Mai Chau

From Halong bay where we last left you we decided to take a trip out to a small place in the mountains called Mai Chau. We had the option to take a tour which would have been good but we decided to make a go of it ourselves using the general public transport and just "finding" our way. The result was a fantastic couple of days where we were able to experience Vietnam the same way as the locals do.

We started early in the morning with a Moto-taxi ride (Motorbike with driver) to the bus station. This was a good start as the drivers took us to the wrong bus station so we had to negotiate somehow telling them we were in the wrong place and then get them to take us to the right one! Next we had to find the right bus to get us to Mai Chau which was no mean feat as all the signs are in Vietnamese. The next imidiate problem was when do we pay and how much do we pay, have we paid the right person, is he even getting on the bus with us, why do we not get a ticket in return for the money we've handed over............etc. I think you get the picture!!

Turns out we got on the right bus and even got off at the right stop and paid the right amount of money to the right person which was good!

Upon arriving in the village, we had to organise staying with a local family in their house. The houses are very basic stilt houses. They have an open ground level room and normally a single upstairs room for eating and sleeping in. You sleep on rolls on the floor with a mozzie net over the "bed". There is no air con or hot water and cooking is traditional home made food over an open cooking fire. Various houses in the village offer this so you can just turn up and find someone who is willing to look after you. We found a place and the man and his wife then took us in for 2 nights and fed us with breakfast, lunch and dinner. We managed to get in 2 hikes on short one and one full day one. Some of the locals do the same thing every morning and evening to collect wood and to work up in the fields. The do it with massive loads on their backs and are generally women over 60 years old. They are hard!!

I'll let the photos do the rest of the talking for here...