Sapa trekking

Immediately after returning to Hanoi from Ha Long Bay I caught a sleeper train to Sapa in northern Vietnam. I really like the idea of turning travel time into sleep time so you don't miss anything, but it can be very difficult to sleep on a moving train, even with a bed. While I didn't have the best sleep of my life, the train was a fun new experience.  There was even a snack cart coming by all the cabins. I felt like I was on the train to Hogwarts.

Once we reached our hotel we were given breakfast and introduced to our guide for the trek. "So" was a 28 year old native who spoke relatively good english. She was married with three children, 1 girl and twin boys. She was dressed in traditional Sapa clothing, which involves a lot of layers, embroidery and bright patterns.

It was really cold in Sapa, much colder than Hanoi, which had been chilly. It was nice for trekking, because it wasn't unbearably hot. We ended up hiking about 10 km the first day. The path was along the mountain an passed by villages. There was a beautiful texture to the land from all the rice paddies. Sadly, it was very misty, so the visibility was not the best. However, I thought the mist added a nice mystical quality to the photos.

We had a break for lunch at the first village which was pho. During this break we were completely accosted by natives wanting us to buy something, anything. And if you did buy something, someone else would come up and ask "Why you not buy from meeeeeeee." The me was really dragged out, almost like they were singing.

A main crop grown among the rice paddies in indigo, a plant that makes a dark blue dye. Most of their fabrics are dyed this color.

As part of the tour, we were given the opportunity to stay with a local family. We were given mattresses in the loft of their house and played with their absolutely adorable 4 year old little girl, "My." She was not shy at all, had a winning personality and loved to have her picture taken.

We watched So and our host, Him, make dinner. Even My helped out with rolling the spring rolls. Dinner was the best food I had eaten in Vietnam. As you can imagine, I am pretty cautious after the pho incident. I stuffed myself.

After we were given happy wine, which is made from fermented rice. They served it in shot glasses and it tasted like pure alcohol. It definitely warmed us up. The night was cold, but I was comfortable wrapped in mulitple layers under 2 blankets. It started to rain and thunder. The sound of the raindrops on the roof was very soothing, but did not bode well for hiking conditions the next day.

The second day of hiking was ridiculously muddy. I slipped and fell multiple times and by the end of the day was caked in mud. We had women following us again and they were really good at helping us along. Considering they had rubber boots with no grips, I have no idea how they stayed upright.

All in all, even with the mud and the cold, I had a lot of fun trekking through Sapa. I'd highly recommend a homestay if you have the chance. It was a great experience and the area is gorgeous, even with all the clouds.

Ha Long Bay tour

Getting sick and missing the tour with my friends turned out to be a blessing in disguise. I met some really fun, really interesting people on my tour.. but I'll get to that later.

I opted for a three day 2 night tour of Ha Long Bay. The bay is littered with towering limestone cliffs. They form a beautiful backdrop as you cruise along the water on a boat. It was a little cloudy the first day, but it cleared up on Christmas Eve, which was a very nice early present from Santa.  The fist night you spend sleeping on the boat. The cabins were much nicer than I expected.  As I was a single female, I was given a roomate. Tess, from Texas, was absolutely fantastic. She is taking a year long trek around the world and has amazing stories and pictures to go along with them. We had a blast together.

Boat dining room

Dinner on the boat was an array of seafood dishes, and one chicken, for the more discriminating folks. The squid was supposedly caught directly from the bay. I tried my hand at squid fishing that evening, but failed miserably. However, since ALL the boats in the bay had lights on and hooks out, I didn't feel so bad.

One of the more interesting characters I met was Bobo. Bobo is a chill surfer dude with a gnarly California accent. He is also the host of the show, Finding Bigfoot, on animal plant and discovery channel. Talking to him was an absolute hoot. His group had been filming in Vietnam; hunting for some type of ape-man out of myth. I've seen the show a time or two, it is always entertaining.

My first brush with celebrity

Getting back to the architecture of the bay... wow. Rarely have I been in such beautiful places. My favorite was the climb to the top of Monkey Island. The rock was very jagged and sharp, but gave some fantastic hand holds. Using my rock climbing skills, I channeled my inner monkey and climbed to the very top.

We spent the afternoon exploring Cat Ba Island. The island is a national park and home to the endangered Cat Ba langur, a black monkey with a white mohawk. There are only about 60 left on the island. We biked along rivers, through valleys into the village. It was very peaceful. I kept an eye out for interesting insects, but there weren't any, other than the occasional butterfly.

