Return to the Full Taste of Happiness

The Golden Tortoise got us successfully way out of Hanoi, but unfortunately it forgot to pave the 200 kms of road leading into our destination of Dien Bien Phu. We were semi-warned in the universal language of sign language as we checked out of our guesthouse in Son La that the road was "very bad and very bumpy". Like anything that we had experienced in Asia so far, we had to check it out for ourselves.... the road was terrible the second we got out of the city limits and continued that way for the next two days all the way into Dien Bien Phu.

The road was under some kind of "construction", although in reality all they had done was completely ripped up and destroyed any semblance of a paved road. The conditions varied anywhere from inches of wet, sticky mud, to stripped pavement with marble sized pebbles on top (the worst to ride on!) to about .01% of the surface that was actually resealed and was like riding on a cloud to heaven. Needless to say, the riding was difficult, but thankfully Mo impeccably timed the acquisition of some trendy dust masks with the conclusion of the paved road. We rode most of the way with our dust masks on, as the dust from passing trucks and vehicles was too thick to breathe without the masks on. To top it all off, we had two of the hardest climbs of our trip, and upward progress was slowed even more as we fought to keep traction and keep ourselves upright. The combination of steep road and SPDs toppled Mo over once and drew some blood on her chain ring, but she recovered quickly and kept on trucking like a pro. While we were collecting ourselves on the side of the road, a kind Vietnamese motorcyclist stopped to check on us and offered us the international gesture of peace - a cigarette. I respectfully declined but really did appreciate the offer; we would probably be doing a lot better in Vietnam if we were smokers. :)

We met an American couple cycling the other way on a beautiful Comotion mountain bike tandem and stopped to swap information and tips. They had come in from Laos over the border that we were headed to, which was very good news as they were the first real-life people we had met that had come across the border. Supposedly it was open for foreign travelers, but the opening was so recent that none of the guidebooks mentioned it and no one really knew for sure. They assured us that they had no problem crossing, although still didn't know if we would be able to procure visas on arrival. We mentally psyched them out when we told them that the next 150km were just as bad as the 50km they had just crossed, and were glad that we were at least nearing the end of the rough section.

We took a rest day in Dien Bien Phu, one of the larger cities in Western Vietnam and the site of a famous decisive French military routing by the Vietnamese. The local museum had a very interesting display of wartime relics and memorabilia, and we spent part of the day chatting with a group of four US marines that had come back to Vietnam to relive and rehash their experiences in the 60s. Hearing them talk about how they had found their old combat positions in the middle of destroyed battlegrounds made us just begin to contemplate how intense the situation really was some 30+ years ago.

We left DPB and headed towards the border of Laos, really not knowing what to expect... we were way off anything that was in a guidebook at this point, and were a little nervous about what to expect at the border crossing into Laos. The climb up to the border was a 18km monster and, while the road was finally sealed, we were getting into some super remote jungle. As we climbed for a couple of hours we barely saw any cars, and began to worry that the border wasn't actually open. Finally we arrived at the Vietnamese exit post and tried to figure out if we could get a visa-on-arrival in Laos. No one that new anything spoke any English, so we processed our visas, checked out of Vietnam, and headed into no man's land.

The 1km ride between the border posts was a bit nerve racking as we began to contemplate what we would do if we were stuck in international limbo in the middle of no where. The best that Mo came up with was to bushwack our way through the jungle a few hundred meters away from the border post, sneak in, hopefully not get shot, and deal with it when we had to leave the country. Confident that we at least had a plan B we were pleasantly surprised that the Laos border post had recently been awarded the "most laid-back landlocked border crossing in the universe" award - yes, they had visas on arrival, and while it took us about one hour to get through (see: Laostime) they let us in for just a few dollars extra in baksheesh (hey, it was Sunday). A wave of relief immediately swept over us - not only did we firmly have both wheels in a country, we were back in Laos... no traffic, no hurry, no problems.

With the Luck of the Golden Tortoise

We tried, we really did.... we tried to motivate and keep riding through the rain, leaving our palatial estate in Hoa Binh and climbing, climbing, climbing into the mountains of Vietnam... Perhaps the rain would clear, the sun would come out, we would get out of this infernal mud, and the road would finally dry off. Perhaps...

