Today I left Hanoi behind and joined a tour to get to Ninh Binh and the next stop on my grand adventure.
Tour busses are interesting. Most are the hotel size that pick people up from the airports in the states. Some are fully decked out vans that would put the Mystery Machine to shame. Those are nice. The hotel busses are hard to get in and out of.
I know I am an ample beauty to behold, but on today’s bus, butt to gut, I did not fit down the aisle without bumping people along the way.
Because they put three seats across with an aisle. Add my backpack to my wide ride and… it was hard. It also did not have handles to help pull yourself in; a very high step; and a full load of people.
Today’s tour guide is very smiley. I catch some things he says, (and make no mistake he is very enthusiastic about saying them) but when the conversation passes the basic first year English or rehearsed speech, I am lost.
Not blaming him. He is doing 2 languages and I am barely making it though one, so much respect for his trying. And much scolding for me not taking more time to at least try to pick up the language. This is entirely my inability to bridge the gap.
I think he just said bicycle ride. Why would he say bicycle ride? Lord.
Ninh Binh and the Trang An cultural complex is about 2 hours from Ha Noi. In Iowa, like Iowa City to Des Moines. Not far. Don’t need a bathroom break usually, just go.
So far on my full day tours, I am left wondering what more we could see if we just went. It seems like there is a lot of time spent standing or stopping at places no one wants to see. As proven with this next example.
We stopped after an hour at an obvious tour stop, lined with busses. If I understood him correctly, UNICEF came in after the wars and was helpful to the people, and this was a store where they sold things to help support the UNICEF causes.
Okay, as someone who carried those little orange boxes around at Halloween every year as a child, I can get onboard with that. For those of you born after the 1970’s, google ‘trick or treat for Unicef. I am sure someone has put something out there.
I am glad they are supporting causes with these stops, but I am also annoyed to stop when we could have fit another site into our day. Perhaps that is the wrong attitude. Perhaps this is how real people from places other than Iowa travel. Perhaps, I do not care. This stop, as awkward and annoying as it was, I met Theresa from Scotland.
Teresa is traveling alone, as I am. She has a knee issue as I have a hip. As we waited… forever… for the driver and the guide to finish their ‘very good coffee, yes’ at this pit stop, we talked. I think we hit it off, or I simply annoyed her enough for her to adopt me, but she was the gem in my day, so this stop was worth it.
Sadly, we could not sit next to each other on the bus because it was full and everyone else was in groups, so we were in the single row of chairs and a few rows apart. But because of the pit stop, we met. Thank you UNICEF.
Next we would ride bikes. I heard him correctly. What a disturbing thing to be the first thing I hear clearly, but here we are.
Eventually we ended up in what I would call Vietnam’s Kissimmee in relation to Florida’s Disney World. It is the tourist trap before the corporate tourist trap. Billboards everywhere, tour buses and Pop up t-shirt shops. You get the idea. The gauntlet of tagalongs anything popular must put up with.
I debated. I know I can get on a bike and pedal. I also know since my hip replacement, I have only been on stationary bikes and looking at the display of ‘bikes’, I am not inspired.
But I am here. I am out for shenanigans, so bike it is.
Bad move.
It appeared to be a bicycle. Not new, but I am not prejudice. I have an old and a new hip, for example and both work. Not always as designed, but the general purpose of the joint is there.
I should have stopped when he said (I think) to always use both hand breaks to stop. It really is amazing the warnings we are given in everyday life we ignore.
I did not fall. I did not dislocate a hip. Nothing hospital worthy happened. In that respect, the ride was a grand success. However, I would describe it more like a pogo stick with pedals experience than an actual bike ride.
We were fine on the road except for the traffic from Hanoi bled out to the tourist areas surrounding it making the narrow roadways and lack of shoulders unnerving. But as in Hanoi when you walk out in the street. Go forward at a steady pace and they others will move around you.
I was relieved when we went onto a side road until I discovered the potholes. No, these were passages to middle earth, not pot holes.
Okay, learn to avoid those and the next challenge. Gravel.
I am from Iowa. I was raised on a gravel road, walking, riding bikes, driving, the whole thing. I know how to navigate gravel.
This was not gravel. It was pounded down path with lose gravel in places, but without consistency nor warning, it would shift to foot deep soft gravel. Like quicksand. Or quick gravel. Or whatever, the point is I would be bouncing along and suddenly treading through sludge. The wheel would catch and slow, causing jolting and unsteadiness… and as I said. This is not bicycling, or at least any version I am accustomed to, but challenge 2 faced and adapted to.
I rather felt as if I was in the forest with Wesley and Buttercup and now waiting for the R.O.U.S’s to appear. If you don’t understand that sentence, watch The Princess Bride.
Our guide said (I think) if we wanted to take a picture of something, then to signal him and he would stop. I was so focused on the road, I have no idea what I would take a picture of other than gravel. I know what gravel looks like. I do not need a picture.
We rode on. We stopped. The tour guide wanted a group picture, so we all obediently got off our bikes, posed, and then he wandered away after motioning to the scenery. It was nice scenery. I took a picture.
Our route continued, me regretting my decision after what felt like 2 wrong turns because we went down a road, made a loop and returned to where we were without any obvious purpose for taking the loop in the first place.
Eventually we came upon a gate. We stopped at the gate. I took a picture.
I tried to take several, but again, the tour guide wanted a group picture because apparently this group is now family. Some ritual bonding by pogo bike I was unaware of I assume. Perhaps this is the gate of initiation where we will pogo over a live goat and if I survive, being the eldest present, will be come matriarch of the goat pogo jumping tribe.
Nope. He just wanted another picture. So I took another picture.
Suddenly, and this is the funny part, when others wanted to take pictures at this particular gate, we were running late and there were better pictures at the temple. So off we went pogo pedal kin.
I have established that tour guides, or at least, 2 of the 3 I have experienced in Vietnam, are not focused on keeping a group together. They throw a hand or a flag up in the air, and in my reality, run off expecting everyone to follow.
There were two points on the bike ride alone the guide lost the half of the group I was in entirely. Poor Teresa, who couldn’t ride a bike was left sitting at the bike station wondering why we were not back yet.
But we did eventually end up at a temple. I have no idea what temple, or where we were, but a temple none the less. The tour guide ran off again so we stood.
I took a picture. And another. And another.
Teresa appeared with the tour guide who gave those who did not have covered knees, skirts to wear. It is a temple thing. To be respectful, below the knee and over the shoulders must be covered. No tank tops and shorts, or if you forget the rule, you wear a rented skirt.
I have yet to wear a rented skirt.
We walked around the first temple, and again, the guide ran off saying there is another temple. Teresa and I followed along at our slower pace and discovered there were two possible temples in the direction he ran off in, and we had no idea which way they went.
To sum up, it was not a great temple experience. I did see some random cattle on a long leash wandering across the parade grounds. I also saw a martial arts class playing tug of war.
I remember playing tug of war with the kids when in martial arts classes. They appeared to be having fun as we usually did. I am excited that at least is universal.
And I had a nice talk with Teresa.
** Addendum: It was bothering me that I could not tell people where I was, so I took the coordinates from my GPS where the roaming cattle were and established the location as “Ly Thai to Stele house’ on google maps. Next to that is the Temple of Emperor Le Dei Hanh, which is the one I wandered through before we lost the tour. We saw part of Temple of Emperor Đinh Tiên Hoàng, but avoided climbing the hill to see Tomb of the First Emperor Lăng vua Đinh Tiên Hoàng. We were at the Hoa Lu Ancient Capital. I’m glad I was there. I wanted to see that.
