The journey to Ninh Binh was not pleasant. Our worst two days on the bikes.
The first day was a hard slog through the mountains in the rain. Especially after the lovely scenery of the national park petered out into just your average fields.
Freezing cold, sore bum, soaking wet shoes, and nothing of much interest to look at. It was a tough day.
The weather was made that much worse because neither of us had a good poncho. Doug had a leaky north face and I had a bin bag with arms and a hood. Everything below our waists got soaked.
Sitting in wet boxers all day is miserable.
This was five days in a row of getting soaked. We were fed up.
So the following day we purchased some better ponchos.
And traded the mountains for the highway.
This meant trading rain for traffic, grime, and aggressive drivers.
The highway, QL1A, is the main artery in Vietnam between Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh city. So naturally, it came with its own challenges. By the end of the day, I wished we had stuck with the rain.
It was hectic and overwhelming at times. Especially after over a week in the mountains with minimal traffic and barely a truck in site.
The heavy trucks and crazy bus drivers haul ass down this road at frightening speeds. It’s your job to get out of their way. Bus drivers are the worst. A number of times we would overtake a bus as it was stopping to pick up passengers only to have it hurtle past us then cut us up to pick up more passengers.
It was mentally draining, you had to keep your wits about you. We had a couple of frightening near misses.
On top of that, you finish the day grubby as anything. Just looking at the amount of grime on your face makes you worry about how much of that grime you are breathing in.
Avoid this road at all costs!
Ninh Binh
We did make it to Ninh Binh in one piece and spent two nights in a town on the outskirts called Tam Coc.
This is one of those towns not quite caught in the claws of tourism, instead, it feeds off the scraps left from Ninh Binh city. This makes it a peaceful, relaxing place to stay. If a little dead at times.
We met a pair of scousers who clearly loved the place. They had spent ten days straight there basically just chilling on one sofa in the hostel. Too much wacky backy I think.
We only did one activity here. And it wasn’t visiting the big Buddhist temple nearby, sorry George.
We got rowed around Trang An lake. This is a lake with similar limestone formations as Phong Nha except they are in a lake.
You are taken through some limestone passageways and stop at a temple and the village film set from King Kong.
This boat ride was alright but it was too touristy. We were often waiting in a queue to go through a passageway.
It also rained. Of course it rained. Fortunately, I had my new poncho this time.
I marveled at the strength of the old Vietnamese woman on the oars. We both had a go and it was tough. She had some serious stamina.
After another night chilling we hit the road again.
Beyond
Beyond was supposed to be Cat Ba island but we got up late and had some complications.
After another hard, dirty, wet drive to the Tuan Chau port. We missed the last ferry of the day by half an hour.
Then it rained some more.
The following morning it was still raining. The ferry was delayed and we didn’t end up arriving in Cat Ba until the evening.
