Wednesday 6 September – Ta Van – Bac Ha
The sleep, yeah, not quite as good as last night.
Again, it’s all me. I rarely string two good ones together.
Weird dreams, for some reason, with no rice wine to blame.
I did, however, make it back to my room without incident, after making the obligatory toilet run during the night.
It’s all about the positives.
And it has to be, because today I leave.
I don’t really want to, but at the same time, it’s probably time.
Hey, better to be leaving wanting more, I guess….
But right now, it’s just after 6.00am. There’s light between the gaps in the wall, and Ta Van is well and truly beginning its day.
It’s certainly not noisy, but it is awake.
Lay there for a bit, then make the move. A bit of packing up in anticipation, and then outside to begin the ‘lasts’ by 6.45am.
The day actually looks alright, and while it’s cloudy, it doesn’t, at least at the moment, look like it’s going to rain.
That’s good, as I have a short walk coming up.
Take in that view, and try really hard to capture a photo of it, in a way that I haven’t been able to in the previous 500 attempts.
It doesn’t work.
It never does.
Breakfast this morning is a pancake, with honey and a banana, along with another one of those instant coffees.
It’s all good, and much appreciated, but being the non-breakfast person that I usually am, the coffee would have been enough.
More view watching; really dreading having to walk away from it later; while also watching Cho Cho’s family go about starting their day.
Her daughter in law is doing some laundry, and I can’t help but think about that washing machine; the one we take for granted, and the one that Lisa complains about; that we have back home.
Yes, it leaves a bit of soap residue on the clothes occasionally, and every now and then it overflows, but it doesn’t require a water filled bucket on the ground, nor someone’s feet, in said bucket, stomping on the clothes.
It also doesn’t require hand rinsing with cold water, running from a hose that occasionally pulls apart.
Yep, small dose of perspective administered…..
At least there’s a view while the laundry is done.
Sit and chat with Cho Cho for a while, with it all having that feel of inevitability about it.
She gives me a small Hmong bag that she’s made, as a small keepsake, and something, I guess, that can be a reminder of my stay.
It’s a lovely gesture, and something that Lisa will end up with, but as far as reminders of my stay, I don’t really anything material, as I doubt I will ever forget my last two days here.
She’s been an amazing host, and just so incredibly generous with her time. She’s so passionate about her home and culture, and it really has been great to listen to her enthusiasm.
I completely understand that a homestay like this might be a bridge just a touch too far for some, and while she could perhaps change a few things to polish up the edges, I really hope she doesn’t change much at all.
It’s all just so real, and to me, that’s exactly how it should be.
Honey the dog has been hanging around all morning, annoying me, but not in an annoying way, if that makes sense.
She’s gone from that inattentive, always on the go type puppy, in a totally loveable way, to now seemingly not really wanting me to be too far from her sight.
Does she know I’m about to leave, and doesn’t really want me to?
Even the cat, who spent all of yesterday being a typical aloof cat, is hanging around far more this morning.
It’s weird….
It ticks over 10.00am, and the time, unfortunately, has arrived.
Bag grabbed, and I follow Cho Cho off into the rice terraces. Not being anywhere near as wet as two days ago, the walk is far easier.
But then again, having walked where we did yesterday, I’m now a little more practiced in rice terrace and slightly awkward path / track walking.
Past local houses that still fascinate me, and then into Ta Van proper.
Cho Cho, again, leading the way.
Walking down the very road that pretty much signaled the beginning of this little adventure just two days ago, a group of probably ten westerners is being led up towards us by a local tour guide.
I get a smile from the guide, but absolutely nothing from the tourists. Even the one enjoying what may, or may not, be his first beer of the day, gives me no acknowledgement at all.
We get to the small general store we pulled up at the other day, and my taxi driver, the same one who brought me here, is already there.
The goodbye to Cho Cho is reluctantly done, and I’m in the car and on the move by 10.20am.
Through Ta Van; so many homestays…..; and then out and off in the direction of Sapa.
The weather is far better than 48 hours ago, but the driving is only slightly better, which I guess is still a positive.
Into Sapa itself, and yep, my initial opinion from the other day is still the same.
