24/02 Day 12, Sa Pa

Its really great being back here. The surroundings of Sa Pa are so amazingly beautifull. I’m staying at the Eco Palms resort, which just consists of five or six traditional thatched roof houses, which all have an amazing view on the rice terraces in the Muong Hoa Valley. The resort is located some 7km from Sa Pa, so this morning I decided to walk to town and enjoy the wonderfull views over the valley.

Right before Sa Pa I came across a crossroads, with one road leading to Sa Pa’s city center (to which I actually intended to go to) and a road leading just into Sa Pa. For some dumb reason I chose the second road and walked into Sa Pa, and then also walked out of it again. I figured that if I would just keep walking, that I would come accross another road leading back to the city center, but I didn’t. Instead the road led into the Valley. At some point I came through a traditional Hmong village. In this village I found some stairs leading even deeper into the valley. Along the stairs were stalls with traditional colorfoul Hmong arts and crafts, which were a joy to look at. I followed the stairs along the stalls down and down and down, untill I reached the river at the bottom of the valley. Two rivers came together at this point and at their crossing was this very nice bamboo village, with houses and waterwheels using the power of the fast flowing rivers. At the point where the rivers merge there was this magnificant waterfall (Cat Cat falls). It was a really nice surprice and incredibly unexpected! So nice to take a wrong turn now and then :-)

23/02 Day 11, Sa Pa

It actually has happened a lot during the last 11 days: Vietnamese standing alongside the road, seeing me stroll by and then yelling something. Probably it means something like “look at this idiot, doesn’t she know we have motorcycles?”. But as said before, the Vietnamse love it when you just smile and wave back at them.

Today was no different, but in today’s case all Vietnamese that saw me pass by actually knew that the road that I was following went up some 1500 meters. In their eyes, that made me into an even bigger idiot. “Are you really going to cycle up there? Don’t you know we have cars, taxis and busses? You very weird person!” I came accross a lot of Vietnamese today. The people on the motorcycles hooted their horns, combined with frantic smiling and waving and gesturing that I should just hop on. The people in the cars turned down their windows and stuck their head out of the car and cheared me on, but still screamed stuff to me. People with pick up’s gestured that I should just put my bike in the back. The people in the busses just took their cell phones out and tried to take as many pictures of the white idiot as possible, after which they waved at me and stuck up their thumbs...

22/02 Day 10, Lao Cai

I’m getting close to the end of this trip. Each day i’m wondering whether I will finish the day’s ride, not exactly knowing what challenges lie ahead. Today those challenges consisted of some more climbing and some more pretty bad roads. I really thought I had already seen the worst roads of Vietnam, but it turned out it could be even worse. What added to the fun was that it was raining this morning, which caused the bad road to be bad square, consisting of distorted subgrade of the once smooth asphalt road, covered in thick red mud that clogged between my wheels and my fenders.

However, once the road reached the top of the hill it crossed the border with the Lao Cai provence and from there on the road was fine again! If I ever get to sit with the people’s committee of Lao Cai again I’ll thank them for having proper roads!

21/02 Day 9, Yên Bình

The Vietnamese people are really wonderfull. Yesterday evening I was really hungry and the hotel owner’s wife had gestured me to go outside for food, but due to the tet holidays most restaurants are closed, so I wasn’t able to find any. I did stumble uppon somekind of really nice coffee place where a Vietnamese guy and a Vietnamese girl were sitting outside having coffee. The girl spoke English pretty well and I asked here if I could get some food there, but she told me it was a coffee place and not a restaurant. She also told me that I would have a hard time finding a place to eat due to the tet holidays. So I continued my way for about 100 meter, after which the girl came running after me.

She told me that the lady that owns the cafe could offer me some traditional Vietnamese rice cake. So I followed here back and was served water, a coke, local thea, traditional Vietnamese rice cake, some cold meet and some other stuff. It was really great and the old lady seemed really happy to help me out! She even said that because it was tet that I didn’t have to pay. So I ate the food and the lady kept bringing rice cake untill I was full. After that I left, I thanked here and unnoticed I left some money underneath the tray, because I don’t like to live out of someone else’s pocket. So I walked back to my hotel and after about 500 meters I found the old lady running after me, calling me and waving the money that I’ve left behind in the air. No way that I was allowed to pay for her food. Such kindness.

20/02 Day 8, Nà Hang

Oke so my little scheme worked! I succesfully bypassed about 32km of the route that I orriginally planned for today by crossing the lake with the boat. At the other side of the lake I found a perfectly good and flat road that led to the main road! I’m so clever :-)

So in my head the rest of today was going to be an easy day! Only some 68km to cycle and only one large ascend ahead... In reality that unfortunately turned out to be somewhat of a deception. It took me 2,5 hours to complete the first 20 of todays ride. The big ascend was insanely steep and once at the top I felt quite relieved and I was looking forward to my long descend. But it never came. After the top of the hill the road went down a bit. But then it went back up. And then in went down a bit. But after that it went back up again. And after it went down a bit again, it went back up! And when it went back up, it went back up at some 10-20% incline. So the next 10km took me another 1,5 hours to complete :,-(

19/02 Day 7, Hồ Ba Bể

After 6 days of quite intense cycling, my buttocks were pretty happy that they were separated from my saddle today. And the rest of my body didn’t mind not riding either :-) So today I had some time to explore Ba Be lake and the surrounding national park. The Americans told me yesterday that the best way to do that was by boat, so at around 830 i found myself sitting in one, together with someone who would navigate it accoss the lake and the nearby river!