Or maybe not. About 100km outside of Hanoi we turned around and headed back for the city, the first time we had backtracked on our whole entire trip. It was a tough and trying decision, but we were tired of being wet, and a bit tired in general after a flurry of traveling and few too many nights without a good sleep. This time we caught a bus from Hoa Binh, opting not to ride the crazy stretch of road again, and navigated our way through the Hanoi motorbike frenzy once more, to a nice, quiet, and peaceful guesthouse in the old quarter.

It was here that we recharged our batteries for a few nights, getting good sleep, finding some good food, and enjoying the quite charming Northern Vietnamese city. One night we spent a few hours walking around the central lake, which felt eerily similar to Lake Merrit but was the location of one of Hanoi's most famous folktales. Legend has it that magical golden tortoises live deep within the lake, ancestors of the O.G. tortoise that took the sacred sword from the king long ago and returned it to its rightful owner. We had vague ideas of what this legend was about, and were completing our second lap of Qi Dong walking and arm exercises when we saw mass hysteria at the far end of the lake. Motos were driving off the road and into the park area, which is strictly verboten in normal times, cars were parking up on the sidewalk, and people were running en masse to the edge of the lake. At first we thought they were enjoying the sunset, but unless they knew something we didn't, there was much too much excitement for an everyday occurrence. Police began impounding motos left and right and no one cared - they couldn't tear themselves away from the water. Realizing that we were of course in Asia, we did what any good soul would find themselves doing upon seeing such a huge crowd - we ran over and joined in. Peering in the water the excitement was contagious, even though we had no idea what we were looking for. And then, we saw it - the golden tortoise surfacing for air, and then promptly plunging under, startled by the deafening cacophony of gasps and moans from the anxious onlookers. People were almost falling in the water at this point, as they tried desperately to snap a photo with whatever electronic device they had. We asked one of the hundreds of onlookers whether it was good luck, as the mob ran clockwise around the lake, following a feint trail of bubbles beneath the surface. "I hope so!" she said, as she took off to follow the crowd, and perhaps grab more of that lucky turtle power.

We felt incredibly fortunate being able to see this amazing occurrence and not have any of our personal possessions impounded by the police. We only hoped that all the citizens who had a long walk home (and a lot of explaining to do to someone) would remember what a lucky event they witnessed. Feeling rejuvenated, we went to the 6:30 performance of the water Puppet Theater, which while incredibly touristy and packed with Westerners, dong-for-dong one of the best entertainment values in the whole world. It was a puppet and live music event, and the puppeteers did it all in a murky pond of water up to their waists. Jim Henson would have been proud.

With images of the Golden Tortoise in our minds we set out again, still determined to take the back road into Laos and start working our way back to Bangkok. We rode out of central Hanoi for the third time, finally starting to feel a bit comfortable in the traffic, and jumped into the madness of the bus station. Mo dusted off her incredible bargaining skills and got ourselves and our bikes on a bus headed West for a very reasonable price, only a bit more than the actual charges. This was quite a scene as the driver started almost triple what it should have cost, and the falang with bicycles bargaining immediately drew a crowd of Vietnamese, all looking for some good entertainment. After a full day on the bus, complete with locals absolutely fascinated by Mat's arm and leg hair (to the point of stroking it, pulling up his pants leg, and inviting people from all over the bus to check it out) we made it to the picturesque town of Son La, a few hundred kilometers out of Hanoi and well on the way to our final Vietnam destination of Dien Bien Phu.

Stuck in Hanoi with the Luang Prabeng Blues Again

After a few days of rest in Hue and some antibiotics (thanks Jennifer and Scott!!!) Mo was back in full force and we jumped on an overnight "sleeper" bus North to Hanoi. The seats were not normal seats, but rather some space-age pods that fully reclined while allowing your legs to extend to some degree. We managed to get a bit of sleep, more so than a regular bus but definitely less than your average room in a guest house. At 5:30 AM we awoke to being dropped off in the rain, in the middle of nowhere, outside the city center of Hanoi. Conveniently, there was a queue of taxis awaiting the bus, friends with the bus driver, who were waiting to take the passengers to a wonderful guest house nearby, for a hefty fee. Argh. Of course we couldn't load our bikes in the small cabs, and we weren't planning on staying in Hanoi anyway. We pulled a janky photocopied partial map of Hanoi and set to it, navigating the streets of the huge metropolitan city, on our bikes, in the rain.

At this point we realized why The Amazing Race didn't select us for their show - we would have demolished all other teams involved. Somehow we found our way to a hotel for breakfast, found the central part of town, and then got directions to the bus station that would take us to the start of our next cycling leg: a journey west from Hanoi, over the mountains, and back into Laos.

