Ho An 10.01.07

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This guy was making wire baskets (for catching sea creatures?) just outside our hotel.

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I can’t remember how we spent the morning, but we started to look at some of the Hoi An “attractions” (old houses, family temples, museums, etc.), and came across a young backpacker walking out of this place, who recommended it highly.  Always keen for a good veg restaurant, we went in.

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And found tofu so fresh, it was still steaming. 

I wanted to go to the Hoi An Orphanage, but the address was in “Let’s Go Vietnam” (which I highly reccommend BTW), and not in the Lonely Planet which was in the day bag.  I had found the orphanage on the way back to the Grasslands hotel late at night by walking into the rusty barbed wire surrounding it and scraping some flesh from my scalp.  Unfortunately neither of us could remember where we were at the time.  A young western woman entered the restaurant and ordered in Vietnamese, Mark asked her if she knew where the orphanage was.  Fortuitously, she did.  Her name is Emma, she is a  social work and psychology student from Melbourne, and she is in Vietnam for the 4th time to work at the orphanage for a month on her annual holidays.  She gave us directions worthy of me (crappy), and we hoped to catch up with her later.

Unfortunately, from this point on, I have no photos until later in the day.  Rhubarb (the macbook) decided that even though his hard drive was full, and he wasn’t going to save the pictures to it, he would delete them from the memory card anyway.  I hissed, and cried, and stamped my foot, but they did not come back.

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I went into one of the “assembly halls”, places where chinese families could meet and celebrate.  They were doing a solid trade in incense cones, which were hung from the ceiling and had labels attached – it appeared to be some kind on ancestor worship, but there was no-one around to explain it to me, so I just drank in the colour and movement, took pictures like I was possessed by a thwarted japanese tourist, and grinned from ear to ear.

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This is one of 2 photos I took at the orphanage.  I just couldn’t be a “tourist” here, there is too much life and suffering, it is too close to the edge.  This little girl is 5 years old.  Emma says that 2 years ago she would not speak, or smile, or engage with anyone.  She is the first child that engaged with me – she motioned for me to come to her, pick her up, and take her to the food.  She had already eaten, she was just trying it on.  She spent most of our visit either in my arms on on my lap, smiling and laughing and clapping her hands, and being tickled by one of the other kids.  She lives in the room with the severely disabled.  Of the 70 odd kids at the orphanage, about 25 have disabilities, many of them quite profound. 

Visitors to the orphanage are asked to give a donation – Emma had warned us that this would be expected (and of course, we went with the intention of helping out), but that if we did want to make a financial contribution, it would be much better spent by giving it to a UK based charity that directly helps the Orphanage, rather than allowing the money to go to the Director of the Orphanage (from where there is no transparency as to how the money is spent).

The Kianh Foundation was started by two women who visited the orphanage in March 2001, and found the children living in revolting conditions.  They met a boy whose spirit touched them, and they resolved to do whatever they could to change things for the children there.  We made a small donation in the official donation box (100,00D, less than $10), which Emma said they would be happy with, and then met Emma at a park down the road (the director gets suspicious if she leaves with visitors).

Emma led us to Jenny’s Bamboo, who is an Aussie expat and is authourised to collect donations on behalf of the foundation.

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We bought Emma a beer, and sat and chatted till night fell.  Again I looked for Pho (a place recommended by our tailor), but we couldn’t find it, and my guts are still not quite up to scratch, so we went for Emma’s reccomendation of Cafe 19 – “try the tofu with stuff”.

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On the way we found the place where we had our cooking lesson – highly recommended.

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Tofu with spicy greens and peanuts.  One of the top 5 meals so far.  Mark ordered this, I ordered “Tofu, Vegetables and Rice”, but it came without any flavour whatsoever, so I gave up and ordered the same thing.

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A Hoi An Lantern shop.

Nha Trang 12.01.07

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After breakfast, we formulated a cunning plan.  We would visit the pagoda and the champa temple (this one still in use), and then try to find the Whale Island office after lunch, to let them know where we were staying so we could be transported to the island.  On the way we saw this fabulous laughing Buddha – unfortunately they didn’t have a smaller scale model inside.

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The caged bird sang prettily, though an identical bird, in an identical tiny cage just flitted from side to side like his mind was fractured by prolonged confinement.