I spent my Christmas Eve in Cat Ba Town. It is very touristy, but my hotel room had a view of the ocean. After dinner with my boat friends, we headed out to a local club for some kaorake. It was decked out in true Christmas style, with icicles and pink heart balloons suspended from the ceiling.

Christmas morning I was able to skype with my family with the hotel's free wireless (yay!). The internet quality and availability is so much better than in Africa, although I suppose that is to be expected. I spent the day traveling back to Hanoi and as soon as I got there hopped a night bus to Sapa in northern Vietnam. Yay for back to back adventures!      

Hello Hanoi!

After 30 hours of traveling halfway around the globe, I made it to Hanoi. My first taste of southeast Asia is in stark contrast to eastern and central Africa.  The city is hustling.  Motorbikes are flying everywhere, taxis are darting around and people are hurrying along the sidewalks. After a bit of haggling at the airport, we found a taxi to take us to Koto Hotel.  For $5 a night Jordan and I were given our own room. No dorm beds for us! (Just yet...)

The next day we explored some of the city. Mostly we walked around the small lake.  There was a beautiful pagoda to visit that sits in the center.

Afterward we partook in one of Hanoi's finest traditions, bia hoi. This is beer brewed fresh daily. It is available in little restaurants/bars on the sides of the roads and is directly poored from a keg.  The cost of one glass, about 2500 dong, or 25 cents. I really enjoyed it. It is a nice light beer and a nice change from the darker beers I was drinking in Africa.

Hanoi is known for its water puppet theater, which was... interesting. The puppets sit on water, which covers the mechanisms that make the puppets move. There was great, authentic vietnamese music. It was so soothing it lulled me to sleep. Whoops.

We headed back to the hotel a little early, even though the night life was already in action. We were getting up early to take a tour of Ha Long Bay. I, unfortunately, did not make it on this tour. Three months in Africa, I never vomited, not once.  One day in Hanoi eating pho from the side of the road... death. Ok ok. Maybe I don't need to be so dramatic, but I hate being nauseous. It reminds me of chemo and I mentally start freaking out. I think it might be some form of PTSD. Everyone else (3 total) were just fine. I told them to go on ahead and I'd catch up.

The people at the hotel took amazing care of me. They woke me up in the middle of the afternoon, offering to take me to the pharmacy, the hospital, call a doctor. They insisted that I eat and scolded me for skipping breakfast.  The vienamese are such nice, thoughtful people. At least the people who worked at Koto Hotel were. They had one boy walk me down the street to find some safe boiled rice for me to eat and they gave me tons of bananas from their restaurant. So not such a bad day afterall. I rescheduled my trip to Ha Long Bay for the next morning.

Note: If you ever need a budget hotel in Hanoi, I highly recommend the Koto Hotel. The rooms are clean and breakfast is included in the cost of the room. The staff are absolutely fantastic. They go above and beyond to make you comfortable.  They also act as a tourist agency and you can book all your side trips, bus and train tickets through them at really good prices. And there is free wireless. How can you go wrong?

Goodbye Africa

Africa as a whole is an amazing place. It is so diverse with mountains, oceans, lakes, plains, deserts, not to mention the amazing abundance of mammal life there. It's wild, dirty and basic. I'm sad to leave, I really loved it here. Thankfully my occupation as a medical entomologist ensures that I will be able to come back some day.

I would highly recommend the company African Trails to anyone wanting a budget tour through Africa. The people are great and figuring out how to cook on a single burner with warped pans is all part of the experience.

As I travel more I find that yes, it is the experience that you are having, but even more so, the people who make the trip unforgettable. I met some wonderful people along the way and had an absolute blast with them. You all know who you are, thank you!

Now it's on to the next adventure, Vietnam!

Kloofing in Knysna

Kloofing. Awesome word, isn't it? It's Africaans for canyoning, i. e. scrambling through water and over rocks in a canyon. About a 30 minute drive outside Knysna, South Africa is the Drupkelders Canyon. The direct translation is dripping cellar. One of my favorite past times in Kentucky was climbing over rocks in the Rockcastle River with my friends, Adam and Kacie, so I was excited to get the chance to do it in South Africa.