It reminds me of an amusement park, with it all looking like it’s been built with nothing else in mind other than the tourist dollar.
The Bollywood Indian restaurant, the Italian pizza place, the tacky looking fairy lights; it all looks so contrived and fake.
It’s worse than what Hoi An has become, and it would bother me not one little bit if this is the last time I ever see the place.
We pull up at an area that seems to be where the buses leave from, and after paying my driver (250 000 Dong, same as Monday) he points to the bus I need.
Out of the car, ensuring my phone comes with me this time, and I make my way over to one of the buses.
A guy standing next to it answers in the affirmative when I ask if it’s the Lao Cai bus, and he directs me to get on.
We then proceed to sit there for 20 minutes, before heading off at 11.00am.
But there doesn’t seem to be any great urgency, as we crawl through the streets of Sapa, still with the bus door open.
The crawling, which is quite possibly the slowest you can go without actually stopping, continues, and then the penny finally drops.
It’s not just a people moving bus, but also a courier / delivery bus, and we stop several times to collect things that obviously need to make their way between Sapa and Lao Cai.
On we go, door still open, wheels still turning slowly, and I’m not totally sure how all this is going to work.
For some reason I have this thought in my mind that this bus is just a shuttle bus, and that at some point we will be transferred to a different one.
I don’t know why I think that, but it turns out to be an incorrect belief, as the bus, with door now closed, picks up speed as we leave Sapa behind, and begin our descent down the mountain.
The driver then uses his horn, and at that very moment, I’ve managed to tick a box that I’ve long wanted to tick.
The sound of the horn is a noise I have heard often, but never while actually sitting in the vehicle that possesses that horn.
I’ve always associated the sound as one that is a very local bus sound, and if you’ve heard it, you will know exactly the noise that it makes.
If you hear it while out on the street, it will certainly get your attention, as the noise penetrates your ears, bounces around in your head, before making its way down your body, and exiting somewhere near your toes.
I find it loud, piercing, painful, and annoying, but here, sitting on the bus, I just love the sound that it makes.
Yep, love it! And love that I’m sitting on, and experiencing, a local bus.
We stop a couple of times to pick up and drop off, both people and things, and one of the pick ups includes a local woman in all her traditional dress.
I’m not great with the recognising of traditional clothing, but I believe she may be a Red Dao woman.
Regardless of her tribe, she just helped contribute to my whole local bus experience.
Local bus, local people.
I message Mike, who is still in China, but also heading towards Lao Cai, and it appears that we will get there around the same time.
He helps with instructions on where to get off, so I now have a plan.
I am, however, not completely convinced that I will have the intelligence to achieve this plan, despite the very clear instructions that I’ve been given.
Having said that, I do find it difficult imagining and seeing things that I’ve never seen before.
Into Lao Cai, and a number of people are dropped off at different spots.
We reach a bridge, and I’m pretty sure it’s a landmark I need to take note of, as I am of the belief that Mike said to get off here, once we cross it.
If I’m correct, it’s the closest point to both the border crossing with China, as well as not far from where the buses and vans go to Bac Ha.
I consider asking the driver to stop, but being full of doubt, while also being pretty much convinced that my belief is correct, I don’t.
For some reason I think the bus will stop just a little further up, but that is nothing more than wishful thinking.
We keep going, and while I just sit there like an idiot, we are now a significant distance from where I want to be.
Eventually we pull up outside the Ga Lao Cai (Lao Cai railway station), and in limited English, I’m told to wait over by the station for the bus to Bac Ha.
They somehow know that I’m going to Bac Ha, and I can only assume that the taxi driver this morning told the bus driver, after being told by Cho Cho, that that was where I was going.
Again, just assumptions…..
I sit at one of the makeshift food stalls at the station, thoroughly and completely annoyed with myself, and just generally shake my head at my stupidity.
Part of me wants to merely give up, sit, sulk, and take my medicine, by seeing how this all plays out.
But there’s another part that wants to fix this stuff up.
One of the things I really wanted to do while up here, was to actually see the border crossing.