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This is the 10 armed manifestation of somebody in the form of somebody else.  Guidebook is not handy, but I will look up the reference.  We were met at the gates of the pagoda by some very pretty young women who informed us that they were orphans, and that the monks allow them to live at the pagoda and go to school – but that they need money to go to school, and would we please buy postcards or silk paintings from them.  The postcards cost us 100,000D – a shade under $10 – we declined to buy two sets.

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The reclining buddha – finished only a few years ago.  The steps up to the buddha on the top of the hill were populated by beggars – old women, young children, and one girl of about 15 who carried her crippled (and not much smaller) brother with her.  By the time we had climbed to the top and bought water, we had spent about $20 – despite there being no “entrance fee” to the pagoda.  On the way down, the Lonely Planet recommends exploring around the left hand side of the main temple – we found a man who was happy to show us around through the closed gates, and recommended the best angles to photograph the sights from.  He also pointed out the tomb of a female monk, who was either born in, or died in 1953.

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Next to the champa temple.  This is the first intact Linga (symbolising the male) that we had seen.  Splendid.

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Some ladies eating lunch, while a young demolition worker has a rest between bouts of destruction.

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All without a net.

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The view from the top down to the entrance “hall”.

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Shiva above a doorway.

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Three of the four or so small temples.

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More splendid revolutionary art.

After a very pleasant cocktail at the Nha Trang Sailing Club, on a terrace on the beach, we tried to get vegetarian food in two restaurants for dinner, but weren’t thrilled at the prospect of “stir fried legume”. In desperation we ended up in Nha Trangs only “genuine indian”.  I imagine that their genuine Indian is the chef, as the food was pretty good – and the gin and tonic was rather splendid.  Early to bed for an 8am pick up to go to Whale Island.

Catch up – Hoi An 09.01.07

Up early for a 7.45am pick up for the My Son Tour.  “My Son” means beautiful mountain, and it was home to the ancient Champa people who may have also built Borobodur in Java, and Angkor Wat in Cambodia.  Wikipedia is a little fuzzy on this point, but our guide claimed they were the same people.

Duy Phú is about a 1.5hr bus ride from Hoi An, after you buy a ticket (60,000D), you walk to a tin shed, where you wait for one of these to take you the last few k’s.



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This is our guide, showing us a statue of Shiva, and encouraging us to stand behind it with only our heads showing for a photograph.  We declined, but many didn’t.



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A detail of some of the stonework.  The workmanship was incredible – the fact that it is still standing today is testament to the incredible skills they had.  Many of the patterns on the stonework reminded me very much of Victorian decorative work.

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A temple under restoration.  In the foreground you can see a deep crater full of water.  This is a bomb crater, made during the American war.  Until then, many of the towers still reached to the heavens, but ruthless bombing reduced much of what was left to rubble.  My Son is a magical place, but again with the rain, and the endless floods of whinging tourists, and a tour guide that threatened to leave without you if you didn’t get back tot he bus on time.  This is a place that needs time and contemplation, and I think Mark and I would both love to go back – with our own driver.

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Back to Hoi An in the afternoon, and we found the Optometrists that I had seen from the bus earlier in the day.  We were doubly lucky to arrive when Ninh, an English teacher from the local high school was also there.  She dropped everything and became our official translator for the next 15 minutes, even translating for an eye test!  Mark had forgotten to pack contact lenses, and since he is so very blind, wouldn’t have been able to go snorkeling without them.

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Back to wandering around Hoi An, we found this statue in what looked like a parking lot.  We have decided that he is Karl Marx, because it’s unlikely that the people of Hoi An would erect a monument to Normie Rowe.

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Back at the markets, I found this woman selling a large number of onion variants.  The white ones in the small dish in the middle were smaller than my pinkie, and looked like onion grass.

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Back at the hotel, overlooking the river and having a Biere Larue.  Tastes like VB, but is the local beer, and has a very attractive tiger on the label. 

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Then off to cooking class.  We learned how to make “Vegetarian Pho”, Fresh Rice paper rolls, and Tofu with Chilli and Lemongrass.  The Pho wasn’t Pho.  It was a very nice vegetable soup with rice noodles, but it wasn’t Pho.  I think I’ll have to do a cooking class to learn how to make the dead creature variety, and then adapt the recipe myself.  Along with bacon and salami, Pho is something I miss very much, and the opportunity to taste it in Vietnam has been haunting me.  So far, every Pho I have tried has been like 2 minute rice noodles, with no character.  Apparently Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) has great Pho.  I live in hope.

