Trekking in Sapa, Vietnam
We were finally in Vietnam. The doors of the bus swing open, and within seconds we were befriended by the local women of Sapa. Doesn't that sound nice...more like bombarded! And when we say bombarded we mean 10..no 20...might have been 30 women and little girls all vying for your undivided attention to buy things from them. They weren't afraid to be ruthless. One of these little girls, Jew , took a shine to Mick. And when someone takes a shine don't expect to be walking down the streets without them by your side - into shops...out of shops..up the street...down the street..you get the jist. The only way to free yourself is to purchase. But to tell you the truth, Mick seemed to enjoy it more than he should. After all Mick "can't say no to the girls" - ha ha.
At about 10 am half the group (the lucky group) set off on a nice afternoon walk to our homestay. About 3 minutes into our 'hike' we all had sweat patches the size of the Pacific Ocean. I don't think either of us had dry patch on our shirt, so you can imagine how smelly it may have been. Ew. Who ever said treking was an enjoyable sport?? Obviously never trekked in Vietnam. Trek? More like a death hike. So now we're an hour into our mission but thank goodness we were able to go for a swim in the local river. Mm. You can just imagine the look on the locals faces when they saw 9 students crawling their way to the river bank, ripping off their clothes and piling into the water. Sigh. The single most satisfying swim in our lives. But that was short lived. We thought the worst was over, but then after 4 intense treturous hours uphill, downhill, climbing we finally started emerging at the top of the hill (ha, mountain more like), and one by one we collapsed. Overheated, sunburned and half eaten alive. We slowly drifted back into conciousness to the sound of laughter. We look over and see a man in his rice straw hat (Alison looks amazing in a rice hat) chuckling at the sight.
After ariving at our homestay the only thing we could think about was getting into the nice cool shower, getting clean and refreshed. It was a fight to the death for the luxury of getting the first shower. We were stopped in our tracks, shocked to find that our highly anticipated shower was a scoop bucket under tap in a shed. Wasn't exactly what we were used to but AMAZING all the same. Things were looking up when we were served a traditional Vienamese dinner overloooking the village. Delicous. Meanwhile in the upstairs bunk Michelle was spending her evening throwing up in a bowl.
We had the most AMAZING experience of our lives. There might have been a teeny bity of complaining but overall we handld it pretty well. :)
Michelle and Casey
[A wee note from Pacific Discovery: The young minority girls in Sapa are amazing in that they often make this trek both ways in a day just to go to their nearest market to exchange goods and buy food]
At about 10 am half the group (the lucky group) set off on a nice afternoon walk to our homestay. About 3 minutes into our 'hike' we all had sweat patches the size of the Pacific Ocean. I don't think either of us had dry patch on our shirt, so you can imagine how smelly it may have been. Ew. Who ever said treking was an enjoyable sport?? Obviously never trekked in Vietnam. Trek? More like a death hike. So now we're an hour into our mission but thank goodness we were able to go for a swim in the local river. Mm. You can just imagine the look on the locals faces when they saw 9 students crawling their way to the river bank, ripping off their clothes and piling into the water. Sigh. The single most satisfying swim in our lives. But that was short lived. We thought the worst was over, but then after 4 intense treturous hours uphill, downhill, climbing we finally started emerging at the top of the hill (ha, mountain more like), and one by one we collapsed. Overheated, sunburned and half eaten alive. We slowly drifted back into conciousness to the sound of laughter. We look over and see a man in his rice straw hat (Alison looks amazing in a rice hat) chuckling at the sight.
After ariving at our homestay the only thing we could think about was getting into the nice cool shower, getting clean and refreshed. It was a fight to the death for the luxury of getting the first shower. We were stopped in our tracks, shocked to find that our highly anticipated shower was a scoop bucket under tap in a shed. Wasn't exactly what we were used to but AMAZING all the same. Things were looking up when we were served a traditional Vienamese dinner overloooking the village. Delicous. Meanwhile in the upstairs bunk Michelle was spending her evening throwing up in a bowl.
We had the most AMAZING experience of our lives. There might have been a teeny bity of complaining but overall we handld it pretty well. :)
Michelle and Casey
[A wee note from Pacific Discovery: The young minority girls in Sapa are amazing in that they often make this trek both ways in a day just to go to their nearest market to exchange goods and buy food]
posted by Pacific Discovery at
12:04 PM
1 Comments:
Sounds awesome. We really enjoyed reading Casey and Michelle's post. Just like being there, but not as humid and hot by the sound of it. Good to hear that Mick is supporting the locals.
We've just been away in Wanaka and Alexandra ... nice weather - but not muggy :-) ... and we even got to do the rail trail from Omakau to Alex which was neat.
happy travelling
Will & Nicky
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