Ninh Binh and the DMZ

Good morning to all :)

I made it to Ninh Binh on the bus, secured myself a
hotel and headed off to the Tam Coc caves (about 8km
southwest of the city) on bicycle. I met up with two
local ladies who told me they'd take me to the caves.
We ended up at one of the ladies houses' and rented a
boat. (I left my rented bicycle at her house). We
paddled away and landed somewhere. They told me that
I had to walk up a hill, away from them, to get to the
caves and I was worried that they'd leave me there and
keep the bicycle so I didn't go to the caves :( I
don't know what their plan actually was but they were
annoying about a tip the whole way back in the boat.
I passed the "actual" place to catch a boat to see the
caves on my way back but didn't feel motivated to get
on a boat and see the caves.

The next day I went to see Ken Ga which was supposed
to be a floating village (Pascal - don't bother) and
the third day, to kill time, I went to see a cathedral
in a nearby town. The scenery around Ninh Binh is
beautiful and there are few tourists but I wasn't
wholly impressed with the sights. I then caught a
night train to the DMZ on a hard sleeper with a
British guy. This time, it truly was a hard sleeper
(a wooden plank with a straw mat on it). We had an
entreprising conductor who sold us the staff quarters
for about 6 CDN each so we slept well :)

I had a tour of the DMZ and spent the night in Dong
Ha. It was truly hard to imagine the war as there's
overgrowth and vegetation everywhere. My guide was
particularly informative, supported the south and
still believes in two separate countries for Vietnam.
I found it interesting how the north fighters have
received all of the glory and the south fighters have
received no recognition, despite the unification of
the country. The Vinh Moch tunnels were interesting.
It was 25m underground at it's deepest points and
people lived under there for 3 years, as many as 300
at a time. It was clausterphobic feeling after about
a half hour in the tunnels.

I have since made my way to Hué but I'll saved that
for another e-mail as I don't want to go on forever :)

Miss you all!!
Sarah

Tug - I've written you a postcard but you're not on
Canada411 so I need your address if you'd like to
receive it :)

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com