On our way home from dinner, we walked through the market, and encountered some Hoi An Nightlife 🙂

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Hoi An to Nha Trang 11.01.07

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We had time for a quick breakfast, then hired bikes to ride to the free WIFI cafe to check for an email from the hotel booking people, but there was no joy.  We made it back to the hotel in time to pack up our room, and were paying the bill when our driver arrived to take us to Da Nang train station.  I took some randome photos out the window for the mini bus.

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Ahead is the “Marble Mountains”, made of, yup, you guessed, marble.  Apparently it’s an interesting place to visit, but we didn’t have time to stop.

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Most train stations we have seen have marvelous examples of revolutionary art out the front.  It’s brutal, and course, but rather stirring.  Da Nang has a train instead.

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Our tickets.  We are “foreigners”, in case you hadn’t noticed.

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The train “platform”.  Quite likely, the lack of an actual platform is an excellent reason for not allowing people out of the locked waiting room until the train has arrived on the platform. 

The journey was uneventful – barring an unfortunate culinary incident.  I had seen someone buying boiled eggs, which were served with herbs and an interesting looking salt, and resolved to try them the next time the egg man cometh.  When the egg man came, I ordered some eggs, and he looked very surprised.  I should have known then that I was treading dangerous waters.  He cracked open the eggs with a very large cleaver, peeled them, and presented them on a little tray.  They looked… funny.  I proceeded to poke about with it, and found a tiny avian fetus, boiled alive.  Somehow, I think that is crossing the line between vegetarian and omnivore.  We declined to eat it, culinary adventure or no.

There was no-one to meet us at the other end, so we caught a cab to the hotel, and were in our room within 15 minutes of the train arriving.  Exhausted, we went straight to bed with a small Cointreau, and then slept very well.

Hoi An – Poisoned

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I’ve spent the afternoon sleeping – my guts have sincerely disliked something I put into them, and I am staying close to a toilet and trying to keep my fluids up.  Felling a little better, touch wood, and looking forward to the trip to My Son tomorrow.

Picture is one of Mark’s from his new camera.  He is a clever boy, and has been running out to fetch lemonade for me between adventures.

Hoi An

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Greetings from the 6 1/2 floor.

As anticipated, there was stoush when we checked out.  I refused to pay $16 each for a tour that everyone else paid $7 for.  Refused.  I also refused to pay another $25 for the room, and they quickly settled on another $15 (which meant that we paid $20 per night, which was more than the hotel was worth, but I was saving my energy for “The Battle of The City Tour”.  The front desk staff tried to placate the cross tourist, but it quickly became clear that the cross tourist wasn’t going to budge, and Mrs. Hotel was summoned from sleep.  The situation was explained, the tour leaflet was shown to her, and I pointed to $7 pp.  She said that because we had lunch on the tour, we had to pay $9 extra.  I calmly pointed out that everybody had lunch, and that although she had charged me $16 each, the leaflet that she had shown us prior to booking clearly showed that lunch was included, and the lunch had not been worth $9.  A lot of shaking of heads ensued, and I was a little concerned that she might call the police on us.  Doing a runner wasn’t an option, as the hotel keeps your passport until you pay your bill.  It’s a police requirement all over Vietnam  apparently.

She backed down and glared over her shoulder at me in disgust as she stormed off, and I was left a shivering wreck, unable to enjoy my breakfast.  I was left feeling like a cow, that perhaps the $18 US that we were arguing about was worth so much more to her than to us, and that it was churlish of me to kick up a stink.  But then by the same token, if it becomes the norm for hotels to rip people off like that, Vietnam won’t be such a lovely place to visit.  Some Aussies in the lobby that witnessed the incident came up and thanked me for sticking up for what was right.  That $18 is nearly enough to pay for the next two nights accomodation in Hoi An.

The bus picked us up “at 8 o’clock”, which was actually more like 8.45, and we were off again.  Hue has some lovely places to visit, but with the never ending drizzle, we weren’t inclined to stay and wait out the weather.  We tried to get a trip to Hoi An via Bach Ma National Park, but were told that it was “impossible” to go in the wet.  I suspect that impossible = not pleasant, and we can handle not pleasant, but apparently Bach Ma is a relatively unusual spot for tourists to go, and no-one wanted to take responsibility for us whinging about the rain.

The bus drove through a really long tunnel just north of Da Nang, and the rain seemed to go away.  It still wasn’t beach weather, but it was an improvement.  we stopped so the bus could change tyres (or so the tourists were stranded at a place which served food and drink), and then we were on our way again.  On reaching Hoi An, the bus stopped at two “recommended” hotels, but most of us had accommodation already booked.  We had arranged with a guy from the place we had dinner with the night before to go to his hotel – The Grasslands.  The map looked like it was close to town, it was $10 a night, and they offered to meet us at the bus, so we figured we didn’t have much to lose.

