, the centre's work is vital in preventing these species becoming completely eradicated by human desires or speciality food and medicine.

Thanking Hom we returned to the bus for the final journey to Hanoi, where our Stray route completed. We said goodbye to our Stray guide, Wu, who with the enthusiasm and humour of a teenage boy has taken us all the way north from Ho Chi Minh City.

In the late afternoon heat we edged our way through the hectic streets of the city's Old Quarter but by dark we found peace and dinner at a rooftop restaurant overlooking the Hoan Kiem Lake.Read more