So I’m back from my six days holiday trip to Vietnam. Overall, it was a very worthwhile trip for surprisingly low cost. We had one night in Hanoi, one on Cat Ba Island in Hai Long Bay, two nights on the train going and coming back from Sapa and one night in Sapa itself. This isn’t a travel blog and I don’t see myself as much of a travel writer, so I’ll just jot down some general observations grouped by location. It’s easy enough to find real tourist information on other websites anyhow.

Hanoi

• My first reaction coming out of the airport was one amusement as the city seems to be ringed by vast expanses of paddy fields. It’s a pretty weird juxtaposition. I guess I shouldn’t be too snobby as you see plenty of palm oil plantations on the highway out of the Kuala Lumpur airport as well, but in Vietnam, the paddy fields are right next to the bustling city.
• My second reaction was that traffic is a nightmare. Apparently there are precious few traffic lights in the city and next to no traffic rules as no one seems to know or care who has the right of way. Basically, everyone assumes that they have right of way and only swerve out of the way if a collision is imminent. As a pedestrian, you simply step out into the traffic and trust that the hordes of motorcyclists and motorists will avoid you. Everyone honks their respective vehicle’s horn pretty much constantly.
• The Old Quarter is a delightful warren of little streets though the traffic there is much, much worse. Vietnamese drivers must be incredibly skilled to be able to squeeze past each other and find little niches in which to park their vehicles within the narrow confines! My wife suggests that the entire area be restricted to pedestrian traffic only and be turned mostly into a tourist and leisure area. This is what the old areas in many French cities are like for example. This would make it less chaotic but it would also deprive the quarter of some of their charm, which comes from seeing real Vietnamese people going through their daily routines in such crowded spaces.
• We went to the usual tourist spots and it was interesting to just sit in a car and see the streets of Hanoi. The Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and Museum stuff are totally ridiculous however. It’s nothing but Communist propaganda and of no real cultural or artistic value whatsoever. What’s disconcerting is that the young tourism-student guide we had along with us seemed to genuinely believe in all of the stuff.

Ha Long Bay

• The scenery here is strangely ethereal, enhanced by the fact that the boats move at a leisurely pace and you don’t see any speedboats zipping about. No real activity to speak of. You just relax on the boats, preferably on the upper deck if the weather permits and just see the jagged islands appearing out of the mists. It’s like visiting a strange world in a videogame.
• We spent a night on Cat Ba Island, which turned out to be a poor decision. It’s actually a surprisingly large island but there’s nothing to do and nothing to see there, so the travel time is just wasted. It would have been much better to spend the night on one of the boats instead, even if it costs more. Either way, I was glad that I brought a book along to read.
• We went to a cave there, reputedly the most beautiful one of the lot, but I didn’t think much of it. The caves in Mulu, Sarawak are much more impressive and seem much more natural given that there are still actual wildlife living in them. The cave we saw here was completely sanitized for tourist purposes, including colored lights and even paved ground.

Sapa

• Between the eight hour train ride back and forth from Hanoi and the night we spent there, this turned out to be the most time consuming part of the trip. The trains turned out to be more nicely appointed than I expected save for an air-conditioning system that only worked erratically. The train was still too noisy and swayed too much to let me sleep comfortably.
• We had mudslides on the narrow winding highway both going in and out of Sapa. On the first day, it was raining heavily and we had to walk across the muddy area, baggage and all and take another vehicle on the other side of the mudslide. That was not a pleasant experience. On the way back, there was a mudslide again on a different section of the road. Thankfully, the area had already been cleared when our van joined the queue so it took only a short while for us to get going again. A couple of guys in our group had left earlier just in case something like this happened, and they ended up being stuck for more than two hours there.
• The rice terraces are as spectacular as advertised though we noted that the best views are actually along the highway rather than at Sapa itself. I think that they’re doomed to obsolescence so it might be a good idea to go and see them while they’re still there. From what I’ve learned, the lots of land are terribly small and run by individual families and they only have one harvest a year. Everything seems terribly inefficient. I guess they must lose a lot of young people to the cities and eventually the terraces will be maintained only for tourism purposes.
• We went on two treks there. The first day, we went to a couple of the villages with the first one being about seven kilometres from Sapa. It wasn’t too difficult for us, but the terrain was very muddy and there were areas where you had to work to keep your balance. The hike on the second day was much shorter as it was only to visit a nearby handicrafts center. Overall, it was a pleasant place with surprisingly cool weather.
• Our local guide in Sapa was a sixteen-year old girl of the Black Hmong tribe. She also spoke the best English of anyone we have met in Vietnam. She claims to have learned English only from tourists but I don’t really believe that.

General

• Dealing with the local currency is a pain given that RM1 equals about 5,000 Vietnamese Dong. Given their living standards and the depreciated currency, we also expected food prices to be significantly cheaper than in Malaysia. As far as we can tell, it’s actually more or less the same.
• The Vietnamese are generally rather bad at English, but it’s still your best bet for communication. My wife thought my French would come in useful, but nope, we didn’t meet a single Vietnamese who spoke French. Apparently the only ones who bothered to learn were those who worked for the French administration during colonial times. I did notice on rare occasion store fronts with a “On parle Francais ici” (We speak French here) sign.
• There are people who try to rip you off. Our transport from the airport to Hanoi tried to get us to pay him USD15 even though our itinerary specifically said that it’s included. He was probably trying to get paid twice. A guy at the train station walked up to us very abruptly and wanted to take my luggage away from me and direct me to my train even though it was obvious that I already had a guide. I don’t think you get this sort of stuff in Malaysia. It’s just something to be careful about.
• Despite being generally not very sociable people, my wife and I enjoyed talking with the fellow tourists we met. Since most people have identical itineraries, it was cool to run into the same people over and over again despite the fact that we were with different groups. The most amazing example of this was when we shared the train compartment both times with the same German couple, though we were with different groups.
• We noticed a lot of dogs everywhere in Vietnam and very few cats. Most surprisingly, the dogs all looked very healthy and of discernible breeds, rather than the sick and wounded mongrels we commonly see in Malaysia. Perhaps this is due to the Muslim-dislike of dogs in Malaysia?
• Both of us enjoyed our trip and we’ll probably try to visit Vietnam again to see some of the other places and spend more time in Hanoi.