The Grasslands is a nice hotel.  TV, air conditioning, a pool in the foyer, and free internet (not WIFI).  And free bicycle hire, in case you want to go into town, and don’t fancy the 15min walk.  And the $10 rooms were all full – so we got a $15 room.  We decided to find a hotel closer to the action for our second night in Hoi An. 

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We found a hotel that had been recommended by a couple from the Central Coast, and checked it out.  We looked at a few other places, but ended up at the Huy Hoang I Hotel, in a $10 room.  It’s very ordinary, and smells of mould.  I’ll see how my lungs handle it, but we may find ourselves back at the Grasslands before we leave Hoi An.  We stopped for a pancake like thing at a stall in the markets – no idea what it was called, but we asked the chef to make ours without shrimp – delicious!

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They come out of the pan burning hot, and are placed on a piece of rice paper – you add salad and green banana slices, and then dip into a mysterious sauce with chilli added.  I decided it was best not to ask about the sauce, but it didn’t taste fishy, and was delicious.

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A bit hard to see in this picture, but the roof of this building is typical of Hoi An – the tiles are concave and convex, and fit together like yin and yang.  During winter it is common for moss to grow on the roofs.

After lunch we did some more wandering the streets, and were dragged in to a tailors shop.  I ordered a pair of jeans (the jeans I have are on their last legs, and one more hike will surely kill them), and Mark ordered a lairy shirt.  $25 US for both – we can pick the up this afternoon and see wether we got good value.

More wandering, and we found a fabulous local “cocktail”.  Rum, coconut cream and pineapple in a blender.  15,000d (about $1.20 Aus), so we had a couple with some veggie spring rolls for dinner.  Not exactly health food, but we were having a day off the diet.  We walked back to the hotel past the most garish dress shop I have seen in my life.  Andrew, this one’s for you.

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Hue

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We arrived and were met by a woman from the Sports Hotel (a recommendation from the guy at the Sunny), but there was a bit of kerfuffle about actually finding a cab.  When a cab was found, it only had seats for five people, but there were six of us (including the driver and the woman from the hotel).  A squishy ride later, we arrived and were taken up to our room – 602, and the lift stops at the 5th floor.  Up another flight of stairs, my legs screaming every step, and then up over a platform in a corridor and down again.  Very weird, like the 6 1/2th floor in “Being John Malkovich”.  The room is pretty ordinary, a good view out the tiny (barred) window, but hardly worth the $25 we paid (because there wasn’t a cheaper room available).  I spoke to Mrs. Hotel, who said that the room would be “cheaper”.  I expect a bit of stoush when we check out tomorrow – especially since the tour we took today was waaay overpriced, the remote for the TV doesn’t work (and neither does the air-con), and there doesn’t seem to be enough hot water for both of us to have a hot shower.  I’m going first next time.  Oh, and the roof leaks.  Mark just got dripped on.

After stashing our stuff, putting the gadgets on charge, and scrubbing up a bit, we wandered out to find the Buddhist Veg restaurant that was recommended in the “Let’s Go” guidebook.  They recommended a bike ride, but my thighs weren’t up for it, and the weather wasn’t conducive either.  We found a friendly cab driver to take us, but it had been closed for many months.  He took us to another veg place which was just around the corner from the hotel, and we had a pleasant lunch.

Wandering around in the rain had limited charms, and we were both feeling wrecked from the train journey, so we hauled ass back to the hotel for a mid afternoon nap.  It was difficult to get up, but we had to arrange activities for the next day, so at 6pm we wandered down to the lobby to book the “Hue City Tour”.  Wandering around aimlessly in the rain is bad enough for one afternoon, we thought it might be better to do some guided wandering if the weather stayed bad.

Back to bed to watch some “Heroes” on the laptop, and then more sleep.  I thought I had slept OK on the train, but apparently not.  Or maybe we were catching up on jet lag. Still not feeling refreshed and wonderful, we had breakfast in the lobby (bread and egg), and played on the ancient PC’s that supplied internet at a snails pace until the bus arrived to take us on our tour.

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First stop, the Imperial City.  I don’t have words to describe this ancient city, and my pictures in the rain won’t do it justice, but I am very glad we saw this, even in the rain.

