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View from stateroom
as we sailed into Haung
Long (Hanoi) |
Today was a day we skated out on sightseeing trips!
We had our choice of an 11 hour trip to Hanoi
(3 hours to get there and 3 hours to get home) or a nice easy ride on a Chinese
junk without sails to look at “monoliths” in the bay.
Guess which one we took??!
Hanoi was the capitol of the Viet Cong during
the Vietnamese war (or as they call it here “The American War”) and is, as they
describe it, “grim.”
We loved Saigon,
which I’d call bright and cherry, and Da Nang, which we enjoyed from the
perspective of seeing Hoi An, the ancient trading center.
I didn’t need “grim.”
And all of a sudden, it is COLD here!
Did I pack cold clothes?
Of course not.
Not even a jacket or long sleeve
sweater!
Why oh why does this always
happen on a vacation??!!
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| Our "Junk" |
So off we went for a short bus ride to get on the junk and
float to see the monoliths.
I bet you
are wondering what monoliths are.
The
monoliths are huge toothlike structures made of weathered limestone, sticking
up out of the water.
Actually, they are
quite remarkable.
And, because we are in
a country where superstition and myths predominate, each one of the many, many
structures have names – one looked like the face of an old man and another
looked like a banana or ----.
You get
it!
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| The Littlest vendor! |
One of the fun things was, as soon as we got a bit out in
the bay, we had other junks sidle up to our boat.
They had baskets of odd and assorted fruit
like apple bananas, star fruits, dragon fruit, mango and papaya.
And little kids, not much older than
3- year old Iris, would jump from that boat to our boat and
try to sell us the fruit! And there was
laundry drying on the back of the boat.
So we figured they live on the boat!!
The littlest kid had no shoes and he had the dirtiest feet and legs,
raggedy clothes and was darling. His dad
was steering the junk. And they kept up
with our boat until, finally, finding no takers, they jumped back gracefully
onto their boat home and took off to find another boat full of tourists! How lucky our kids are that they don’t live
on “junks” and can take baths!!!
Along with that, a Vietnamese young lady appeared with a box
of irregular pearls in various size strings, trying to sell us necklaces or
earrings. And, when that didn’t work,
she tried to sell us embroidered pictures.
Because she didn’t speak English, she would write a figure on a piece of
paper and then you were supposed to write a lower figure on that paper ---
until you came to an agreement. I felt
sorry for her, but I really didn’t need any more pearls!!!
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| Monoliths |
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| More monoliths |
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Monolith called the
"Thumb" or...... |
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| Floating village among the monoliths |
This was our last tour in Vietnam and a good one to end
on.
We have seen enough temples,
markets, monoliths, cultures in Southeast Asia to last a lifetime.
So tomorrow is our last sea day and then on
to a days’ stop in Canton, China followed by our disembarkation in Hong
Kong.
We are excited to see Hong Kong, a
city we’ve heard so much about.
We will
be able to compare it to Singapore.
And,
regardless, when we get home and are reading the newspapers and news magazines,
we now won’t be able to lump all those exotic names together.
We will now know what they are talking about
when they say “Bangkok”, “Singapore”, “Hanoi”, even “Darwin.”
And we will feel we are much better educated
internationally.
Your description of the children reminds me of the children we saw in the Amazon who rowed out to our touring boats in their small canoes. They wanted a dollar to have their picture taken holding parrots, snakes, a huge sloth, and big iguanas. They were beautiful people but desperately poor but our standards. The guides just kept saying they loved their simple life with no worries except catching a fish for supper. Not sure I believed that!
ReplyDeleteYour trip has kept me going through a really rough rehab time on my knee. I thank you for all the photos and descriptions you have shared. I am looking forward to the rest of your trip!!
ReplyDeleteDe Lynn K
The snow will be glad to see you, too.
ReplyDeleteThe children are dressed like it's below zero C. How cold is/was it? You two are looking good...none the worse for wear.
ReplyDeleteWhat an interesting trip. It's almost as if you have sailed to another world, and in a way, you have. Thanks for taking the time to share your adventure with us. Joanie
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like you've made some great choices for excursions lately...you must miss cyclones and broken engines and mystery and mayhem! So glad for you!!
ReplyDelete