Cycling Through Vietnam’s Violent Past

Part Six of Six

The leg of this journey was supposed to feature a long-awaited ride on the Reunification Express train, crossing from South Vietnam into the North. We waited and waited but had been warned the train didn’t necessarily arrive or depart on time, and about an hour after we were supposed to leave, we were told we could now wait on the platform since the train was finally coming. We waited about a half-hour longer, in the cold, when it finally pulled into the station.

We all piled onto car 13 (we should have recognized the omen)supposedly our first-class carriage. As we were walking through the car, we could tell this was not right. This was definitely not first class. It was crowded and it actually smelled… horrible. Some of the passengers were hacking and coughing as they tried to get settled, while children played noisily in their berths and in the hallway. As soon as we reached the end of the car, our guide turned around and said “everyone back”… we had to get off the train.

Our faces registered panic at the same time, as we tried to rush off the train before it pulled out of the station. We had to squeeze past people who had spilled out of their berths to look out the windows and we had to wait until our porters unloaded our luggage again. We didn’t have much time, so we pushed and shoved our way to the front of the car… as politely as possible… and all managed to get off with our bags, just as the conductor blew the whistle to depart.

Because of the Tet Holiday and the increased business, the railway decided to attach our specially appointed car to an earlier train and sent the information, cryptically in an email, which the tour company had missed.

So when you are handed lemons…

Our guides booked us on a flight to Hanoi where we would hotel it for the night, and then bus back to where we were supposed to start cycling the next day. Too bad we wouldn’t get to ride the Reunification Express, but this was a much better alternative than sitting in a stinky and loud railcar.

When traveling in certain developing countries you have to maintain a sense of humor or you will lose your mind. Hang onto your patience and roll with the punches. The Vietnamese have a favorite saying, which we all tried to adopt: “When you can’t forget, you forgive. And when you can’t forgive, you forget.” Great words to live by, and explains a lot about the Vietnamese character.

The Beauty of Vietnam’s North

We had to travel by bus for 4 hours to Namh Dinh where we were scheduled to start riding after our train trip. This would be my first day back in the saddle after a bout of stomach sickness. Luckily it was relatively easy across mainly flat terrain, surrounded by farmland and spectacular scenery… absolutely breathtaking.

We rode through villages surrounded by Karst Mountains, rising from the flat terrain, and jutting up into the sky. There was a smoky haze in the air which gave them a surreal appearance, almost ghost-like images.

This was the Vietnam I had seen in so many photos and guidebooks, and I was excited that I was now seeing what had been waiting for. The ride was a good and steady pace as we traveled across the countryside, greeted by more villagers with children running out to enthusiastically yell out their Hellos.

We stopped for tea and coffee at a beautiful roadside restaurant nestled next to a mountain with a rice field in front. When we arrived two women were irrigating the rice paddy, the old-fashioned way, by scooping up water in a conical pail and dumping it into the next field. It was fascinating to watch. We rode on for another hour or so, stopping to take a lot of photos along the way.

We rode into a little village for lunch, and while it was being prepared, we took some photos and mingled with a few of the townspeople.

I took a photo of one man with his grandchild and I gave him a US dollar as thanks. He looked at me quizzically and when I walked away he asked one of our guides what I had given him. He apparently had not seen an American dollar bill before so when he was told what it was, he rushed out to cash it in for Vietnamese Dong. The whole time the family kept smiling at me and pointing to the baby who, I was told, they now believed to be a good luck charm. I hoped I would earn some good Karma heading into the New Year too.

Our next stop was Cuc Phuong National Park where we would stay in a guesthouse. It was pretty basic accommodation, air-conditioned but no heat, and my thermometer was already registering just 15C and the sun hadn’t even gone down yet. This would be like a Canadian spring camping experience so I bundled up in layers, 2 pairs of socks, my pajama bottoms under my pants, two t-shirts, a hoodie, and my jacket.