I’m not sure it’s a big tourist attraction, but when the decision was made to visit Sapa, Lao Cai, and its border crossing, this was something that I wanted to experience.
And now, here I am, kind of within walking distance, and I’m sitting here in all my sulky glory considering not doing what I really wanted to do.
After what felt like half an hour, but was probably in fact just five minutes, I put my big boy pants on and set about rectifying my ineptness.
I look at Grab, but there’s none nearby. I could maybe get a taxi, but I’m at a train station that is frequented by tourists, and as such, I’d prefer not to deal with a taxi driver that hangs around a tourist oriented place.
Walking is decided to be the best option, and as I get up to walk away, the woman running the little makeshift shop, as well as one of the guys that was on the bus, try to stop me, saying the bus won’t be long.
The whole little scenario has made me feel a little awkward, and while there’s every chance that the whole thing was legit and would have worked out, I just have this slight feeling that I’m being taken advantage of.
I use Google Translate to tell the woman I’m meeting someone, and then head off into the now very warm sun.
Google Maps tells me the way, and the walk begins, trying very hard to take advantage of any shade I can find.
It only works sometimes, and it’s not long before I can feel sweat accumulating on several areas of my body.
That just reinforces my stupidity, and I take it as a form of punishment I most certainly deserve.
I try Grab again, but nothing comes up, so the walk in the heat continues.
About halfway there, clothes now far wetter than when I started, and I walk past a guy standing near a motorbike.
I hadn’t taken any notice of him, mainly due to concentrating solely on getting to the border as quickly as I could, but did so when I heard him say something to me.
It took a second to register what he’d said, and when I did, I realised that he’d said, “Motorbike?”
Ahhhh, he’s a xe om! (motorbike taxi)
He now well and truly has my interest, and I say, “Border?”
He doesn’t understand.
I try “China?”, and we now have an understanding.
To be sure though, in case he can somehow inadvertently gets me across the border, I show him Google Maps, pointing at a pagoda or temple right next to the actual crossing.
Again, just trying to help him understand that I have no need or desire to actually leave Vietnam.
He understands, and says, “Twenty!”, to which I reply with, “20 000 Dong?”
Yep, we have an agreement, and I’m quickly seated behind him on the bike, and now feeling much cooler than I was.
Just a few minutes later an official looking building looms up in front of me, and I recognise it straight away as the border crossing.
Lao Cai border crossing.
We reach the building, but he keeps going, and I realise why; he’s, quite rightly, taking me to the pagoda I’d pointed to on the map.
Managing to get my point across, and he pulls up somewhere between the two. 20 000 Dong handed over, along with a very appreciative cảm ơn, and my earlier ineptness has now been dealt with.
I wander back towards the official building, with the aim, seeing as it’s almost 1.00pm, to try and find something for lunch.
There’s a few food places around, as you’d expect, with people coming and going, and I eventually find a place doing bánh mì’s (20 000 Dong). Fortuitously, there’s a girl next door doing nước mía đá (15 000 Dong), so one of each is promptly ordered.
They both quickly arrive, and while I’ve certainly had better bánh mì’s, it was just nice to be able sit down in the shade on the footpath, and watch the goings on of the very nearby border crossing.
Cars dropping off, and picking up, the suitcase laden Vietnamese and Chinese, and then everything else associated with that type of activity.
The food places, the souvenirs, the hotels, and the people offering money exchange on the street, to the newly arrived, or the about to depart.
Exciting probably isn’t a word I would use to describe it all, but I am very pleased to have manned up and made sure I ticked a box that I had drawn in my head, however many months ago I decided Sapa would be on the itinerary.
Lunch done, and with Mike still somewhere, but now not too far away, on the other side of that imaginary line, I head off to get a closer look at what is actually there at that ‘line’.
Past the official building, and then the pagoda, and down some stairs to the edge of the river, which just happens to be that line.
Standing on Vietnamese soil, but looking at Chinese soil, as well as some native Chinese fishing on the other bank, all the while seeing people walking across, in both directions, the very nearby bridge that is the crossing.
Again, it’s probably hardly exciting for most, but for me, who lives on a rather large island, I find it kind of cool being able to ‘see’ two countries at once.