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We’re both wet through, and there were points in the day when I thought I couldn’t take another step, but we saw some of the important parts of the city, despite the weather being miserable, and our wet weather gear being inadequate.  I also had a moment of profound joy amongst the hustle and bustle of the tour, between fighting on and off the bus, and evil tourists dropping rubbish (which I compulsively had to pick up).  At the Thien Mu Pagoda, the rear of the pagoda area was boarded up for renovations, but behind the renovations is an important relic from Vietnamese buddhist history.  In 1963, Thich Quang Duc, a buddhist monk drove to Saigon and set himself on fire to protest the treatment of buddhists in Vietnam.  His car was taken to Hue, and can be seen at the Pagoda.  We skirted the renovations to see if we could find the car, but couldn’t.  We did find a temple, with a monk outside asking tourists to remove their shoes and raincoats before entering the sanctuary.  I could see a harried and annoyed look on his face, and judging by the way I had seen a lot of the tourists behaving, I felt rather sorry for him.  I took off my shoes and poncho, and turned to him with a smile and did my best imitation of a respectful prayer bow.  I have no clue about buddhist rituals, but I have a great respect for buddhists, and after having read about this extreme sacrifice, I was in quite a contemplative mood.  I don’t pray, and I certainly don’t pray to religions I don’t believe in, but when the monk smiled and ushered me in to the inner sanctum, and showed me how to kneel at the altar, I felt it was only right to do so.  I knelt, with hands clasped, and my forehead touching the altar, while the monk struck a bell that reverberated through the wooden altar, and also right through my head and chest.  I gave thanks for peaceful times in this beautiful country, and felt very blessed to have been welcomed here.

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We boarded a Dragon Boat on the Perfume River back to Hue, and then bought our bus tickets to Hoi An for tomorrow morning.  Apparently it’s too wet to go to Bach Ma National Park, which is a great pity.  Dinner at a little Veg place with great spring rolls, booked a hotel in Hoi An (and forgot to get change for dinner, so it cost about double what it should).  Back to the hotel to try to dry off for tomorrows adventures.

Hanoi to Hue

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My morning coffee on the train.  I swear the coffee cups are getting smaller.  This was prepared with a dash of sweetened condensed milk, some coffee syrup, and then a dash of hot water.  Tasted like heaven after sleeping on the train.  Mark and I paid the extra $3 US for a “soft sleeper”, which means you get a mattress and a pillow instead of a hard bench, and I am glad we did.  It was hardly luxury, but we did sleep.  We were met at the train station and taken to our hotel, which we have no idea about, other than it was recommended by the guys at the Sunny in Hanoi.

Yesterday we had a quick breakfast at the hotel on Cat Ba, then on to the boat for the trip back to the dock at Ha Long Bay.  Then into a bus for the long journey back to Hanoi.  Two stops, one at a workshop for handicapped children, where I bought a cotton headscarf (the first cotton I have seen so far), and then lunch at a restaurant that seems to be owned by the tour company. 

We were dropped at the Sunny (where the wireless internet had inexplicably stopped working), booked the hotel for Hue, checked our email, and stowed our bags.  We went to the night markets for dinner, and boldly went to try our Vietnamese language skills again.  I had been feeling pretty dismal about it, crushed by my inability to master the tonal language thing.  But I tried again, AND I WAS UNDERSTOOD!  the lady seemed really happy that we were vegetarian, and told all of the other patrons in the stall.  We were asked if we liked chilli, but that was the last decision we were allowed for ourselves – they took care of everything.  THey gave us a burner with a big pot of soupy stuff in it (we think it was actually vegetable stock, it certainly wasn’t fish, chicken or beef), and then they added veggies and noodles and tofu, and served it up to us.  It was delicious, and we were both left feeling very glad to have found a good dinner, but also to have been understood finally. 

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Back to the hotel to catch a cab to the train station, and then off to Hue at 11pm.  The train cost us $35 each, and saved us a night in a hotel.  If you’re thinking of taking the train, ask for lower berths, that would have been a lot more comfortable than being up top – especially with my whole body still aching from hiking the day before. 

Help Please?

I lost my sock pattern, and was wondering if anyone has the Patons Patoyle accessories pattern book, could you please email me the instructions for the Ladies anklet (the one with 14cm of ribbing to start). I own the book, so it’s not copyright infringement (in my mind), and it would really help me out. Thanks !

My travelling email addy is rhubarbandcustard AT mac DOT com