18.2.23We didn’t wake up until 9.30am.It was the first time I’d slept past 5am since leaving home.We definitely needed it. Our plan today was train street and the lake, but not time to do both as we’re meeting the Hanoi Hashers at 1.30pm. Hash House Harriers are world wide. https://images.app.goo.gl/EL35oMzqcLwfKiHw8 We belong to 1 of…
19.2.23Our alarms went off at 5.30am.We had a message last night to say meet at 6.30am at 26 Hang Tre for the bus to Sapa.I had booked from Hanoi SSB as close to our hotel and we’d even checked out where it is.Hang Tre is an additional 15 minutes walk. Left our cases with the…
20.2.23We received a text yesterday saying to be ready for trekking by 9am.We packed what we needed for an overnight as we will be staying in the mountains tonight. There are just 3 bathrooms between everyone. In the end I decided to wait by the sink area so that I was next in line for…
21.2.23 We all slept surprisingly well, at Buffalo homestay, but all struggled to be brave enough to come out from under the duvet. I slept in my clothes as the pjs I laid on the bed on arrival felt damp. When first dozing off I swear I could hear a water buffalo trying to break…
22.2.23 I could have so easily opted out of today’s trek. It was cold and our clothes still haven’t dried out fully. Getting out of bed was hard. We sat with Saffron, Josh and Nick at breakfast debating what to do. In the end it came down to whether our main bag would be delivered…
23.2.23We slept well at Heart of Sapa and went down for breakfast. The hotel is so quiet, and the staff are just lovely.We chatted to a guy from New Zealand. Not sure what his job is but he’d spent a lot of time in Turkey with Syrian refugees.He loved his time there and was overwhelmed…
24.2.23We’d been told to be ready by 9am for our 9.30am minibus pick up.Another similarity to Turkey is Vietnamese time. At 9.30 I asked the reception girls to call and check they’re coming.15 minutes later they arrived, then we had 3 more pick ups.A young lad at the back by me keeps doing very loud…
25.2.23 I was so excited by the pineapple pancakes on the breakfast menu, John chose the same. They were a stack of yellow pancakes containing slices of banana with a side dish of a sort of pineapple jam and just ok, didn’t warrant the excitement. John told them that our toilet is leaking, they looked…
27.2.23Another day a different motorbike as we didn’t want to use yesterdays again. Yayy, we have one with good back brakes, a working horn, although no speedo or fuel guage working. We had a large loop planned and hoped we would have time to do it all. We planned to be up and on the…
28.2.23Happy birthday to my mum, 84 today. Gosh, we’re all getting old and it flies by. We contemplated going to Cuc Phong National park on the motorbike today, but it seems to be anywhere between 45 and 70km away depending what leaflet or map you look at.It just felt too far for me, John was…
1.3.23Onward to Dong Hoi. We felt very sad leaving Tam Coc, we loved our time here so much. The train took 8 hours, we arrived in Dong Hoi exactly as scheduled at 4.35pm. Nothing remarkable to say about the journey, poor for people watching blogging apart from the man who offered us some cognac from…
2.3.23 John discovered a very pleasant roof terrace at the top of our Dolphin Homestay building. It was nice to see Dong Hoi in the daylight. After reading up on options to get to Phong Nha caves a motorbike gives us the most freedom.There’s a bus at 8am, but doesn’t come back until 5pm, which…