SaPa

Our journey to SaPa was via overnight train. A small 4 berth bunk for 8 to 9 hours and thankfully we traveled light leaving half of our luggage in the 'secure' lobby of a hotel back in Hanoi.
After the transfer from Lao Cai station on the border with China we arrive in a misty SaPa and are immediately at the mercy of female vendors from the local villages. They take a particular shine to Margaret.

Mid morning, the mountain cloud clears enough for us to climb up through a hillside country park to enjoy great views across SaPa.


The following day we take a trek to some local villages with a guide called Mylan. During the morning walks on our way to Y Linh Ho and Lao Chai we leave the tarmac and initially follow the construction route of a new road and soon descend through the mountain cloud and onto the rice terraces.



The route was both steep and treacherous in places and it wasn't not long before Helen lost her footing and went up to one of her knees in the paddy field. From that point Helen is firmly hand in hand with one of the local village ladies who chaperoned us all day.



Moments later and David also lost his balance on the rocks and smacked down on his knee onto another small boulder. Luckily, only moments before he had put the camera safely back into it's carry case.

Our guide, Mylan, misses the action but it soon became clear that she had taken quite a shine to David and starts to refer to him as honey.
After lunch our walk took us down to Ta Van village. We missed the snow by a couple of days on Mount Fansipan, but it clearly took its toll on the water buffalo who were extremely sick and dying from the cold. It's a reminder of what a tough existence the mountainside terraces offer not only to the people but their animals too.

When we arrived at the village were led into the school yard and Mylan immediately headed for two swing seats and sat down on one. Helen and Lloyd enjoyed sitting on the one opposite meaning that David had to sit next to Mylan who did the classic 'cinema-yawn' manoeuvre to place her hand on the seat behind her 'honey'.

It was also at this point where she turned her attention to the lump that had appeared on Davids knee and ran to another of the ladies to get a needle to relieve the pressure from the bruising in the wound and advised David to put Tiger Balm on it later.
On our way back to the minibus, there was a large swing - similar to those we saw throughout Nepal. When David remarked upon it to Mylan, she straight away said he must have a go on it....

On another afternoon, we went for a nice stroll around the lake with Margaret & Lloyd, but resisted the temptation to take a swan pedal boat out on the lake.

Our journey back to the railways station was through some of the most staggering scenery, but sadly the minibus had heavily tinted windows to scupper any photo opportunities and, to be honest, as it was a bit of a white knuckle ride for the majority of the way, taking the camera out of the bag was not a sensible option to take.
However, the day train back did offer one or two lovely glimpses of fantastic Vietnamese countryside.