Hello, hello, HELLO!!!

I have been cycling for 6 consecutive days from Hai Phong to Hue and have covered a total of 527 miles. It seems the past week has consisted of waking up, getting on the bike, cycling for 30-40 miles before stopping for lunch and then another 30-40 miles before finding a suitable 'nha nghi' - hotel to stop at for the night, showering, finding dinner and going through the trauma of trying to communicate what we would like to eat, and bed. Showering is interesting over here - there is no concept of an actual shower or a shower curtain, the bathroom is your shower, so it's more like a wet room. This means that everything gets wet and I think if the odds are against me, and it is my time to go, then I think it will be slipping over in the bathroom, and not on the crazy roads here! In one of my last posts, I wrote that hotels were pretty easy to find, but they seemed to dry up along some of the Highway 1 road we have been traveling along and there were a few times when it was looking a little sketchy and the sun was coming down (about 5.30pm, so quite early), but we were saved at the last minute, and it is amazing how the worry of not finding somewhere to stay disappears like weight off your shoulders. 

The landscape has changed from towns and paddy fields to large open and beautiful countryside. I have also seen my first mountain, crossed over more canals and rivers and seen glimpses of deserted white sandy beaches. We have also cycled through affluent towns, government towns and seen poor farming villages. As a result of the latter, not only do I need to look out for scooters, cars and trucks etc, I also need to negotiate the road with chickens, cows and buffalo, which is a challenge as cyclists are not as agile and quick moving as the scooters who easily scoot around them. 

Mount Hoang Son in the distance at the end of a very long open and hot road!

It seems also there are differences in how the women dress outside of Hanoi. Where the girls wore next to nothing in Hanoi, in the country they wear next to nothing but then cover their bare skin with various other clothes. Most of them wear big jackets with crazy designs of them that cover their whole heads (under or over their helmets), or large floppy hats under their helmets, very skinny trousers (sometimes under skirts) and socks in their open toed high heels, gloves, a huge face mask and big sunglasses. I wonder whether they may just be better off wearing the one-item burka, rather than lots of small items that they then take off when they get indoors. At first I thought the face mask was worn so to not breathe in the thick black smog that the trucks pump out. But it is because they don't want to get tanned by the sun. This only struck me when I saw a huge billboard advert in the middle of a paddy field for 'skin-whitening lotion.' Sadly, like in India, the people here think that the fairer skinned you are, the more successful, rich and prettier you will become. This saddens me as I wish they would just realise they are beautiful the colour they are. It also puzzles me how our Western societies want exactly the opposite and we seem to spend thousands on fake tans and beach holidays to 'top up your tan' to get that healthy glow. 

A number of separate groups of women along the way have found great pleasure in my height. I have had women stand next to me to compare their height to mine and they have all pointed and quite forwarded laughed at me for being taller than them. I'm not really sure how to take it. In my society, being 5 foot 7 is average for a woman, over here I tower over 90% of them by a whole head. I would never dare laugh at someone for being different at home or anywhere. It just shows how different our morals are, I guess. 

My patience is wearing thin on the excruciatingly loud horns that continue to be blown right down my cochlea, which makes my brain rattle in my skull. I may as a result be partially deaf in my left ear by the end of this trip and I am seriously considering getting it checked out when I return. Whilst happily cycling along the hard shoulder enjoying a rare occasion when there were no vehicles around, the silence was brutally wrecked by a bus that enjoyed blowing its horn at me consistently, to which I lost it slightly and explicitly stuck my middle finger at the driver. I am not sure what such unpleasant Vietnamese sign language is, and I have no idea if they understand the finger, but either way they stopped beeping and my poor frontal lobes took a while to settle again. 

We have also received approximately 3692 'Hellos' from random people on the side of the roads and drivers. Such a high number you may think, but this may be because the average number of 'hellos' per child is three, but have been as many as 7. At first, it was a wonderful reception, but now (and I do feel mean saying this) it is a chore to have to say hello to 70% of the people you pass. 'Ha-low, hell-o, HA-LOOWWW!' they shout, quite aggressively at times! They seem to be quite attention seeking and sometimes they come from places when I didn't even know anyone was there. 

Now in Hue where we will rest for a couple of days, catch up on personal admin and enjoy being a normal tourist for a bit, but it has felt very satisfying to know I have cycled here and not just stepped off a bus. 

Food is my fuel...

Seeing petrol stations everywhere here reminds me that food is my fuel for my journey. After the mammoth 68 miler day, I realised that I really need to fuel my body more and not get into that scary state of pure exhaustion and low sugar levels. Sometimes I wish it was as easy as just stopping at a petrol station and filling up! Dining experiences have been interesting here. I love my food and I love eating out. I was very much looking forward to Vietnamese food and read a lot of good things about it, but it seems to be a little inconsistent. 

