No Fixed Abode: Near miss

Mon 11 Apr 2016 - Sapa

Yvonne woke this morning with her tummy still not quite right so she opted to stay at the hotel planning the Sri Lankan leg of our journey, which starts in just 2 days.

Meanwhile Glenn took a walk around Sapa to see what he could find. Wandering past the many gear shops, all purporting to sell North Face stuff all crazy prices (genuine? Go figure), he found his way to the main square and sat down to people watch. Before long an elderly minority lady sat next to him and started to talk in good English. Once she realised she was not going to sell him anything they talked about children, grandchildren and out world tour. Glenn was not sure if she grasped anything other than the one month spent in Vietnam.

Ambling up and down streets he came across a building site and was soon noticing all the health and safety infringements that would not be tolerated in the UK. No sooner had he spotted a guy not wearing a hardhat, loading bricks into a bucket that was being hoisted to the top by a rickety crane, when the bucket snagged on something and a dozen bricks cascaded down. Luckily the guy had been watching and managed to dash for cover, cursing the winch operator.

As Glenn was near Huong’s organic shack he went to pay him a call but found it all shut up. Maybe tomorrow.

After demolishing a small loaf of coconut bread he returned to the hotel to see how Yvonne was doing. She was feeling better but not 100% so decided to skip lunch and try and starve the bugs out.

After a short nap to recover from a late night watching Man U lose to Spurs on a blurry internet stream, Glenn decided to go for a longer stroll to the Cat Cat minority village, a couple of km down the hill. When he came to large sign showing the way to ‘Cat Cat tourist area’ he feared the worst. As he descended a flight of stone steps his fears proved well founded. The stone path was lined with stalls all selling brightly coloured Huong clothing, silverware and general tat. Cruising past the chorus of “you buy” he did stop a couple of times to admire the view and snatch some photo’s of everyday life. At the valley floor was a nice waterfall and several large bamboo waterwheel pumps but nothing to hold him there too long. On the way back up he followed his nose along an unsigned track that led through the actual village of wooden shacks and the smell of animals (think farmyard). It’s difficult to believe people still live this way - especially scooter and mobile phone owning people.

Back at the hotel he found Yvonne had made good progress with a Sri Lankan itinerary and she was now feeling well enough for food so we set off for a restaurant that Glenn had passed on his earlier travels, which had some attractive fixed price options. Aside from the price the food, including a starter of pumpkin soup (we couldn’t remember the last time we’d had proper soup), was the best we’d had in Vietnam and the owner seemed very pleased when we told her so.