Luckily I was alone in the cabin so I could also strip off the comforter from the other bed which kept me warm all night. There wasn’t much to do there, so we called it a day around 7 pm and crashed for the night.

We got up the next day to the sound of pouring rain outside and combined with the cold, we knew this would not be fun day cycling. After a vote, while not everyone was happy about it, we decided to ride the bus and tour the area.

Cuc Phuong National Park is the first and largest National park in Vietnam, created in 1962 during the war. It’s also a nature reserve and celebrates some of the ancient histories of the country.

Our first stop was a series of caves where the first people of Vietnam lived, dating back 7000 years. We climbed up the mountainside using stairs and ladders and made our way through the caves.

After climbing back down we headed to the Endangered Primate Rescue Center. It is run with the help of the Frankfurt, Germany Zoological Society, and is home to more than 140 primates mainly Langurs, Gibbons, and Macaques.

They had been rescued from poachers and were from areas where their habitat had been destroyed. They are kept in different enclosures, small areas for the first stage of their resettlement, and then they were moved to larger semi-wild enclosures to prepare for their eventual release.

When we first arrived we wondered about the loud sirens that were echoing through the park. It turns out it wasn’t sirens but the calls of the Gibbons… simply amazing.

After a short visit, we got back on the bus and drove to the massive Bai Dinh Buddhist temple in Ninh Binh, Vietnam’s largest. It covers approximately 700 hectares, about a kilometer from the bottom to the top with numerous temples scattered around the site.

There are more than 2000 stone Buddha statues, all images of former prominent Buddhist monks. The statues’ body parts, usually hands and knees, are discolored by the oils of everyone who touches them, in hopes of a blessing.

There are also several massive gold Buddha statues and thousands of small gold Buddhas housed in small wood cubes covering the walls of the temples. Construction started in the late 1990s and was completed about 20 years later. It’s a magnificent sight and the view from the top is spectacular.

We made our way through the site fairly quickly since we had a long bus ride ahead to our next stop-off point at the port city of Haiphong, the gateway to Cat Ba Island and Halong Bay.

Cat Ba Island

We woke early the next day and made our way to the dock where we would take a fast boat across to Cat Ba Island. We docked under more cloud cover and rode through the beautiful island, about 25km to our hotel in Cat Ba City.

It turned out to be a sleepy little beach town, with a lot of backpackers around the community but not a lot of other people since this was the low tourist season, which meant we basically had the community all to ourselves.

We had lunch in our hotel on the top floor overlooking the bay and then a few of us wandered down to the beach. We stumbled on a nearly deserted resort that had its own private beach overlooking the bay and the spectacular scenery of the Karst outcroppings.

The group settled down at the resort’s beach bar for an afternoon drink before wandering back to town. As we made our way back to the hotel the sun was starting to set so we headed to a rooftop restaurant and had front-row seats to one of the most beautiful sunsets I had seen in a long time.

We woke early, ready to ride. This was it, our final 30-kilometer bike ride to the other side of the island and the port of Gia Luan where we would board a junk for the cruise through Halong Bay. We pushed the pace a bit so we could spend more time admiring the scenery of the bay but again we had hoped for better weather.

As I climbed the final big hill I wasn’t feeling sad at all, in fact, I was happy to see the end of this marathon journey. We took a final group photo on the dock and then boarded the boat for the chilly ride across Halong bay and to our final destination, Hanoi.

Hanoi

We arrived in Hanoi late afternoon and checked into the hotel and what a welcome relief that was. We had time to get cleaned up before boarding the bus to take us to our farewell dinner. We were all in great spirits as we said our thanks to the guides and bid them goodbye.

When we began this trip the guides told us we needed to have a sense of adventure and a sense of humor and be ready for whatever happened. I think we all took that to heart and accepted the challenges we faced and ended up having an experience to last us a lifetime.

__________________________________________________________________

You could read so much amazing content on Medium and it could be your next step in becoming a writer, for just a few bucks a month. And if you sign up with this link you will also be supporting my writing.