It certainly, if nothing else, beats seeing two States….
I hang around for a bit, and as I turn to walk back up the stairs to the road, a rather large bus pulls up.
A number of local tourists, as in something like twenty, get off and head down to the river, and it takes me a minute to realise what they’re here for.
It’s exactly what I’m here for, and that’s to ‘see’ China.
I find it rather amusing, as I thought I was the only one who got a kick out of such boring and inane things.
They head over a little closer to the main bridge than I did, reaching a length of bunting tape, put up to obviously stop people from getting any closer.
With bunting tape clearly nothing more than a visual deterrent, and not knowing both how far these local tourists might push the boundaries, and what, or who, is keeping watch over this quite possibly sensitive area, I move a little further up the stairs, just in case someone does something silly.
Amazing what goes through your mind, especially after I did something silly, China related, with Toan back in 2017.
Doing what I just did. Sort of….
Leaving them to their tourist site, I head back towards where I was earlier, this time in search of my first cà phê sữa đá since leaving Hanoi.
A café is found, my limited Vietnamese is used, and my cà phê sữa đá quickly arrives, looking far more like a cà phê đen đá, than a cà phê sữa đá.
There’s a reason for that, as my coffee is missing the sữa bit, which gives it its ‘white’ appearance.
Yep, I have iced black coffee, instead of iced milk coffee.
Doesn’t matter, I’m now once again in the shade, and the cold drink, in all its black glory, will more than suffice.
I grab my phone to message Mike, and as I do, I receive a message from him, asking where I am.
Reply is sent stating that I’m sitting opposite the Sapaly Hotel, and as I look up, I see a familiar face walking down the road.
It great to see him again, almost a year after last seeing him, when we bumped into each other in Mu Cang Chai.
We sit and chat for a bit, while I try and get a taste for cà phê đen đá, and Mike has a beer.
Time to make a move, and now that he’s here, I don’t need to worry about those confusing instructions he sent me with regards to where you catch the bus to Bac Ha.
We walk up a bit, then turn off to the left, and up towards a bridge running overhead. A limousine type van pulls up next to us as we walk, and the question of are we travelling to Bac Ha is asked.
The yes answer is greeted with an offer to get on, so we do, and the bus proceeds to travel the further 20 metres to the bridge, where it then pulls over at 2.00pm.
The driver hops off, and while there are other vans there, it doesn’t really look like any type of bus station.
We sit and wait, and while I do, I can’t help but think that those confusing instructions from Mike were anything but, and I’m more than a little embarrassed by my inability to follow them.
Although, to be fair, I hadn’t actually got up to that particular component of them.
We sit, chat some more, and just generally wait. Our driver then returns, and we’re on our way at 2.30pm.
But like the earlier bus, we have things to deliver, so several stops are made along the way.
It’s typical Vietnamese countryside, as expected, and as we get closer to Bac Ha, I spend a ridiculous amount of time trying to ascertain whether I can see anything familiar.
I travelled to Bac Ha from Tu Le with Toan in 2017, but having left it all up to him, I didn’t really need to know the exact route. But now I’m trying to recognise scenery, based on a couple of photos and memories of that day.
Some of it kind of looks familiar, but I suspect that may be more wishful thinking, or maybe just hope.
I really don’t know, and that annoys me more than it probably should.
Then again, I might be being a little hard on myself, seeing as it was six years ago….
On we go, brain starting to hurt from overuse at trying to recall long forgotten things from dark recesses, and we get into Bac Ha around 4.00pm.
Dropped just a couple of hundred metres from the hotel, the Ngan Nga, which I already know due to some help from Google Maps, and the 100 000 Dong fare, which was the same price I was told at Lao Cai train station, is paid.
Quick walk up the street, and I follow Mike into the hotel, at which he’s stayed a number of times over the years.
And judging by the reactions of the staff when they see him, they think very highly of him.
He grabs a couple of beers out of the fridge in the bar, and he directs me back outside to the tables out the front.
Great minds obviously think alike, as I can think of nothing else I would prefer to do, at this exact moment in time.
