it's been ages...

or at least, it seems that way. But the time has also flown by. Finally finished my fall volunteer training, which just takes up so much time - working 2 nights a week is hard! It means that I can't play at all at night, or Sam starts to get whingy - "you're going out again? But you're never home..." And, for the last couple of weeks, I have been out 4 nights each week. Which, even to me, seems a bit excessive.

A quick plug for my bro - he's a vancouver-based artist/designer, and I am really impressed with his new designs - both furniture and spaces. Here's a link to his website:

http://www.zilliondesign.com/

If you click on the absolutely middle picture on the bottom, "split bookshelf", that's one of my (old) favourites - I bought this piece, but Ben is storing it for me while I live overseas (which seems sort of indefinite at the moment).

Sam continues to be his irreverent self. He recently had a school assignment to create a dinner party made up of fictional, historical and "real" guests. He invited Mother Theresa, Queen Elizabeth, Mickey Mouse and Wayne Gretzky, among others. Part of the assignment was to write down a "memorable moment" from the meal, and his went like this:

The memorable moment during my dinner party was when someone farted, and I said "who did it?" and everyone said "not me" except for Queen Elizabeth.

Not a monarchist, I'm thinking.

why adventure travel isn't for princesses... (part 2)

details, details...

well, the trip to Vietnam, as I keep telling everyone (when asked) was an "adventure". Which, at this point in my life, is a euphemism for "not quite what I signed up for".

Hanoi was frenetic - craziness everywhere, everyone moving, working, selling, yelling. Very few cars, but thousands upon thousands of motorscooters and bicycles. Probably the most important tip there (no thanks to our guide, but more on that later) is to cross the street very slowly. That gives the scooters time to go around you. If you run, the will run into you. Simple, right? Actually, not as simple as it sounds. It is almost impossible to resist the urge to run as fast as you possibly can when there are 78 scooters, 38 motorcycles, 102 bicycles, 12 cars and a bus heading right for you. Trust me on this.

Our guide... Didn't really approve of us. I think we were a bit of a dissapointment to him. We lacked the necessary interest to listen to his 40 minutes of explanation for every single facet of every single thing we looked at. Tragically for him, several of us (well, all of us but Steve) quickly developed the habit of wandering off the moment he drew his first breath. We may have missed a few tidbits, but the Lonely Planet made up for it.

He did manage to hold off on a few things, though. For instance, he failed to mention to us until we were in our berth that the travel company had failed to book us into the first class car on the night train to Sapa. When we got to our berths, Sam said "this isn't luxurious!". We all had to agree. And our helpful guide neglected to tell us (until after our trip to Sapa) that the homestay we had been booked into had left several groups covered in bites the next morning... Judicious timing or completely useless? You decide...

Luckily, our alternate guide in Sapa did mention that we "might not enjoy" the homestay we had been booked into, and would we like to see it? We saw it, and barely enjoyed the 3 minutes we spent inside. Yikes! There were no beds, no lights, no toilet, but lots of chickens and ducks running around. Not to mention that it was indescribably filthy and right on the side of the road... However, we explored for a bit, while the driver of our antique Russian army jeep tried to figure out why our vehicle wouldn't go. After he removed some obviously (to him) useless parts, we moved on...

After decided to forgo the homestay altogether, we booked ourselves into the only absolutely lovely hotel in town, had a hot bath and a good night's sleep, and were able to enjoy the real beauty of Sapa the next day:

After a day of exploring, hiking and drinking coffee to keep warm, we returned to Hanoi via first class sleeper car on the night train - no great shakes in a communist country, but better than not first class... After quick showers and dodgy breakfast in a hotel by the Hanoi train station, we hopped on the bus to Halong Bay, and had the adventure described in the post below...

more to follow...

a little ditty...

...about our trip to Vietnam.



This is the soap that was eaten by the rat:

This is the junk* that housed the soap that was eaten by the rat:

This is the bay on which sailed the junk that housed the soap that was eaten by the rat:

*some artistic licence here, as that isn't really our junk, but a picture of one just like it.