Riding around in the rainy madness we realized what the one piece of gear we wished we had most was: fenders! Somehow we neglected to bring these from the states, and had to improvise some for our bikes out of duct tape and plastic water bottles. They worked decently well, however the Vietnamese have a remarkable ability to stay completely free of dirt and mud while riding their bikes and motos through the street. It seems that in the culture it is very important to keep your clothes clean, even with our plastic fenders after a few minutes of riding we looked like we had just finished Paris-Roubaix. We literally became the laughing stock of every corner we stopped at, with people pointing at us and making disgusted faces at how dirty we had allowed ourselves to become.

We headed out of Hanoi towards our bus station and began to get a hang of riding in all the traffic. Hanoi has a unique per-capita income that allows nearly ever inhabitant to be able to afford a motorcycle, but not a car. So the streets are literally filled with thousands of motorcycles, zipping back and forth like some futuristic arcade game. Our pace was somewhere in between the slow motos and the fast local cyclists, which resulted in quite a lot of passing and getting passed. We finally figured out one of the main traffic rules which helped things go a bit more smoothly - as a driver, you are responsible for all traffic in front of you, but none behind you. So motos, bikes, and vehicles routinely merge from the right hand lane without giving as much as a glance over their shoulder - as long as they are a fraction of an inch in front of you, they have right of way. Riding actually became easier once we discovered this rule, as we knew when to hit the breaks and let people in.

Mat had the great idea of riding right bast the bus stop 12km out of town and riding to our starting point, 70 km away. He was not operating super clearly due to lack of sleep and mud in his brain, but this is what we did. Accordingly, he had a breakdown about 30km into it when the hundredth person pointed and laughed at our mud covered bikes and butts. We got some Pho and managed to salvage enough motivation to but on, and about 40 km out of Hanoi the traffic lightened up a bit and the scenery became gorgeous. If only the rain would stop.

Unfortunately, it didn't. We spent a night at a terrible value guest house in Hoa Binh after after an interesting meal full of all sorts of things we couldn't identify. We even gleefully accepted a bottle of what we thought to be water but turned out to be incredibly strong moonshine to drink. The bottle itself would have killed a man, but we had a few shots at the risk of offending the local spirits and called it a night. At least we were out of Hanoi and on the road back to Laos.

The Insanity of National Highway 1

Last time we left you we had descended highway 9 in Vietnam to the coast, cutting across the DMZ and a beautiful, albeit misty, mountain descent. Our intention was to continue along the coast riding south on National Highway One, the highway running the length of Vietnam. Nevermind the warnings we had heard from other cyclists met along the way, nevermind the warnings from seasoned Vietnam travellers; we were going to try it ourselves. And besides, it's the flagship route of our out-of-print Lonely Planet Cycling Vietnam book - how bad could it be?

CRAZY BAD!!! Think I-5 in California, but a mere 8 meters wide with only a painted line separating the two "lanes" from each other. Now eliminate all the other roads running up the length of the state - force all traffic from 101, 1, etc. onto the highway. Eliminate all semblance of traffic rules, through in 8 million motorbikes, cyclists, pedestrians, add a few thousand trucks and buses that have guaranteed right-of-way because they're bigger than you, and you might start to get a sense of what it was like.

Up until now the riding has been hard at parts, but we never felt endangered by traffic. Hectic and chaotic yes, but endangered, no. When the fifth bus swerved head-on into our lane and we had to jump off the shoulder of the road in a millisecond to avoid it, we both knew that our plans would be changing soon.

We finally arrived at Hue, and Mo came down with a stomach bug that had been pestering her all day. She wins the gold star for pushing through the madness and pedalling on despite discomfort. We got a nice hotel room in Hue, complete with English TV (it's still amazing to us how comforting BBC is in the middle of Asia), and we strategized our next moves and recovered.

