I got out of 'Nam with no injuries!

Prepare yourself for a long one.

You ready? Ok.

Well, not so long as I have now decided to do these by country-ish, read on for the very lovely Vietnam.

Vang Vieng was where you left us. We rented tubes for a float down the river. Now the guidebook warns a little about the nature of the section of river, but it can't prepare you for it. The music starts blaring the moment you start floating. Then you see the makeshift bars with men holding out long poles for you to grab onto to draw you into their bars with lashing of Beerlao (the local beer, well national beer) and after drinking your beer you can jump off high platforms into the river. Sounds fun eh? Just looked stupid to us and ruined the beautiful landscape which we wanted to appreciate. Sadly, we had planned to go visiting the caves and kayaking further out of town but I got ill - typique!

From Vang Vieng it was Vientiane, the capital. From here we left the ever lovely Laos and landed in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Hanoi is one crazy place! There are a million mopeds and motorbikes all around the city and with the town having a very French colonial town to it, it's not all surprising as it's very difficult to fit one car down each street. The best way to get around is by cyclo, a bicycle with a seat on the front with a canopy. It's a nice and relaxing way to sit back and watch Hanoi zoom by on motorbike or car. We took our cyclos to the Ho Chi Minh masoleum to visit the Vietnamese Gandhi, sadly it wasn't open for some reason, not sure why. Things have crazy opening times in 'Nam. I have to mention, on the money Mr Minh looks ridiculously like Patrick Stewart's asian cousin. We trekked around Hanoi and eventually found the Temple of Literature, by way of the Lenin monument. TofL is a beautiful, tranquil 1,00 year old temple which was Vietnam's first university. Lovely spot, even though you still hear the drum of the millions of motos speeding by, but you are in the busy city of Hanoi so you can't complain.

The next morning we were loaded on a mini bus on our way to Halong Bay, another on the list of UNESCO world heritage sites we've visited. Halong Bay is an area 3 hours north-east ish of Hanoi and is a bay with almost two thousand karst peaks jutting out of the sea. It's quite a sight to behold. We boarded our boat which was in the style of a Chinese junk boat, it was very lovely and had a top deck with loungers for us to well, lounge about on.

We were then taken to a cave which was called "The Surprising Cave", on first entering the surprise had yet to reveal itself. The caverns inside got bigger and bigger as you went on inside and was suprising well-lit and paved, the guide kept on pointing out rocks that looked like things and general other titbits of info. Then, we saw it. The SURPRISE. It was lit up bright red and very difficult to miss. Apparently, the French who discovered the cave, were very "surprised" when they saw this rock, hence the name of the cave.

The evening was spent lounging around on the open air deck after a huge dinner on the boat. Our group was basically us around three other couples who might've been twice our age, so there wasn't a huge amount of socialising going on, but it was a lovely evening - the boats nearby had their lights on which reflected very prettily on the water.

After our lovely cruise around Halong we had our first night bus in Asia. Now, we realise there's a reason we don't get them! The roads were shocking. Lying back in our chair your head would just be bumping up and down constantly, not fun at all. Oh, and this was after already using three different modes of transport to get to the bus! Our arrival in to Hoi An was fine and we found a lovely little room in a hotel that included free breakfast - yay!

Hoi An. A lovely colonial town, also a UNESCO world hertiage site, famous for it's tailors. So, of course, we head off to find one as there is a certain wedding in the summer I needed a pretty dress for. I do feel sorry for the poor lady who had to deal with me! First I had to choose what dress I wanted, and then the fabric! Finally I chose and the dress was ready for me the next day, but I did have two fittings that day to make sure it fit perfectly. It's very pretty.

We ended up spending a few days in Hoi An ,enjoying wandering its little streets and cyclying down to the fantastic beach. It's a huge long stretch of sand. Some might say the bad bit about it is the wonmen who'll come up and try and sell you anything from a leg wax to a pineapple (took them up on the pineapple, not the legs though). They speak suprisingly good english, but apparently we all say "top banana" and "lovely jubbly". The funniest lady broke out lines such as "Sorry ain't good enough" and "I'll bust a cap in yo'ass". Oh, the hilarity!

One day whlist strolling in Hoi An, my flip flops broke :( "luckily" the lady in the shop which we were outside of had flipflops and tried to sell them to me for $5, I got her down ut still was ripped off - but what are you to do? Feelin heartbroken we set off in search of some new shoes - Hoi An is also known for it's handmade shoes. So whilst I was browsing and trying on all aorts of sandally things, David was half harrassed by a the lady and asked if he wanted any. Lookg through a book he found something he did want - red shoes! The lady gave him a strange look when he said red, but sure enough the next day he had a pair of red leather loafers and just for $25. He's a very happy man!

We splashed out and flew down to Hoi Chi Minh City, not as nice as Hoi An, I don't think we ound the old quarter. We meandered around the city and took in the war remnants museum, which had quite a horrific collection of things related to the war in Vietnam. We also bokoed our way out of Vietnam on to Cambodia via the Mekong.

Early the next morning we manage to get on our tour bus an dhead out. The Mekong is the river (that you might remember) as the one we spent two days travelling along between Thaialnd and Laos). We were actually in a similar boat bit smaller and few people. We cruised around the town and saw the floating markets where the boats will hang a pumpkin or pineapple, which ever they are selling, on the mast of their boat. We also stopped at a coconut sweet making place, it's aboslutely yummy and we've managed to save some to bring home. After that we visisted another place that made rice kripsie treats - but on a huge scale and they even popped their own rice using hot sand in a pan over the fire. These were also yummy but we didn't buy any. For our lunch we were sat net to a Vietnamese couple who were very lovely. The man, named Sun, was 70 years old and claimed the woman with him wasn't his wife - she was in the states. He was just like a Vinetmamese Hugh Hefner!He was lovely to talk to, he'd been put into prison during the war and was an architect.

Another early morning and we got in some smaller boats to tbe rowed around a floating village, complete with fish farms, a floating petrol station and air conditioned houses. The boats were all rowed by aladies who were drssed in the most garish trousers you would ever see! From the little boats were transferred into a bigger boat to take us to Cambodia. Though first we had a two hour wait for the guy to sort out our visas (sure we could've done this ourselves, but ah well) so we sat in a restaurant and ended up having a wonderful timing plaing cards with the local kids and trying to take photos of some crickets they were getting to fight each other.

So, after getting on and off another boat we finally arrived in Cambodia! As that's another country, you'll have to wait til I find the time to do another post. And photos will folllow shortly (fingers crossed!)