Sapa, September 2017

I woke up and headed downstairs for breakfast which was a buffet of sausages, bacon, rice, noodles and boiled eggs. There was also tea and coffee, you could sit inside or there was a little balcony with breathtaking mountain views. 


I walked around Sapa town for a bit after breakfast then headed back to the hotel. Our tour guide met us at 9:30am and we had a new family from Australia join us. Our tour guide was very sweet although it was a bit difficult to understand at times which wasn't ideal. Although he was very confident speaking in English I'd give him a 2/10 when it came to understanding English. When he would ask me a question and I would answer I would have to l repeat myself at least 3 times before he understood. And even then given his response it wouldn't  suggest he understood what I was saying. I would have expected a higher level of English given the price of the tour. 
Communication could have also been improved. He would explain at the beginning of the day what we would do but that's it. So we would have no idea how long we would we walking for, when lunch was, where lunch was, what was the plan next etc. 


So the 6 of us headed to Cat Cat Village which is about a 45 minute walk from Sapa town. It's all pretty much downhill, there were several local people selling handcrafted goods and the usual local trinkets.

Along the walk there were several beautiful views of the mountains, greenery and waterfalls. We stopped after about an hour or so and watched a local dance performance. 


I then asked some local people to take a photo of me and then stuff got weird. They then asked to have a photo WITH ME! Why on earth these people would want a photo with me I don't know, but I'll take it. Throughout the day this happened about a dozen times. I came to the conclusion that in this part of Vietnam they are not used to seeing people of colour and took it as a weird compliment. 

We then walked uphill for about another hour, one couple couldn't stomach the walk so got a motorbike ride to the top of the hill. I was tempted but if these parents who are almost twice my age can do this hike so can I! 


We got to the hotel for lunch at around 12:30, our bus was scheduled to go back to Hanoi at 3pm so I decided to get a 30 minute foot massage for 80,000 Dong/£2.60 to kill some time. I then headed to the bus station and the bus left at 3:30pm. I slept for a few hours then watched some shows on my iPad for the rest of the time.
 

We got back to my hostel at 8:30pm. I quickly headed out, got some dinner and supplies for the bus journey tomorrow. 

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