So far we have been eating bread (banh my) and Nutella (woohoo!) for breakfast. The French have left their mark here as baguettes are widely available in the mornings. However, since Hanoi we have not been able to find any more Nutella anywhere (boo) so not sure what I will have on my bread then. Lunch and dinner is then either 'Pho' (noodles) or 'Com' (rice) - usually from a roadside stall sat on nursery plastic stools or chairs if it is luxury. One thing is for sure about Vietnamese food - their meat is pretty rough here. All the chicken I have had has been mainly skin and fat, the beef chewy, the pork hard. Now, I tend to avoid the meat altogether. In one restaurant, we ordered chicken and actually got a whole chicken, and I mean everything, including the feet and it's whole head, which we took great joy in dissecting!

Since Hanoi and struggling to read Vietnamese menus, I came up with the brilliant idea of taking photos of the rare Vietnamese/English menus in the touristy parts. Then, when in a tiny village when only sign language will do, it is easy to just show the restaurateur what we want in Vietnamese from my camera. Learn some Vietnamese words by looking at my picture below!

I have also made a habit of taking a picture of food that I really like but don't know what is in Vietnamese. This worked perfectly today when we stopped for lunch and saw the lady had eggs there, but we wanted them hard boiled. How on earth anyone would be able to communicate that across, I don't know but once we showed her the picture on my camera of a hard boiled egg (due to the whole baby chick incident), she knew exactly what we meant and happily boiled them for us! 

The Vietnamese language is tonal and so very hard for anyone to understand us when we try to speak it. I try my best to listen to how the local people say it and repeat it in exactly the same way, but it still isn't right. I went out to get some bread the other morning. Knowing exactly how to pronounce it, but knowing I would not be understood, I also wrote it down on a bit of paper as a last resort, hoping I wouldn't have to show it. Bread - 'Banh my' is pronounced 'bang me', which in itself is hilarious and I can't help but stifle laughter when I ask for it. So, there I am asking for a shop keeper to 'bang me' and she doesn't understand what I am saying, so reluctantly I pull out the paper and show her. "Ohhhh, bang me!?" and scurries off to get some, saying it in exactly the way I just said it!

A rather strange experience in an actual restaurant came this evening. Seemed quite posh with proper grown up tables and chairs and waiters - lots of them. We had 5, all tripping over themselves to serve us, and then stand there and stare at us, then interfere when we were putting the wrong thing in the wrong sauce. Just what you want when you're trying to eat. All we ordered was rice and seabass x2 and this is what we got...

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and more came out after this! Wondering how much it will cost, we were gobsmacked when the bill came to £3.90! Crazy.

The long road...

I gained a new personal best for the most miles I have ever cycled in a day. 68 miles. Which I am impressed with especially pulling a trailer that weighs in total 25 kilos and the temperatures rose to a maximum of 42°C. Yes my bum hurt, yes I was disgustingly sweaty and yes I was absolutely exhausted to the point that I couldn't even stand in the shower. Not a good state to be in but I'm glad we did it because now I know how far I can push my body, I was waaaaay out of my comfort zone. And when this happens, emotions take over and homesickness settles in. Why am I doing this when I could be easily coming home from work at 5, maybe cooking dinner for me and Michelle and sharing a bottle of rose, watching a film or catching up with my parents on the phone? Sat on the bathroom floor of the hotel in Ninh Binh, shower still running and shaking, I struggled to remind myself.

It is times like these though that I need to remind myself that if it wasn't for me doing this trip and getting my body into such a state, the BHCP and WaterAid wouldn't potentially be getting £5k each (if I reach my target of course). It also makes me realise the importance of home and how much I value this concept even more now. And of course I think about all the family and friends I have back at home who are cheering me on through texts, messages and emails - thank you for keeping me pedalling just that bit further!

It seems that although only a few towns are actually marked on the map, we have cycled through villages, and then come to long open rice paddy fields, and then another village, and then another paddy field. And so this goes on, which essentially is good for us because there are never really any worries for food, water and accomodation in Vietnam. All the villages look the same. They all have refreshments stalls, petrol stations, cafes, restaurants and garages. The scooters, the trucks and the horns are continuous throughout!

Tam Coc is a beautiful region just outside Ninh Binh, so we decided to take a look and have a well deserved rest. Similar to the Halong Bay and Cat Ba region with the moss covered rocks jutting out of the water, we were rowed in a tiny boat by 'Nam' through the rivers of Tam Coc and under the caves. A perfect way to get away from the polluted, busy roads and relax. Ready to hit the roads again tomorrow.

