Our next destination was Cuc Phuong National Park, established in 1962 as Vietnam’s first national park. We visited the Endangered Primate Rescue Center, where they rehab mostly monkeys (chronic drinking of rice wine?), many from the commercial market and prepare them to be returned to their natural habitat. We saw several different breeds of Langur, which is an unusual and colorful variety of monkey.


That night we slept under mosquito netting; I’m sure it wasn’t necessary, but when it’s there, you gotta use it. It rained hard in the morning, making the rain forest’s mossy road especially treacherous for bikers. As "designated wuss" (DW), I stayed in the van for the first part of the ride, grateful for the option.


We traveled by van to Haiphong, the largest port in Vietnam. You may remember Nixon ordering the bombing of Haiphong harbor in 1972, or the exodus of hundreds of boat people later in the decade. Now it’s exploding with new construction.

From there, we boarded a private touring boat and spent 3+ lovely hours puttering around Ha Long Bay. The magnificent limestone formations sprinkled throughout the bay (close to 2000 of them) provide an eerily prehistoric aura. We stopped at an island to explore some fabulous natural caves which were lighted beautifully to highlight interesting rock formations and shadows. The boat docked at Cat Ba Island where we mounted our bikes for our last ride.

Somehow this 22k ride seemed easy despite 7k’s of hills. The scenery was lovely and the villages were typically friendly and ragged. The cool air was welcome relief from the extreme heat we’d been riding in for the past 10 days or so. I actually wished we had a longer ride.

After we checked in to our hotel on the island, I decided to treat myself to a post-ride massage. After all, didn’t I deserve it?

Since the hotel salon was being renovated, I hit the streets to find one that looked respectable. After walking the length of the main drag and perusing the options, I chose one that had several friendly women out front. The negotiated price was 60,000 dong, which is less than $4. A lovely young thing dressed in a white mini-skirt and cami led me up a narrow, gray stairway. At the bottom, 2 boys were cleaving a chicken on the floor. When we reached the third floor, she showed me into a small room that was lit by a red florescent bulb and furnished with a queen sized bed. Steven said that should have tipped me off as to where I was. Maybe, but I was too focused on the smoke from the lit cigarette in the ashtray and insisted on changing rooms.


My hostess showed me into another room containing 2 double beds and 1 florescent bulb (not red), and bade me take my clothes off and lie down. There was a bottom sheet on the bed and a grungy looking pillow. Not wanting to seem ungrateful or overly critical, I did as suggested and was graced with a bath towel.


My “masseuse” then produced a percussion symphony on each of my body parts: pinch, pound, karate chop, drum, finger poke, castanets, move on. Oy vey. As soon as there was a break in the action, I bolted upright, grabbed my clothes, thanked her very much, threw some dong her way and escaped with every ounce of energy I had left. Didn’t even stop for chicken!

`On our way to Hanoi, about 40 miles east, we stopped for a visit with Little Phuic’s grandparents. Notwithstanding its proximity to Hanoi, the village they live in is astoundingly archaic. The main house is 3 rooms. Granny and Gramps and their beds, a table and 2 benches, and the ancestor altar are all in the main room. I saw one electrical outlet above the table. There’s a guest bedroom where Little Phuic stays when he’s visiting, and a store room/root cellar. Declarations of war bravery adorn the walls, along with a village proclamation congratulating Granny on her 80th birthday.

A separate building across a small courtyard contains the kitchen and an adjacent “rest room” of some sort (I didn’t want to look). The kitchen has an electric rice cooker (!) and a 2-burner stove top. Behind the kitchen is a series of small rooms/pens for any live stock, chickens etc that happen to be resident. There are a few places where herbs and vegetables are growing. Gramps served us tea while Granny sat on her bed contentedly chewing her betel nut. They were truly gracious, although the bomb crater just beyond their front yard has to be a nagging reminder of “the American War”.

Hanoi is pretty crazy and chaotic, but it’s more westernized than Saigon and the cooler temperatures made it feel more manageable to us. Since we’re practiced street crossers at this point, it was also less intimidating and life-threatening. That said, Steven took a hilarious video of Judy and me clinging to an older lady in order to safely make it across.

We spent the morning trying to see the highlights but like NY, the museums are all closed on Monday. Stumbling around with our heads bobbing in and out of street maps and tour books, we managed to get a sense of the Hoan Kiem Lake District which is the central commercial area, the Old Quarter with its shops spilling over the sidewalks, and the French Quarter, more elegant and residential. We visited a “tube-house” in the Old Quarter. Built in the early 1900’s, these started as market stalls, evolved to store fronts, and then extended many times in the back to accommodate family members’ living rooms, court yards to let in light and air, and store rooms. Taxes were based on store frontage so from the street, these houses look like small single storey structures.


Hoan Kiem Lake is the Central Park of Hanoi. There’s Tai Chi at dawn, vendors selling everything from live chickens to fried dough, lunch rendezvous’, old men playing chess, and lots more that goes on here.

We visited the Temple of the Jade Mound on an island accessible via the red-lacquered Huc Bridge. The temple buildings are from the 1800’s and contain wonderfully ornate altars, with dragons, birds, statues of gods, huge vases, and offerings of all kinds of food, flowers and incense.

My charge for the afternoon was just that – charge up a storm! I didn’t disappoint, and Steven was thrilled because he didn’t come with me. Little Phuic met us for a last dinner and regaled us with tales of his financial woes, in preparation for the laying on of tips. Nonetheless, the food was divine and we gorged ourselves. Steven and I braved the ice risk and indulged in real drinks, a true celebration.

So now, we’ve stuffed everything into our suitcases including a ton of dirty laundry, and are primed to leave in the morning. It’s been an amazing trip – fascinating, fun and just long enough to feel like we’ve truly been away. The rice noodles have left their mark, but cycling along the way provided some damage control and more importantly, intimate exposure to life on the streets of Vietnam.


What a way to go!