The lake and the river are both surrounded by high and steep limestone walls covered in old rain forrest vegetation, which this morning disappeared into the clouds. There are a very limited amount of roads in this area and the roads that are there are rugged and narrow. And knowing that the lake measures about 7km from north to south, you get some idea off how remote this beautifull area feels. And for someone born and raised in the Randstad, that’s quite exciting!

18/02 Day 6, Hồ Ba Bề

Today began wtih a pretty long climb of about 850 meters to an elevation of 1350 meters. In order to make sure that I would have enough time to finish today’s ride, I left at around 0700. It took me about 2,5 hours to reach the top of the pass. Although it was hard work, it was a pretty nice climb. The road was not to steep and in proper condition and there was not much other traffic. At some point I was completely alone, surrounded by clouds and no noise except for the sound of tjirping birds and water running down the mountain.

Before I left for this trip a collegue told me that I should try meditating once I would find myself in a nice natural ambiance without any other human pressence, but I guess the cycling itsself works as some kind of meditation for me. While I’ on my bike, my mind doesn’t have to solve any complex problems and doesn’t have to deal with people. The only thing I have to do is ride my bike up that hill, which takes a lot of patience (today almost 3 hours of it for the first climb. I can’t afford myself to freak out about the remaining time and distance because the the cycling becomes frustrating. So I continuously calm myself down, focus on the final goal of the day, keep my legs spinning those pedals and remind myself of how lucky I am that I get to see all this beauty and soak it all up. And i finish each day like this: glad that the cycling is done but also very happy with each new experience and the places I’ve seen.

17/02 Day 5, Nguyên Bình

Despite me liking the place where I stayed last night very much, I woke up this morning at around six and tried to imagine what I could be doing there for the entire day. The conclusion was short: not much. So after having some fried noodles as breakfast (which I still find very strange) I left, hoping for the best.

Yesterday’s ride has more or less put a dent in my confidence. The elevation profile doesn’t look that shocking and it was only a 87km ride, but I’ve been riding for almost 7 hours yesterday (actual time on the bike, without breaks). So I was really hoping that I would make it through today, preferably with a little less pain then yesterday. And I’m very happy to tell that I did. Today’s distance was a little longer (107km) and the elevation gain was a little less (1240m) and it took me about 6,5 hours, meaning that I was a lot faster then I was yesterday. Luckily the ascents were a lot less steep and the roads were in good conditions. My 350meter climb actually went pretty easy. This made the cycling a lot more fun and every climb was rewarded with a speedy descent. My brakes were happy they didn’t have to work so hard today!

16/02 Day 4, Ban Gioc

Yesterday was new years eve, but I fel asleep at around 830. At midnight I was woken by some fire works, which sounded very loud between the mountains. So my new years eve was quite uneventfull...

This morning I had some trouble to find the receptionist and get my passport back, so I only left at 0800. The day started out pretty good, with a nice gradual descent on a recently paved and smooth road, through a landscape dominated by these limestone spikes that were covered in an early morning haze.

15/02 Day 3, Quảng Uyên

Today was insane. I left around 730 and stumbled upon my first limestone giant about 10 minutes later. And after that it was just beautifull view after beautifull view. Truly amazing.

I rode about 117km today and had about 1700 meters of elevatiaon gain, which meant I had to do a lot of climbing. Luckily the roads were not to steap and I’m carrying not to much weight, so the climbs were not to hard. I don’t necessarily like riding my bike up hill, because in general it’s quite tiring. But in someway its just incredibly gratifying. Its like your brain produces some kind of substance that makes a nice view much more satisfying after you had to do some physical effort to be able to see that view. So despite all the physical strain, I’ve been enjoying myself for the most part of the day.

14/02 Day 2, Đõng Đăng

I think I can get used to a hotel room instead of a tent :-) It’s quite comfortable to have your own room with your own shower after a long day of cycling :-) And it was also quite nice that I had my own power socket for Marvin the Garmin and Appie the Apple, let alone that this morning I only had to stuff a minor amount of stuff back into my two panniers and I didn’t have to break up my tent and pack all my camping gear :-) All very easy! Though I’m not quite sure whether I liked the loud Vietnamse television that was on all night in the room of one of my neighbours.

Today was an easy day. The first 17km were false flat (which actually appears to be the right translation of vals plat) which was quite annoying because it looked like the road was flat but I barely made 17km per hour. During the descent it luckily also worked the other way around :-) Before I knew I reached the city Lạng Sơn, where I visited a 16th century fortress and climbed one of the limestone rocks towering above city. I also allowed three local guys to take a selfie with me. I’m still the exotic sensation and apparantly very interesting :-)

13/02 Day 1, Đinh Lập

Day 1! The day started a bit hazy and with an overcast sky, adding to the already grey and pale appearance of the scenery. I’ve left this morning at 730 and left the busy roads of Halong behind me quite fast, replacing them with a road through rural area which was frequently and violently disrupted by the construction of the new express way between Hai Phong and Van Don. After about 30km I could also leave these frequent construction sites behind me, after which there remained only the many high tension power lines as a reminder of the large city that was still nearby. Gradually the power lines disappeared from the landscape and after about 40km I was making my first climb on an empty mountain road, with only a limited amount of scooters and barely any cars passing by. This was exactly the reason why I chose to head north!