One one things

After breakfast we were introduced to our guide, Su May. She was young, probably around our age, and dressed in the fantastic Red Dzao attire. Sa Pa is one of the easier places to meet Viet Nam’s minority tribal people. They are scattered around the Northern parts of the country whilst a few live in the Central highlands. There are several different tribes, most have their roots in China whilst some have roots in Thailand and Laos. The tribes that we would encounter in the North were largely originating from China. Our plan was to spend the first day trekking South of Sa Pa, through a couple of villages, down to a valley and along the river - a total of about 15km. The second day would be a shorter trek of about 10km to the North of Sa Pa to a Red Dzao village where Su May hails from. The drizzle persisted as we headed out but luckily the skies had cleared a bit and visibility was pretty good.

On the way to our trekking route we stopped at the Sa Pa market where tribal women were busy buying or selling their products. The costumes were fantastic - at this stage everything was a blur, I didn’t know what was what, everything was so colourful and pretty I couldn’t get my head around the different clothing styles of the different tribes. Su May took us to her mother who was selling carpets and some clothes. She was a dignified lady, looking quite regal in her red head-dress and her navy blue gown with the intricately embroidered red and white markings down the centre, studded with silver and other metal accessories. We also met our first Flower H’mong lady, dressed in a black top and knee length dress with stocking like coverings up to her knee - also decorated all over with pink and orange embroidery - again a wonderful array of colours and character. Sadly we didn’t have a lot of time at the market since we had a long day of trekking ahead of us and we had to make a move.

As soon as we got on to the main road young Black H’mong girls smiled and walked with us, with their umbrellas and dark blue dresses with green embroidery. “your name? where you from? how old are you?” All through big smiles. We answered all the questions and proceeded to follow Su May along the main road. Sa Pa was crisp with the light rain in the air and the cool mountain breeze whistling through the pine trees. We were quickly out of town and on our way to the trekking route off the main road. The fantastic views began to emerge between the trees as the valleys below us unfolded in all their splendour. The slopes had been tamed by farmers into staggered rows of paddy, working their way downwards to the river that cut through the valley splitting the mountains in half. We’d spend the rest of the day making our way down the mountains to the valley - a lot to look forward to.

By now most of the H’mong girls had disappeared after asking their questions but one remained and she kept skipping between R and I - smiling at us, asking the odd question and pointing out things in the distance. Having left the main road, the footpath through the mountain wasn’t always easy to tackle, particularly given the wet conditions. Slippery muddy patches and loose rocks had to be avoided and the going was slow. By this time our party had been further expanded by another Black H’mong lady who joined us with a child secured to a pouch on her back. After some time she introduced herself to us and Cha, and the other girl was Mu. As the path became tougher going downhill along slippery rocks, Mu and Cha became our unofficial helpers, deftly navigating the secure rocks and holding our hands to help with balance. It was a pretty warming experience as well as an awe inspiring one, given their adeptness at tackling the mountain terrain in pretty basic slippers. Every now and then Cha and Mu would present us with little gifts - a friendship band, a fantastically woven horse using a few twigs and leaves from the surrounding foliage and similar creations. Whilst at the back of my head I knew that a lot of this was to help convince us to purchase something from them once we reached their village, they really went through a lot of trouble to help us.

Every so often we stopped to admire the fantastic views of the mountains and the valley that have made Sa Pa a favourite destination in Viet Nam. We took our first break at a little shelter where a group of Black H’mong girls were talking amongst themselves. They giggled mischievously and a particularly pretty young one loved the camera and smiled sweetly for a picture while the two elder girls looked out of the corner of their eyes, conversation uninterrupted. The views were stunning. The river had run into some white water and flowed in a hurry through the green mountains that straddled it. We took off again, this time on a gentler slope as we had almost reached the bottom of the valley. Unfortunately the drizzles returned just when we reached the river so it was a bit too cold to have a dip. We crossed the river at two places, first over a very shaky bamboo bridge and then at a shallower point by jumping from rock to rock, helped by Mu and Cha - baby and all. We walked passed some isolated huts, probably the fringes of a village. Conditions were pretty basic, wood based huts with few facilities to be spotted at first glance. A few kids ran out to smile and look at us expectantly, but we had to carry on. Later on a feisty little 8 year old girl followed us trying to sell some tribal products and when we said no money she looked at us and said “no money, no honey” and turned on her heals, leaving us in fits. It was almost 1 O clock now and time for lunch. Su May cooked up some fantastic noodles whilst I enjoyed another lovely Viet Namese drip coffee as the river flowed along next to us.

After lunch we made our way to Ly Lao, a Black H’Mong village. It was hard to say that it was a village as such because once again the huts were not clustered together - and again were pretty basic, with farm animals almost sharing the living quarters of the people. A pretty sturdy building dominated the scene - a school built with Japanese assistance. We went in and saw a few kids engaging in some after-school dance/exercise routine. “They have a few learning problems” said Su May, nodding towards the kids following the teacher’s routine with various degrees of enthusiasm. The kids weren’t in the traditional H’mong clothing - hopefully not a sign of things to come in the future. The cultural uniqueness of the people of Northern Viet Nam is what really struck me and attracted me to the place. We left the school and continued the walk through paddy fields to reach Ta Van village - home to the Zay tribe. On the way we saw a fantastic piece of technology used to create rice flour. A pole is placed across a ledge like a see-saw by a mini-waterfall. At one end of the pole is a bucket which is constantly filled by the water from the mini-waterfall. At the other end of the pole is a hammer like extension - beneath which is a bowl full of paddy. As the bucket fills up with water it tilts to that side, emptying the bucket back into the stream, and the weight of the hammer side swivels it back until the hammer hits the rice - the bucket at the other end fills up again and the process repeats - crushing the grains of paddy constantly until flour is formed.