Cat Ba island

So, it took a day to get the leisurely 'tourist' boat, a traditional Vietnamese junk, over from Ha Long Bay (in mainland Vietnam) through the Tonkin Gulf to Cat Ba island. The boat literally had 'Tourist' written on the side of the it. As if it isn't bad enough that you can see lots pale skinned people on it, they had to go and write a big sign too! There are hundreds of islands in this region, with Cat Ba being the biggest. The islands look like huge rocks and they jut right out of the water. It's as though an angry giant has just smashed one massive rock with a hammer into lots of tiny shattered pieces. Most of these islets have vegetation growing on them and from afar it looks like moss.

We passed a floating village of people who live on houses built on top of big blue drums. People do their shopping by buying things off ladies on their little rowing boats. 

The beauty around here is breathtaking and it would easily take months to explore everything in the region, finding new and exciting things each time. However and much to my great disappointment, humankind continue to ruin nature's wonder. I saw rubbish floating on the sea's surface, oil carelessly being spilled into the sea and the boats chuck out disgusting thick black smoke. This has disturbed me as I thought most people were aware of the consequences of such actions, but it seems that these people either know and don't care, or just don't know. Western countries have been pushing hard to educate people, to change their attitudes and thinking towards their actions regarding the environment; all such changes take generations to become effective as I learnt during my Psychology degree. If it takes so long to change people, why does it seem that governing and influential bodies are not doing anything about this already?

Thoughts aside, Cat Ba itself has provided us with a very pleasant and relaxing stay. We made some friends on the boat who we continued to spend time with whilst on the island. Our hotel was great and super cheap and gave us some amazing views of the bay. 

Cat Ba has a few beaches which we have spent most of our time on. They are all in bays of tall rocks looking out to other islets and the occasional small fishing boat that may pass by. 

We also hired some scooters for the day (Mum, please don't stress!) to explore the island. Hey, if you can't beat the things, you gotta join them! No way would I have done this in a city, but because the island roads are so quiet, it seemed like a good independent way to explore, and true, once out of the town I only saw a handful of other people on the roads. 

So now the rest is over. We are waiting for the boat this afternoon to get back to main island Vietnam to Hai Phong where we will then head south along the coast. There is not much between Hai Phong and Hue, so I imagine it will be a tough two weeks of hardcore riding to get to the good bits in the south from Hue onwards. And so the sweat begins...

 

First 2 days cycling - Hanoi to Ha Long

So, by this point I was itching and raring to get on Sally and go. First mission though was to get out of Hanoi. Easy enough on the map, if you can avoid dying in the process. India prepared me for this and I am so glad I have experienced crazy traffic like this before. Anyone who hasn't been to a non-Western country before would have either peed their pants or had a heart attack cycling through Hanoi.

Scooters here don't slow down, they just avoid you, narrowly sometimes, which is why you cross the road here slowly, so they can judge. In fact, no one slows down for you, or anyone. And as for horns, well. In the UK, any type of vehicle would only normally use their horn to express anger or a warning of danger. In Vietnam it means; 'I am coming through, GET OUT OF THE WAY' but is not considered angry. I don't understand it! It's just continuous beeping ALL THE TIME! Everyone thinks they are the king of the road, no one wants to slow down for anyone else and no one wants to drive behind anyone else, everyone wants to be at the front. This means that overtaking is common, and it doesn't really matter whether anyone is coming the other way or not. Since coming out of Hanoi, the roads have opened up to trucks, which are the worst. Their horns are just deafening and the noise totally wipes out anything or one you are listening to around you. I could go on, but I won't.

The type of vehicle, as it does in most countries is a display of ones wealth. The bicycle being the poorest mans way of transportation. Next is the bus, then the scooter, then the motorbike, then the car, then the 4x4. Westerners are nearly always considered to be rich to local people, and to them we are, but it is all relative. Therefore, seeing two Westerners on bicycles attracts a lot of interest. I think there is also the amazement of different looking bicycles, as the ones here are sit-up-and-beg Dutch style bikes. Then there is my trailer. This seems to attract a lot of interest. I've had people poke it, lift it, kick it and watch me attach it. People stare at us, some point and laugh. Drivers of scooters turn to crane their necks to watch us for as long as they can without crashing. Some have even ridden along side us, chatting away and then got bored and driven off when they realise we don't understand a word they are saying. People on the side of the road wave and point and we've had lots of 'Hello's! shouted at us. All in all, a very positive and friendly response.

