More pics of Northern Vietnam.....

Trip to Sapa, mountain town in the far north near the China border....

We took an overnight train from Hanoi

Flower gardens on Ham Rong Mountain in Sapa

A view of the terraced rice fields and villages from Ham Rong's peak

The Hmong tribe irrigates its lower rice fields with this river. The building on the hilltop is the tribes secondary school.

The home and rice fields of one Hmong family, if their harvest is plentiful they will share or trade with fellow villagers for wood, pigs, chickens.

The 3 1/2 hour trek to Loa Chai village was half on the unfinished road and half on footpaths through the patties.

Sapa Chaou Homestay

Our Five Star accommodations in the loft

The view from our window

Josh on the front porch looking out over the garden

Hmong boys passing the time

Preparing dinner over an open fire

Clockwise from the top: Mountain mushrooms with pork, Fried tofu with tomatoes and herbs, Strir-fry veg with pork, Bamboo shoots sauteed with onions and herbs, Cabbage and onions.

Sites On the road out to Cuc Phoung National Park, 45 km outside of the city of Ninh Binh......

The motorbike we rode out the to the park

Muddy trails made the trekking difficult in sandals

Finally caught up

So we are now in Malaysia, in the capital of Kuala Lumpur. We were supposed to be in Bali by now but missed our flight so I guess we are staying in Malaysia for a while. We are gonna make use of our visa while we're here and do some exploring before getting back on our path to Indonesia. Today we got caught up on our blog posts for the last few weeks, so check below for all the updates and photos.

Also, I took off the video bar over to the right cause it wasn't working like it should. I replaced it with a link box which has a direct link to my You Tube videos. There is a cool new video of monkeys to check out. And for the first time there is also a link to my live Spot messenger page where you can see a map (with satellite images) of our latest location (GPS locations I send out every few days). Pretty sweet stuff... if your a nerd like me.

Sapa and Lao Chai Homestay

Our last trip in northern Vietnam was to Sapa (one of our Vietnam favorites), way up in the mountains near the Chinese border. We took an overnight train which was surprisingly pleasant (compared to other trains we've taken). We spent our first day hiking through Ham Rong Mountain park, a wonderfully landscaped park in the middle of Sapa, then spent three hours hiking with a guide to the village of Lao Chai. The village is a Black Hmong village, one of six minority tribes in the area around Sapa. We stayed overnight at a homestay and were able to cook meals with our guide. The next day we hiked straight up a mountain to visit our guides house. The valley we stayed in was gorgeous and full of bright green terraced rice fields. The pictures cant even capture the beauty of the area, but its a start.

An aerial view of Sapa from Ham Rong Mountain

The "European Gardens" on Ham Rong Mountain

Rice patties in Lao Chai village

Terraced mountainsides filled the landscape

Erika and our guide...plus three ladies who joined us on their walk home

Ploughing the fields the old fashioned way, with water buffaloes

Water buffaloes escaping the mid day heat by taking a mud bath in the terraces

A view of our homestay, the right most building in the top of the photo

We brought some art supplies from Hanoi for the local school, and spent 30 minutes drawing with the kids during afternoon play time

Hanoi and Northern Vietnam

We are playing catch up today on the last few weeks, so check further down for another post on Hue. Now I will cover Hanoi, Halong Bay, Cuc Phuong National Park. I'll save Sapa for the next post. Arriving in Hanoi on an overnight bus from Hue, Erika and I stayed with Hank and Donna Tomlinson, friends of Josh's parents who live in Vietnam. Hank and Donna were so welcoming and let us stay with them for two weeks, using their house as our base camp to explore northern Vietnam. Our three side trips were to Halong Bay, famous for its limestone islands which jut out of the sea at near vertical angles and are riddled with caves; Cuc Phuong park, one of the nicest national parks we have seen in Asia and home to a Primate Rescue Center containing several monkey and langur species; Sapa, mountain retreat and base camp for mountain trekking to minority Hmong and Red Dao villages.

Pictures from Hanoi

Local fisherman in West Lake, right in the middle of Hanoi

This 500 year old turtle is part of a local legend

Josh trying to fit in on the ever common kindergarden stools at sidewalk restaurants

Vietnam is pretty behind the times when it comes to electric lines

The Intercontinental Hotel is built out over West Lake

Pictures from Halong Bay

Enjoying the sunset from a kayak

The view from one of the caves

This cave that we visited was several hundred yards in, and 40 feet high in spots

Pictures from Cuc Phuong

Langurs at the Primate Rescue Center

There's also a new video I put up of the monkeys playing around in their cages, just look for the You Tube link over in the right column.

Hue & Bach Ma

Sorry for the long break from our last post...we were enjoying ourselves in northern Vietnam and got quite a bit behind. Actually we're in Malaysia right now...more on that later. I'll put up some pictures in this post from the city of Hue, and also from Bach Ma national park south of Hue.

Hue is the former capital of Vietnam, up until 1945 or 54 I forget. There is still a huge royal palace grounds surrounded by a walled citadel. The city was great for walking tours, and the people were really friendly. We were even adopted by a local couple who showed us some local restaurants and invited us to visit their home and meet their children. Bach Ma was great for hiking, although most of the park was not accessible due to landslides. No one seems to want to go hiking, cause its really freakin HOT, so we were quite alone on our hike.

The Imperial Palace inside the citadel in Hue

The Imperial Library with manicured gardens

Local cuisine in Hue - self made fresh spring rolls with shrimp, figs, cucumbers, greens and peanut sauce

One of the potted bonsai trees at the Thien Mu Pagoda

Thien Mu Pagoda, which was the home temple of the monk who infamously burned himself in Saigon to protest government policies

Our Vietnamese friends in Hue

Jungle trekking in Bach Ma national park

A rewarding finish to our hike, a cool waterfall and swimming pool

Lush jungle lined path, notice the 20 ft tall tree ferns!

Butterflies were plentiful along our hike

The view from about 1/2 way up to the waterfall