Hanoi 2013 Day 4 – Trang An, Hoa Lu

Morning alarm was set at 715am but we woke up at 745am, the lethargy accompanied the tired muscles from the day before. When we went back to the panorama restaurant, there wasn’t as many as people and lotsa of empty spaces, and food variety was more than the first time we were there. Overheard someone ordering eggs and so we ordered some scrambled eggs and we were given one big plate of it. Outside the weather was still foggy with occasional small droplets of rain. Haiyan the superstorm had passed the Philippines and touched down on central Vietnam and moving towards our direction and thus there were just an unease of bad weather for our trip.

The guide arrived early and after we busied ourselves getting ready, we got up a smaller minibus (but still spacious for group of 4) and off to 2.5hrs drive to Trang An.

Similar to the drive to Halong Bay, it was more or less a sleep fulfilling drive as there wasn’t really much to see on the road, except for some farming with sparsely dispersed animals like ducks and cows. Apparently it was a good day for wedding as evident for the many wedding cars that we saw on the way. Guess the fortune teller wasn’t accurate enough to foresee the coming of Haiyan. Fell asleep and was woken up by the irregular bumpy roads near Trang An and a another 20mins later, we arrived at location.

We were met with a view reminiscing of the one from Halong Bay, thus a nickname of Halong Bay on land. A visit to the toilet to discharge to inventory built up over the drive and we head to the pier where all 5 of us boarded the little boat for the rowing tour. The view was nice but the gloomy weather didn’t do photos justice and did not turn out like the ones from Halong Bay. There were a total of 9 caves but we could only go thru 6 as the water level was kinda high. This was evident when we were going through the first cave and some points it looked as we were about to knock our heads if we didn’t lower them. It was really quite challenging to maneuver around the tight spot but the boat rower was good. Sometimes she used he legs to paddle when her arms got tired. The whole journey took about 2 hrs and at times the rower could interchange between rowing with arms or legs. We too at times picked up the paddle to help to row the boat especially during the time when there was a drizzle coming along, and we had to quickly don on the raincoats. The gust was strong that my aunt’a umbrella had flipped over a couple of times. The bearing typhoon not only brought the gloom, the drizzle and also many tourists who had to cancel their plans as we understood that Halong Bay was closed today due to Haiyan. One of the affected tourists from a boat said so, from one of the loud conversation across boats that we had while rowing back to the pier.

Tipped the boat rower for her hard work and safe journey and proceeded to lunch at the only restaurant that was available. We were given a Vietnamese menu and also an English menu and both prices were different, obviously for the English ones because they had to convert the menu to English and that costed money (of course you knew the reason). The food was informed to be not delicious and so we just ordered something to get by. There was free wifi though. The guide was there to help us with when the bill came and she noticed that we were charged the English menu costs and she got them to changed it, some Sgd9 of savings.

 

After lunch, we were driven to Hoa Lu to visit the forsaken temples that was used to worship the first 2 emperors of Vietnam, both in temples not to far from each other. The temples were pretty run down from years of neglect but still drew many visitors to it. Both temples had the same layout, just that one had more elaborate design of the bed than the other. This tour didn’t take very long and we were soon on the bus, not before getting some fruits from old lady seller for under Sgd1 (quite a couple of then around). The journey back, the skies darkened and more drizzle – not sure what to expect.

Back at the hotel, took a quick rest and we were out for dinner. Searched the tripadvisor and Restaurant 96 was one if the names that came up amongst the recommended and was an easy 5 mins away. The drizzle was stubbornly going on and on and thus we had to arm ourselves with unbrellas and myself a raincoat. We were brought up to the second floor and seated close to the window. It was a nice little establishment but busy with guests most of the time. It took a while to decide on the dishes but after we made the orders, it took really long to arrive and the dishes wasn’t what was expected – we ordered pumpkin soup which came without the pumpkin and cabbage with came with another type of vegetable. The food was ok though. I guessed the kitchen wasn’t fast enough to sustain the number of guests and there were also tourist groups that came into this restaurant for dinner. The price of the dishes were affordable but we were just not satisfied with the speed at which the food was served, comparing with Avalon that we had previously.

After dinner, my aunt wanted to go for a full body massage and we went to a nearby spa. She went for the 1hr massage while the rest of us weren’t interested left her there and went to shop for souvenirs to bring back to Singapore. Amongst the things that we bought were weasel coffee, lotus seeds and green bean cakes. Along the way, we also saw some raincoats going at Sgd1.2 each and I thought it was the really thick and durable type and so we bought 3. The aunty selling to me was adamant not to give it to me for anything less than the Sgd1.2 and so I didn’t bother much since it was so cheap. Then as  I changed out my current half body raincoat to the new one that we just bought it was only that I found out that it was the really thin cheap PVC type. It was too late then but what’s worse was when we made our way to Hang Gai street, we noticed another raincoat store and they were selling then for just Sgd 0.6! We then knew that we had been had, but heck it was just cheap and we just laughed it off. Bought a thicker type of raincoat for Sgd3.6 and it looked really durable.

The Hang Gai street was part of the Old quarters that was known as an attraction in Hanoi. But most likely due to the rainy weather and it was already late Sunday evening, there wasn’t many stores opened, just a couple of toys stores that were on the verge of closing. We gave up and went looking for a coffee house to get some Vietnamese coffee and ended up at Long Van Thuy Ta. The coffee served was nice though mine, the special Thuy Ta coffee, looked nice but didn’t taste as impressive as it looked. Spent some time chatting about our tour the past few days before we went back to get my aunt who didn’t have a clue on how to get back to the hotel alone.

Back to the hotel, we packed in preparation for the flight home, though we weren’t sure if Haiyan would have any impact on the schedule of our flight. Could only prepare and hope the weather would improved the next day.