Feeling like an old hand on motor-scooters after my trial by fire in Hue, I had a nice walk past the harbor in the early morning:
… and rented a scooter for a whopping $5 where, wonder of wonders, they also had a helmet that actually fit my noggin. Vietnam is a bit, um, lax about certain details, so with nary a Western-style insurance form to fill out, or even a deposit, I was off.
Cat Ba is an interesting island – it's pretty big, so once you are away from the water, it feels like part of the mainland, with rice paddies, small towns/villages, and so on. And the scooter is a perfect way of checking it out – as you are able to zip past wheezing buses working their way up a slope.
The other plus side is that a scooter has its own wind-generated AC – a key feature that was to be a godsend down the road.
I rolled into the park, and opted for the climb up to the peak of the tallest mountain. Even at 9am it was already incredibly hot and humid, and it would only get worse.
A quick aside – this sign made me chuckle... making the claim that buying drinks was good for the environment and park!
The hike was both fun and a real butt-kicker, with about an hour of near-constant ascents. I'd like to say I handled this no sweat, but that'd be highly, highly inaccurate. I don't think I've ever had cause to sweat so much before, where even as you wipe your brow, it's instantly slick with moisture.
Let's just say – I've even more respect for anyone who had to fight in country like this, lugging massive packs for 20 miles a day!
But, all the moisture expenditure was put to good use and I reached the peak – with magnificent 360 degree views of the rugged landscapes.
There was even a bonus climb; a five story iron observation tower. And, just to make it interesting/slightly terrifying, it was rusting, would only accept the weight of five people max, and featured rotting wooden floor planks at the top.
But, what the heck – I was game, and headed up and was rewarded with even better views.
As a funny aside, and a good illustration of how the world views Americans, I got to talking to a 20-something Vietnamese tour guide up top. When he found out I was from the States, he was a bit surprised, and mentioned that I wasn't, um, “large” was how he put, motioning to his belly.
A much, much faster descent, and I headed back to the hotel with no problem, much refreshed from the 30 minutes on the scooter... then it was a grueling couple of hours on the beach and pool, getting my fix of squid and a surprisingly good tuna sandwich.
Alas, all good things must come to an end, and our tour group headed back to Hanoi.
The first leg was via hydrofoil to Haiphong Harbor. The trip was fast... almost too fast, as within the space of 30 minutes, we went from a maze of virgin limestone islands, charming junks, and the odd jellyfish to, well, ugliness.
Don't get me wrong – Haiphong is an incredibly vital port to Vietnam, the entry point for much of the resources that drive its 6-8% annual growth. The downside is that it's ugly, with rusting derrick cranes loading up a long line of battered tramp steamers and modern container ships.
I couldn't wait to get out of there..
After hopping on the connecting bus, we headed back to Hanoi along the main road/highway. Like a lot of Asia, the concept of a US or UK style motorway is still a work in progress, so we found our bus sharing the road with pedestrians, scooters without number, and the odd buffalo-propelled cart.
The other noteworthy thing was that this road provided a clear glimpse at the forces driving change in this nominally communist country. We passed row after row of industrial estates large and small, with names like Canon, Brother, and other multinationals, all sending increasingly complicated high-tech work to Vietnam. This is fueling a middle-class, in turn prompting the development of Western-style suburbs and malls, just as I saw in Saigon.
And then, on the other hand, these factories were often right next to rice paddies, being planted by hand in a labor-intensive, back-breaking process unchanged for centuries.
The dichotomy was fascinating – the picture of a country in transition, and I can only imagine what's going to happen over the next 5, 10, or even 20 years.
Once we pulled into Hanoi, I had a frenzied two hours running down logistical stuff – picking up my forgotten mobile phone from the great hotel I stayed at, stocking up on cash for my trip to the ATM-starved highlands, and catching a quick dinner, all before heading to the train station for a 9 hour sleeper train to Sapa in the mountains by the Chinese border.
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