Halong Bay/Hanoi

Day 4 and 5 in Vietnam -

Halong Bay -

Today we woke up on Cat Ba Island, packed up our stuff, then headed back on the boat to Halong City. The views were gorgeous, once again, as we headed back to the docks, getting relax on a nice two hour boat ride. Once we were there, we boarded back on the same bus that took us there and started the 4 hour trek back to Hanoi. We ended up finding out that the Irish girls, Sue and Kelly, decided to ditch Laos and head down south instead. At this point, Jill and I decided to break off from Bryan and Maria, who both decided they wanted to continue seeing the north. I feel like this is a good incentive for me to come back to Vietnam, as I've had a pretty good experience here so far. We exchanged contact information with Sue and Kelly and we'll be meeting up with them in Hoi An in a couple of days. Tonight, we slept early (10:30p).

Hanoi (Pt. 2) -

Today, we woke up late (9:00a), and only because my alarm went off to remind me to get my camera fixed. It turned out that the place we tried out was $35-40, probably because it was short notice (they initially said it would take two days, though I didn't ask how much it would have been then. Today was easy. The night before, we purchased an Open Bus (sleeper) ticket (which lasts for 2 months) which has stops at Hué, Hoi An, Nha Trang, somewhere else, and Ho Chi Minh City. This means all of our transportation (maybe minus Dalat) is completely taken care of for Vietnam: so nice. So, today, things we did:

- Visited the Vietnam Fine Arts Museum:

- What made this place so cool is that it's, as expected, all Vietnamese artists. We got to see paintings, carvings, sculptures, and ancient doors from the 13th Century up to the late 90's. It was really fascinating to see the progression of styles, mediums, and subjects through the years. Most interesting, I thought, were the paintings from the 70s and early 80s, depicting scenes from the war. The contrast of paintings from the mid-80's onward was so stark; the colors got brighter and the paintings had a lighter quality about them.

- Visited the Water Puppet Theatre:

- Water puppetry is an ancient art of Vietnam using marionettes over a 3 ft. deep tank of water. They told a story in Vietnamese (so I have no clue what happened, save a fish turning into a dragon, a man and a woman falling in love, and (of course) some slapstick humor of men catching men with nets (on accident) rather than the fish. The show started with a few songs played with traditional Vietnamese instruments and continued through the water puppet performance. Aside from having negative leg room, the show was a welcomed change and a lot of fun. I suggest you check it out on YouTube. I'll post a video when I get the chance (the internet isn't fast enough here.

Okay, so my travel mate and I are waiting at the hotel where we will be picked up by our sleeper bus at 6:30p for our 16 (?) hour bus ride to Hoi An. We've got plenty of snacks, our iPods and Kindles are charged, and we're read to head to Central Vietnam. I'll update you as we go along the way.

Talk to you soon,

Garrett