Once out of Hanoi and the predominantly tourist area, things start to get tricky with the language barriers. Ordering food has been a challenge as we had the luxury of the menu also being in English in Hanoi. We watched one lady cook at the side of the road, ready to point at things to say that's what we wanted for dinner the other night. Now I am quite open when it comes to food and I am happy to give anything a go at least once. But, there is a line. As her customers came, she bashed out meals that had chopped up liver and kidneys of some animal; first wince. Then she produced a meal that had chicken feet in it; second slightly more prominent wince. Then, she pulled two eggs out of a separate bucket. I've seen eggs a lot here, so I was thinking they'll either be raw, or boiled. But no, she cracked open the egg and there was a dead unhatched chick, that looked like a brain; HEAVE!!!! She cracked it into a small bowl, added seasoning and stock and took it over to her two customers that happily tucked in. Now that, is too far.

The first day of cycling was good, a gentle 44 flat miles in the pouring monsoon rain, which meant is was a cool 25 degrees; a good day to ease us both back into it. Then today was different. It reached a top temperature of 37 degrees, brilliant sunshine with moderate hills. Still we managed 58 miles. I was continuously applying factor 50 suncream to my legs, but they still managed to burn.

Saw lots of rice paddy fields and buffalo.
 

The craggy rocks of Halong Bay in the distance with more rice fields in the forefront all very neatly lined.

Now, we are in Halong Bay on the north east coast of Vietnam. Tomorrow, we take a trip over to Cat Ba island and spend a few days exploring the natural beauty of the wonderful area. Stay tuned!

More learnt about Hanoi

Because yesterday was taken up mostly by rebuilding Sally, today was spent doing a lot walking around the city. It seems that the wider the streets, the richer or more official the area. Although these streets are pretty, with very wide roads (four lanes sometimes) with trees along the side of the pavements, they are boring. I wanted to find the real Hanoi. Going down narrower roads is a good start. It seems the narrower the road, the more that you get a visual overload. I also discovered, the narrower roads have a higher concentration of people, and this is when the poverty begins. Pictures decribe this better...

A lady barters with an on-the-go grocery man. 

Interesting looking food! I couldn't work out what the jellied grey stuff was, but it looked vile!

Although the children playing here looked happy, I can't imagine these people chose to live here.

A closer look of the one above.

Gents on the street playing Chinese checkers, getting very competitive in the heat of the game.

 

Contrast. 3 beautiful girls in traditional Vietnamese dress, more than happy for me to take their picture!

Local Fame and Sally is alive!

So, yesterday I found out I have featured in the local Eastbourne paper! Considering, it was very well written! To see the internet version, click here. Enjoy!

I also took the bike box apart yesterday. My biggest fear of the trip was to undo the box to find the forks or frame snapped or something. Instead, there she was, all snug in her layers of bubblewrap and polystyrene. Phew. There was not a scratch on her! So it took me a few hours to get Sally and the trailer back to norm, but they now hold pride place in the hallway of the hostel!

First day in Hanoi

I finally crashed at 8pm Vietnam time last night and didn't wake until 9.30am, it was a well deserved sleep. We eventually got out of the hostel about midday into blazing heat and humidity. I kind of expected Vietnam to be similar to India, but actually it is a vast improvement in terms of dirt and poverty. It is a clean city considering and I have not seen anyone begging or hassling us for money. Vietnamese girls are all very pretty - a lot of them wear ridiculous high heels, hot pants/skirts and small strappy tops, designer bags (probably fake) and long jet black, super straight hair. There was me worrying about being the typical British girl not respecting local people by packing very conservative clothes. Everything I have for both on and off the bike comes past my knees and elbows!

Along the streets, there are hundreds of small temporarily set up stalls that sell either drinks or hot cooked food (some of it unrecognisable!). I know they are temporary because whilst eating lunch, I watched one lady serving noodles, looking like she was there for good, but no, she suddenly started to stop serving, pack everything up in her yoke and off she went, cleaning the spot she has picked behind her. The stalls are surrounded by nursery-sized plastic stools that customers crouch on.

At lunch and dinner times the people sit across the whole pavement, so you have to walk around them in the road to get past - it's great.

Lunch for me was king prawns with chilli and lemongrass and rice and vegetables, it was de-licious and cost just 2 pounds 10p - excellent!


One crazy thing about Hanoi? SCOOTERS EVERYWHERE!!! Jeepers, it is an art to cross the road! Scooters are completely outnumbered to cars and they are quite often seen with a family of 4 on them (a great similarity to India!). To cross the road, you cannot wait for it to clear, because it just never is. You just have to walk and let the scooters determine which way they go around you. There are zerba crossings and a green man light to tell you when to cross, but you still have scooters coming in every single direction possible, you almost have to do a constant 360 degree turn when crossing. There are lots of people on bicycles here too though, carrying all sorts :)

I am also a millionaire now. There is about 30,000 dong to one British pound, so changing up $150 today gave me nearly 3 million dong. It's hard to get used to the currency!

