Transportation

The Train

We took the overnight train from Saigon to Danang. It was a long trip, leaving at 11 pm and arriving the following day at 2 pm. With everything so busy with Tet, the train was right full. We had a cabin with 6 beds and were a little worried about who we might be sharing it with. While we were waiting to load the train we were eyeing the potential candidates and desperately hoping we wouldn't have any crying kids in our car with us. It couldn't have been better. We were with 2 Vietnamese women, and 1 Vietnamese man. (The women left about 1/2 way through the trip so there were only 4 of us for the rest of the way. We slept fairly well, and the scenery was great! The food was the part that wasn't as great. We tried rice porridge for the first time, and probably won't be eating it again (if we can help it). Imagine rice....then imaging mushy rice...and then pour a cup of ocean water into it, and that's about the equivalent of what we ate (or at least tried to). Lunch was a bit better with chicken and rice, but we were happy to have more selection when we arrived at our destination.

Motorbike

In Hoi An, we took a motorbike trip about 50 km outside of town to see some Cham ruins. Although the ruins weren't too stunning or impressive, the ride there was great. We passed through many small towns, past people working in the rice fields, and past many trucks I was praying weren't going to hit us as they drove by.

These are a few pics from the trip.

The motorbike is the pickup truck of Vietnam...or southeast Asia for that matter. They transport EVERYTHING by motorbike. We've seen things from fridges, windows and doors, to pigs. Here's some proof.

Sleeper Bus

This was the first bus.....

Sylvia, you were right, the sleeper bus is not the best mode of transportation in Vietnam! We boarded our bus at 2 pm yesterday afternoon. Initially our bus surprised us, it wasn't the traditional type of sleeper bus they have here in Vietnam. There was lots of leg room, it was fairly comfortable and there were less people on the bus. There was no karaoke or Vietnamese comedy playing...all in all it was shaping up to be a good trip....until we got to Hue (another town along the coast). Although we were supposed to take the bus we were on the whole way to Hanoi, they overbooked it and bumped the 3 of us off the bus. We were taken to another bus on the other side of town...this one being the traditional sleeper bus.

This was the second bus.....

Basically, it was bunkbeds, 3 across the bus, with aisles on either side of the beds. Because we were some of the last people on the bus, we got the top bunks, which were a bit more precarious (because going around a corner, it felt very possible that you could be thrown to the ground), and not as comfortable. Also, during the night the driver stopped to pick up extra passengers who slept in the aisles of the bus (for every extra person he picked up, he pocketed the cash). They weren't too quiet getting on! People's cell phones were ringing, people were listening to music in the middle of the night, and they decided to stop and hose out the bathroom at midnight. Needless to say, I'm a few winks short of a good nights sleep. I'm happy to know the trip is over and hope we don't have to travel like that again.

To top things off, when we arrived here in Hanoi, we were told by the bus company they would provide a free taxi ride to our hotel. After waiting 15 min. for them to arrange it, we jumped in the taxi and were taken to our specified hotel. Turns out, they didn't pay the taxi driver and we were expected to cover the cost. We tried to explain to the taxi driver that the bus company was supposed to pay, but the only thing he understood was that we weren't going to pay. He tried to lock Brian's backpack in the trunk and then started calling the police all the while we were wrestling Brian's bag from him and trying to explain the situation. It ended communicating the misunderstanding, but we were still stuck with paying the fare for the taxi. We're going to try to sort this out with the bus company, but something tells me we aren't going to get very far.

You won't hear from us for another few days again. Tonight we are taking a night train to the mountains where we plan to trek up to the highest point in Vietnam. We're hoping for a good nights sleep tonight and a good few days of trekking.