Blurry it may be, but it’s one more photo than I ended up with after our catch up last year.
We sit, chat, and just generally watch the world go by, including all the school kids, who have just got out for the day.
The number of ‘hellos’ directed towards us, blows me away, and it reminds me of how much I’ve missed that.
Mike introduces me to Dong, the manager, who seems like a really nice guy. It’s nice to finally put a face to an email address, after a number of emails back and forth when booking a room, following Mike’s recommendation.
The room I ended up booking, purely because I was here without Lisa, was a windowless room at the back, but Dong is nice enough to upgrade me to a balcony room, at least for the first few nights, before the hordes arrive for the weekend market.
More sitting, more chatting, another couple of beers, and then Mike heads off for a shower. One more beer for me, and as I do, I watch a mouse scurrying out the front of next door.
It dawns on me that I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen a mouse here in Vietnam. Rats, yes, plenty of those, but never a mouse.
I mean, I guess I must have known they existed, but I’d just never stopped to think about them before, due to not ever seeing one.
Oh well, another box ticked!
Off to have a shower, and to check out my room, which while relatively simple, is more than adequate.
Back downstairs and out the front to see Mike, just in time to see a guy with a horse and cart go by.
Love country scenes!
Dinner tonight is with the staff; clearly an advantage of knowing someone important like Mike; and we’re up on the first floor in a private room.
It’s all laid out on the table, and as is the usual Vietnamese way, there is plenty there. Fortunately, however, there’s also a few to help contribute to the eating of it, including Dong, the chef, and some of the room service staff.
The food is duck, a fish that the chef actually caught last night, tofu done two ways, various greens, and a dish I’ve never had before, and one that while I haven’t gone out of my way to avoid, I’ve never had a huge desire to try.
Although, having seen it several times over the journey, there has always been a part of me slightly interested in giving it a go.
Yep, it’s thịt chó, more commonly known in the western world as dog meat, and tonight will be the night I lose my puppy virginity.
And my opinion on Fido?
I don’t know, it’s just meat. Bit beefy, but also a bit chewy.
Nice enough, but certainly not mouth watering nice, that I will now have a huge hankering to partake in woofer again.
But, regardless, there’s another box ticked!
The rest of the food is great, as it always is, helped along by the five litre container of bia hoi, specially brought in for the night.
But it’s the occasion, the actual opportunity to ‘do’ dinner this way, with a group of locals who obviously think very highly of Mike.
What they think of me, I’m not sure. I sense a slight uneasiness from one or two towards me, which may or may not actually be there, but if it is there, I guess it’s fair enough, seeing as we’ve only just met.
More food, more bia hoi, more chatting and laughing, but that doubt of how I’m being received, still lingers.
Mike begins organising tomorrow, with the help of Dong, who I get the feeling could help out with absolutely anything anyone could possibly desire, when it comes to tour type stuff.
The plan is a day on the back of bikes, with at least one local market, as well of course as the usual sights of country Vietnam, that I love so much.
I’m more than happy with that, and I already get the sense that I’m going to see far more of the area around Bac Ha, pretty much solely because of Mike, than I had previously imagined I would.
Dinner and bia hoi done, the night is called, and I head back to my room with a couple of extra beers.
A bit of the usual on the bed, and then an almost hour long phone call to Lisa and the girl, who are in France, letting them know, amongst other things, all about my one ‘special’ dish from tonight.
10.30pm, and with the alarm set for 6.00am, I use willpower that I don’t always know I have, mainly because I often don’t have it, and bring the day to an end.
Another of those travelling days, which always ‘wastes’ more time than you think, but a day in which there were a few little experiences that made it far more than ‘just bearable’.
The Lao Cai border crossing, an impromptu xe om trip, meeting up with Mike again, and a dog invited to dinner.
Was good, and for the most part, it was actually fun.
First of several full days in Bac Ha tomorrow, and by the sounds of it, it should be a good day.
And hopefully, if the doubt in my mind is actually a thing, which is by no means a given, any uneasiness or awkwardness will be gone by this time tomorrow.
Damn my overthinking brain……
Cheers,
Scott
seriouslynot 