Sunday - 21 April 2013      -  Ninh Binh

Hi everyone,  Day 2 in Ninh Binh.  What a relaxing day!
Rick was up and about early this morning like 5.30am early, he must have rested too well yesterday.  Its nice to get somewhere and settle for a couple of days.  Ninh Binh is a great place for that.  The people are so different to those in Ha Noi, a bit more friendly but still hardly anyone can speak english.  The hotel owner and staff are great though they speak english really well.  We had breakfast in the hotel restaurant and then went for a morning walk before heading out on our sightseeing tour.  8am and we met up with the driver the hotel had arranged to take us out and about.  No english so played it by ear, lucky the hotel manager had told him where to take us and what to see.  The weather was a little rainy to start of with so we went for our boat ride down the river through the limestone mountains and caves, a lady rowed us and of course the rowers all row with their feet here.  It was 3km along the canal and 3km back and absolutely beautiful.  That over we headed off to a temple that has been built in a limestone cliff and of course heaps of stairs to walk up and hundreds of tourists so trying to get good photos was almost impossible.  By this time the rain had really set in.  We left there and our driver kindly took us to another temple a Kwan Yin temple on the top of a really high up in the clouds bloody limestone mountain.  Rick and I looked and thought there is no way us two old fatties are gonna get up those bloody stairs (500 stairs up and 500 stairs back on the side of a mountain) and live to tell the tale, but we did and the views were worth it.  High five to rick and I.  By the time we finished the rain had really set in and it was really muddy.  Our driver was going to take us to some markets somewhere but it was 1.30pm and the rain was way too heavy so we asked him to take us back to the hotel. 

We spent the arvo having a nanny & poppy snooze and woke up in time to watch an AFL footy game on Australia channel.  Off to dinner at the hotel restaurant and had great Vietnamese dishes.  The owner of the hotel's wife does the cooking and the sons run the reception along with the husband.  They really are friendly, happy people and fall all over you to make sure everything is perfect.  We went for a nice short walk after dinner  and have now settled in for the night.  This is our last night in Ninh Binh and tomorrow night we are on the overnight sleeper train again (12 hours) for our trip down to Hue. (Hway).  So far the trip has been good except maybe all the travelling and waiting around.  Best places so far,  all of them.  Really looking forward getting to Hoi An in a couple of days after we have been to Hue.

Sorry no photos on blog,  have taken hundreds but on the hotel computer can't upload photos or access facebook so will have to wait till we get to Hue and have Wi Fi again.

Hi Clear & kids, Annie and everyone, have got your comments on the blog and good to hear from you all.  Daniel son and Bj hope you are good and will email you soon, hi to Krissy and kids.  Will do blog tomorrow night before we check out and get on the train.  Hope everyone is well and won't be long and we will be home, just over a week, so sad.  Bye for now.