Today, we walked around the 'French quarter', although I have to say, there is nothing very French about it. Then wondered to the Hoan Kiem Lake where we sat on a bench. We were offered weed, various postcards and asked if we could help with some English from a local. Then we walked to the 'Old Quarter' and this is the kind of Hanoi I thought it was going to be. Busy with plenty of hustle and bustle, street stalls everywhere selling everything you could possibly wish for - I loved it, but it was comforting knowing that just a couple of blocks along it was calm and quiet. I have to restrain myself from buying only the essentials on this trip because I have to carry it. It is going to be hard because I saw so many beautiful things that I would love to bring back to furnish my home. I did buy one thing though - a handbag with a embroidered picture of a Vietnamese lady with a conical straw hat on a bike! I had to have it :)

Final Thanks and Goodbyes...

After waving goodbye to my housemates, I cried nearly the whole way to the airport, and then again at the airport. I think the reality of it all and the fact I'm leaving all my beautiful friends and family behind finally hit. I'd been so blasé about it all, up until now.

I want to take time to thank a few people (in no particular order):

My fabulous housemates - Thank you for putting up with my bikes all over the house.

Michelle Akehurst - thank you for helping me with my decision making and putting up with my dramas!

To my parents - thank you for pointing out all the worst possible scenarios both while I am here and when I get back. I know this is your weird way of saying you love me. I hope you are proud of what I am about to achieve.

To everyone at Thames for supporting me!

To EVERYONE who has donated so far! C'mon people who haven't - get donating!

And lastly, thank you to James Mitchell for all your help, support and research before my trip - I really appreciate it!

Now, I am sat in the common room in the hostel in Hanoi. I am exhausted after traveling for over 24 hours but trying to stay up so I can sleep through in Vietnam time. The flight and connections were very straight forward, stress-free and easy. And thanks to Kris for picking me up at the airport and organising hostels!

So now, I will spend a few days to get over the time difference, do some sight seeing and rebuild Sally (my bike). Next week we'll be on the move on the bikes and the adventure begins! :D

Stripped back to basics

So the time for me to leave is ever nearing. In this last month, I have been running around like a headless chicken trying to get everything sorted out. The challenge of thinking of so many things, along with working my notice, moving out, and being injected with small doses of various different tropical diseases, it is not surprising that in my final week, I crashed and was knocked out with pure exhaustion. This set me back in my planning process, but in true lastminute.com style, I think I have managed to pull it off and pretty sure I haven’t forgotten anything or anyone.

I have finally managed to pull together all the kit I need to take with me. And it ain’t much considering the length of my tour. So, with the horrific excess baggage costs of the airlines and the fact that everything I take, I have to pull along on my bike means that travelling light has been taken to the extreme. I have packed, and repacked, weighed and reweighed everything over and over again.

In September two years ago, I was packing to go on a week long beach holiday to Spain with 8 other girls. I was struggling to get my suitcase under 20kg. This week, when I stopped and looked around my tip of a room after the fourth time of repacking, I sighed and had to remind myself why I am doing this. I literally can only take the basics.

It is both luxuries and the things we take for granted that I will be leaving behind. Thus, no more: hairdryer, straightners, electric toothbrush (this I am really sad to leave, my dental regime is seriously hardcore), epilator, laptop, picking up the phone to call home or friends, make up, outrageous high heels, king-size bed, power shower and a clean carpet under my feet, as well as Nutella. I need to learn to do without. A challenge in itself, but every now and then I feel it is crucial to be reminded of the things that really matter in life, and actually none of the above do (apart from Nutella – severe withdrawal symptoms may result).

So, as a result of leaving all this stuff behind, I decided I needed to make things as easy for myself as possible. Off with my hair then! It takes years to grow, yet my hairdresser rather enjoyed chopping off at least a foot of my hair and gave me a cute pixie crop in under 45 minutes.

I am expecting that there will be times when I will need to learn how to do without some of the basic things in life. A tap to turn when I am thirsty, a shop to just pop to when I am hungry, a bed to lay my tired head on may all be in doubt. It is these things that really bring home to me that this is a pretty big adventure.

For those of you who question my madness you are right to do so but some things are worth more than just dreaming about. Just being is not me. Next stop Heathrow Terminal 3, brief stopover in Singapore then onto Hanoi and the real journey begins.