Across the Border into Vietnam

We took a bus from the world's sleepiest national capital of Vientienne towards the Vietnam border, sad to think about leaving Laos but eager to make headway into Vietnam. Despite the madness of our first three days in the country, Laos had really begun to sink in, and we knew that it would be hard to shift gears from Laos time to the hecticness of the rest of Asia. We were the only falang on the local bus to the border from Savannakhet, and the driver (nor any passengers) were in any kind of hurry to complete their journey. The driver often stopped the bus multiple times in a span of 200 meters, to pick fruit, deliver a parcel to a villager, or allow a teenage boy to hop off, run to the market, buy a diving mask (presumably for fishing) and hop back on. We were considerably less stressed when we realised it would not be a problem to delay the bus a few minutes while we untied our bikes from the roof, and the driver even took a few laps up and down the street on Mo's bike before telling us goodbye and firing up the engine again. Our time in Laos riding between the villages was an interesting look into a country that still largely consists of people living off of subsistence agriculture. Yes, they need to get home, but to tend to their crops and keep the household running - not to be on time for a meeting, make it to class, or show up for work. This simple living, combined with Beerlaos - the ubiquitous, cheap, and surprisingly good national brew - seems to produce an country full of happy and pleasant inhabitants that manage to keep smiling, despite their lack of material possessions or ravaging of their country by umpteen various world powers throughout the past millennia.

One incredibly interesting lens that we have been examining this travel experience through is the multiple land border crossings we have encountered. Many times when travelling internationally the border becomes less of a physicality and more of something abstract that occurs somewhere between the gates of two airports. When cruising around the countryside on a bicycle, the physical land border is incredibly tangible and present, from the countdown of kilometers on the roadside signs as you approach to the different posts to which you hand over your passport that you ride between. With this crossing comes stress and immediate discomfort, as within the space of a few hundred meters you are plunged into a new land where you often have none of the proper currency, don't know how to say simple things like "Hello" or "Thank You", and are immediately confronted with new customs, lifestyles, and ways of living.

The crossing into Vietnam was the most formal of the crossings we have encountered so far, and they even X-rayed our bags in a semi-official manner. The increase in development, infrastructure, and money was immediately apparent on the Vietnamese side, and we fought to find the right tone with which the locals would understand our botching of "Sin Jow", or "Hello". Fortunately the learning curve is quick, and we found an ATM, used enough body language to get a hotel room, and found some dinner which consisted of rice, vegetables, and some unidentifiable meat. We feel fortunate that we are able to explore Vietnam voluntarily as opposed to the generation before us, and we will work on getting off of Laos time and synchronized with the locals, which will be a bit sped up if the mega-jolt coffee served alongside green tea for breakfast this morning is any indication. Yes, despite our discomfort in the new experience, we've already learned "kaffee sua", or coffee with milk - now all we need is a tour company to schlep our bags and we'd be all set.

On a Slow Boat to Laos

Although we were loving riding through the plains of Thailand, we were getting a bit anxious to get into Laos if we were to complete our hopes of a Southeast Asia circumnavigation. This, coupled with our increasingly sore legs and butts prompted us to hop on a bus northward towards the border city of Koh Chang, where we then hopped on a longtailed boat with a guy from Boston who had ridden his loaded-down mountain bike over from Chiang Mai (only the third other cyclist encountered in Thailand!), and crossed the Mehkong River into Laos.

On the other side there was nothing more than a somewhat depressing border town, as the place was used by almost all travellers as a one night layover until they caught the slow boat down the river. The boat was really the only game in town, as the roads heading out were notoriously decrepit and beat up, and the mountains were looking a bit too ominous for our bikes. We bought our tickets for the two day slow boat ride, thinking that it couldn't be too bad and happy that we saved $1.20 per ticket by riding to the boat dock ourselves instead of paying for it through a travel "agent".

It turns out that a two day boat ride is really about as long as it sounds. The novelty of the hard wooden seats and views of the river scenery wore off in about 20 seconds, and for some 17 hours of our lives we were packed into a boat floating down the Mehkong with scads of other tourists and a good number of locals, who knew to sit up in the front of the boat where the air was freshest and the engine noise quietest. At times we felt like we were in some parallel universe people-safari, as the boat actually began to tip over from all the tourons rushing to take pictures of the local village dwellers performing everyday tasks with their telephoto lenses. Yes, this is how you get good pictures, but one can imagine how it would feel to be followed by boatloads of Paparazi was you went to the grocery, got off at your BART stop, or stepped out of the shower. It became annoyingly obscene at points, and the price that we paid for not putting up with the madness is a not so suprising lack of good people-photos from the trip. Thankfully the social life of our trip was saved by a largely disproportionate amount of Bay Area folk on the boat, including a rad lesbian couple living in the Mission in San Francisco. We hung out with them, swapped stories about life at home and on the road, at drank as much Nescafe Turbo as our stomaches could handle.

