Motorbikes and Mosquitos, Feb 12/2010

(Please note that another new post, which can be found below, was made just earlier today!)

We boarded yet another over night train to Hue - this time it wasn't as nice and suddenly reminded me of the horrifying moments I had on the Chinese trains. Oh well, "suck it up" I said to myself. I was really careful exiting this time. We had a little trouble getting a taxi so we had to stand in the blistering hot sun with all our packs for about half and hour. It seems that westerners are not the desired fare here. But finally we made it to our hotel which was lovely. After a nice group lunch, Mr Q took some of us on a tour of the city's citadel and Forbidden City (home to the former royal family.) Hue was the original capital of Vietnam and Hanoi is now the new capital.

It was hotter then hell, and just trying to stay cool drained most of our energy. The grouds of the Forbidden City were beautiful and desserted - on account of the heat. So we had the whole place to ourselves. I kept making comparisons with the Forbidden City in Beijing when we first arrived and it was -15 degrees. The royal grounds were made even more beautiful by all the colourful flowers that decorated every path for Tet (New Years) celebrations.

After we completed our tour the lot of us desparately needed to cool off. We searched out a hotel with a pool and paid to use the services for a day. We spent the rest of the afternoon hanging by the cool blue waters, sitting in soft white loungers, and sipping over priced fruity cocktails. It was divine.

One thing I must say, the bugs are freaking enormous here! I have never in my life seen bugs this big. It's like their super bugs ready to take over the planet. I think it has to do with the fertile landscape of Vietnam. And everyone knows that dealing with bugs is not one of my strengths. The butterflies are as big as birds and I saw a beetle that looked like a volkswagon with wings! I was using the toilet at the homestay in Sapa and I'm pretty sure that a cochroach said "hello" to me. It's also really bad for mosquitos here and I've been eaten alive - even though I'm using bugspray every day with 50% deet! I told you, super bugs. Thank god for all the friendly geckos who eat the insects in our rooms.

Our second day in Hue was one for the books. We were going out on motorbikes for the day. Now mom, don't worry. We had special drivers and helmets. It was totally safe...mostly. They picked us up in the morning and I carefully chose the most trustworthy-looking guy and hoped on the back of his bike. We were all in a row when suddenly all the drivers shouted out in unison "MO! Hai! Ba! Hiya!" (1,2,3, lets go!) and then reved their engins before taking off down the dusty road.

We rode all through the country side and rice paddies stopping at little villages here and there. The first village wad having their weekly farmers' market near an ancient bridge of some significence - I wasn't paying attention. On the bridge there was an old women, a fortune teller. And not just any fortune teller, a magical fortune teller. So we all had our fortunes read and my turns out pretty darn good - but I'm not sharing any details ;) We hopped back on the bikes and went to the Ming tombs. The tombs were discovered by a farmer and lie in jungle-like surroundings. After the tombs we visited some amputies who were making those funny cone hats that everyone wears here. We then went to another village and I got to take a crack at making incense - which is a lot harder then it looks by the way. Later we went to a spectacular view point high above the river and valley before heading to a monastery for lunch. The monks cooked us a delicious vegitarian feast, some of which they insisted on hand feeding us! Then they rolled out some bamboo mats and insisted that we take a little afternoon nap - I wasn't arguing! After our nap we left the bikes for awhile and took a dragon boat for a cruise on the river to a very special one tower pagoda. The scenic peaceful grounds that surrounded the pagoda were dotted with orchids and other exotic flowers. Thousands of butterflies and dragon flies filled the air as monks meditated in the back ground. It was very zen and I think that I must have centered my chi or something while I was there because I left in the most relaxed and blissful state. The boat returned us to our waiting motorbikes and the drivers collected us again and took us back to the hotel. We were absolutely covered head to toe in dirt but we were smiling from ear to ear. It had been a great day.