I was shuttled to the park South African style, in the back of a pickup. In the states they would never allow you to drive on a highway without a seatbelt, hanging out in the back of the bed. But when in Rome...

The hike down to the canyon was beautiful. It was good to be back in the forest. After all the desert landscapes, the lush greenery and pine trees felt like home.  After putting on a wetsuit, I dove into the river and was off! The wet suit added a nice level of warmth I had never experienced while exploring rivers before. It also provided pretty good protection from scrapes. Scrambling can be tough on the skin.

My guide for the day was Nicholas, who was sporting a pretty epic handlebar moustache. He was an amateur herpetologist, so you can imagine we got along great. He was constantly hunting for snakes, skinks and frogs among the rocks. I was on the lookout for cool aquatic insects. I observed exuviae of both damsel and dragonflies in additon to a few caddisflies. It must've been a pretty clean river.

On the hunt for herps

We started swimming upstream. The current wasn't bad at all, until you started to approach the waterfalls. The canyon itself was stunning. It was such a great experience to actually swim through it.  The rocks lining the sides had lots of good cracks and crannies. It's been a while since I rock climbed, so I definitely tested out my skills since the water makes a nice soft landing. Saying they were rusty would be kind. I even jumped off a rock about 9 meters above the water. It was a little daunting when I climbed to the top, but I took a deep breath, jumped and shrieked on the way down.

Ahhhh!

In a lot of places there were collections of foam, which are formed when particles and oxygen are kicked up by the rushing water. In some areas the foam was so thick that small pieces were floating on the air like snowflakes. Very appropriate, since it is close to Christmas and likely snowing at home. The foam also acted as a hiding place for frogs.

Foamy frog

I could've stayed in the river all day, but all good things must come to an end. We had lunch by a calm stream, enjoyed one last swim in the estuary, and headed home.

Capetown, South Africa

Capetown is a beautiful city. It is situated on the coast and surrounded by beautiful mountains.  It has great shopping and a fun nightlife with a stretch of fantastic bars on Long Street.

There is a lot to do in the city, but we only had 2 full days there. We made the most of it my taking the cable car up to the top of Tabletop mountain. Due to high winds, people aren't always allowed to the top. Thankfully that morning was clear.

That afternoon we headed down to the V and A Waterfront. There was a festival going on so there was music and tons of people. We enjoyed some Mitchell's beer, a local brew. If you're ever in the area, try Ol' Wobbly, a delicious and deadly 11% beer.

My last day I spent exploring the city's botanical garden, shops and less crowded waterfront. I wouldn't recommend wearing a dress to explore town. The wind gusts can be quite strong.

Cage diving with Great White Sharks

Who doesn't love watching Discovery Channel's shark week? Growing up watching it has given me a healthy respect for sharks, but particularly great whites, the biggest and the baddest of them all.

The coast of South Africa is home to the greatest concentration of Great White sharks in the world. While in town, I decided to check them out. We set out early in the morning for the coast, loaded ourselves onto a boat and after a quick safety briefing (Don't stick any appendage you still want outside the cage) we were off!

The water was freezing, maybe in the 50s, so we were given wet suits.  Our guides began to chum the water and throw in fish heads. It didn't take long to attract the first shark. I swear, as the day went on, they got bigger and bigger.

As we took our positions in the cage, the spotter kept an eye out. When an incoming shark was sighted we dove down to the bottom of the cage to see. They were huge!

We saw 7 sharks and the size ranged from 9 feet to 13 feet. The longer they were, the fatter. And they were really dumb. Not that I expected a lot, but these are fearsome creatures and they would just keep going after the same set of fish heads, similar to a kitten and a string. They did give us a great show, smacking the cage and even biting it.

Stellenbosch - African wine country

Stellenbosch is a beautiful town in South Africa. It is home to a top notch college, Stellenbosch University and is a typical college town with great restaurants and shops. A major draw to the area is the wine country surrounding Stellenbosch, which is equivalent to Napa Valley back home in California.

My african trails family took a a tour of 4 wineries in the area. We were taught how to check the color, smell and properly taste the wine.

Checking the color of the wine

My favorite winery was Fairview. The wines were fantastic and they even had a cheese sampling. The best was a wine called The Goatfather, a blend of three red wines, Yum!

Fairview

Wine barrels

I loved Stellenbosch so much that I looked into mosquito biology post docs at the university. Sadly, none were immediately available.