To add to the eternity-like feel of the trip, we stopped overnight in the small village of Pak Beng, about halfway before getting to Luang Prabang. Pak Beng, which used to be a small subsistence farming village, is now the major stop on the tourist trail down south. As soon as the boat pulled in, throngs of local children ranging from ages 4 to 24 hopped on and swarmed the luggage compartment in the rear. What followed for the next 30 minutes was a sea of chaos that revolved around these kids pulling up rucksacks from under the planks of the boat, throwing them to a friend, and then their compadre taking off running up the hill to a guest house. The foreigners have no choice but to follow their bag, where they are charged for the porter service and already have a room booked for them at the establishment. To add to the excitement, while Mat was in the back trying to catch our bright yellow panniers before they landed in the arms of an accomplice, a full-on fist-fight broke out between two of the adolescent boys, and a joking play-fight turned into a Muay Thai performance in mere seconds. While this scenario was hectic, stressful, and more reminiscint of India than anywhere we've been so far, it does show the complexity of an economy that so recently has had tourist dollars introduced. Yes, these kids are perhaps rude and inconsiderate, but in the end they're just trying to make a buck to buy food for their family and live another day. You can't blame them, but it does sometimes make the situation difficult.

Thankfully, by reasons unknown to us, the second day of boat travel went much quicker than the first. We both finished our excellent books, chatted with out new found friends, and managed to get our luggage off the boat without hassel or fistfight. Willing to overlook the experience of our first few days in Laos, we headed into Luang Prabang full of optimism for a city that Lonely Planet called "a tonic for the soul".

Cycling Through the Land of Smiles

As predicted earlier, things have become a bit easier after leaving the tourist trap of Bangkok and getting on our bikes. Cycling through Thailand thus far has gone suprisingly well. The roads are well paved with huge shoulders on the side, there are a plethora of food and drink stands every five kilometers (can you say 10 baht thai ice tea?), and the locals we have seen along the route have been incredibly supportive, honking horns, giving thumbs up, and practicing their English phrases of encouragement. One elderly man also riding a bike yelled at us "I love bicycle trip!" with a veracity that seemed to indicate he had been waiting his entire life to yell these four words.

After a hectic day riding through Bangkok we were a bit concerned with the traffic patterns, not to mention remembering to ride on the left side of the road (fairly easy until you get to some crazy traffic circle and have no idea where to go). Once we hit the open road, however, our concerns with traffic subsided quickly. It seems that roads and drivers in Asia are quite used to having all sorts of vehicles and such on their roadways; at any given time there will be pedestrians, cyclists, motos, buses, trucks, rickshaws, elephants, scooters, cars, taxis, and lories all sharing the same space. Slower traffic simply keeps to the left, and if you have to pass someone you make sure the lane is clear enough and then you go for it, usually giving a warning honk, ring, or yell to make sure everyone knows that you're coming through. Everyone on the road has given us more than ample room when passing, with some large lories even slowing to a near-stop rather than barreling by full-speed. This scenario is quite a contrast to the idea of riding on a busy highway in the U.S., where the roads are designed for fast moving cars and that's the only thing that belong on the highways, gosh darnit.

While the going has been relatively easy thus far, it has not been without excitement. We have been trying to stick to the smaller roads, and while our map is decent it doesn't exactly have every turn, bend, or road number that would be nice to have. Combine that with long stretches when the road signs are only in Thai, and it's easy to see how we can get lost every now and then. At one point we were following a small country road that our map had crossing the river on what we assumed to be a bridge. We rolled into a small riverside town and certainly didn't see the bridge we were expecting, much less any apparent way across the river. After some broken Thai and English map studying sessions with a Tuk-Tuk driver we queued up on the street with the other cars and motos and waited for the ferry to come across the river while a fried-coconut-banana saleswoman tempted us with her wares (we bought some and she through some in for free!). We somehow got a special bicycle rate on the ferry across the river and were rewarded with a near-deserted stretch of beautiful road on the other side.

We've been resting our legs (and butts!) for a few days now 400km+ from Bangkok in Sukhothai, an ancient Thai capital, and enjoying the amazing food and ruins. We ran into another couple on bikes crazy enough to be doing something similar to what we're doing, expect that they are loaded down to the max and headed into China. We're still planning on staying light and fast for the time being and will head out North in the morning as we move closer to the Thailand/Laos border and a river trip down the Mekong. Yeee-haw!