The Zays were the least colourful of the tribes we saw in the North but they made up for that by being fantastic artisans, producing some amazing stone carvings and pottery. To wind up the long and fascinating trek we stopped at a little tea shop and sipped some green tea to warm the system up. Su May had lost her initial shyness and spoke at length about herself, her family and her aspirations. She was just a month or so younger than me and was married to an ethnic viet namese and already had a kid. She’s one of 5 kids and is the only one who broke away from the family tradition of farming - much to her parents chagrin - despite earning a lot more as a tour guide than she would in the farm. She spoke the best English of any of the Viet Namese we met on our trip and had learned it almost entirely from tourists. I asked her if she’d prefer to work in a city like Ha Noi and she said that she would never have an opportunity bc she doesn’t have a university degree - though i felt her grasp of English would put her pretty high in the pecking order in the tourist industry. But her biggest desire was to travel abroad. “Australia, Europe, Israel and maybe Sri Lanka” she said, with a sweet smile. It was time to head off so we found a couple of Xe Om motorbikes and took a ride back into Sa Pa town, along the winding roads back up the mountains, looking down on the valley that we had spent a fantastic day exploring, as it quietly retreated behind us.

“Good morning! Coffay! Morning! Coffay! Coffay!” I scraped the sleep out of my eyes - a flashback to 3 years ago on a train in Kerala. It was still dark and I heard “Lao Cai” being mentioned down the corridor - and a European voice said 20 minutes. We were supposed to get out at Lao Cai and find our way to Sa Pa, about 28km away. I looked at the Viet Namese lady who shared our cabin and asked “Close to Lao Cai? Sa Pa?” she looked back at me and smiled to suggest that she had no idea what I was talking about. I smiled back - quite used to the reaction. I had a glance at my phone, I had slept surprisingly well, 6 am it said. But more importantly, there was nothing in my inbox. A couple of days ago we met a couple of chaps who recommended a place to stay in Sa Pa called Saparooms. Before getting on the train I had sent a text to the owner asking if we could stay there tonight - but no response. It was a bit chilly but I expected it to be colder in the Northern mountains on the border between China and Viet Nam, but I later found out that Lao Cai was just over 500m above sea level. The train eventually came to a halt and we scrambled out to a light drizzle and walked along the rail track to the station. Immediately a smartly dressed man with an umbrella spotted our wide eyes.

Chap: “my friend you are with tour?
Me: “no my friend, it’s ok”
Chap: “I take you to Sa Pa - 30,000 VND”
Me: “hmmm we’ll see”

We walked along and our new friend came with us all the way. We stopped by a taxi near the station and I asked how much to Sa Pa? Our friend muttered something to the taxi driver who looked a bit puzzled and showed 4 fingers. “400,000 VND”. Our friend with the umbrella smiled and pointed to his mini-van. 30,000 it is. We stuffed the backpacks in and sat with 2 Germans - the man with the umbrella ran off, looking to fill the van before we left. We waited for about 15mins and we saw him return with 4 Westerners behind him. As they got close he ran ahead and popped his head into the van and with one hand kept his index finger to his lips, with the other pointed to his 4 new customers. “100,000 VND..shhh..no tell them you pay 30,000 VND - you pay me now”. I sceptically reached for my wallet and paid up. He took the money and walked to his new clients and in the rear mirror I saw him in conversation with them behind the van and another exchange of cash. We weren’t quite sure what was going on - but our umbrella man ran off again despite the van being pretty much full with 8 people.

This time the wait really kicked in and everyone was getting restless as other vehicles in the station began to leave. I glanced at my watch, it was around 7.30 and I was regretting having made the biggest mistake - paying up front. It became clear why he had pitted us against the 4 Americans with the price differential (he probably told them the same thing) - he wanted us to pay up front so that we won’t just get out of the van and find alternative transport while he waited for the next train to come in. (Either that or he had disappeared with our cash). To my relief he came back, this time about 6 people. I couldn’t help but laugh aloud - 14 ppl in a 12 seater, plus an equal number of backpacks. Remarkably everything fitted in - I was ok bc we got in early, but it looked pretty uncomfortable for the latest recruits. There was a general sigh of relief as the van finally coughed awake and we were off. The drizzle was still quite mild and Lao Cai didn’t look particularly attractive in its own right. We stopped for some petrol and the guy manning the pump looked in and was enthralled by the tattoos on the arm of the American behind me. He touched the tattoos and stuck his thumbs up and produced an iridescent grin. The American grinned back and we set off again.

I kept glancing at my phone hoping for a message from Pete, the manager of Saparooms. Our fallback plan was to find our way to Saparooms from the drop off and try our luck for a vacant room, if not there were plenty of other spots to stay which we would just have to find. The air outside got cooler and the road began to wind as the climb to Sa Pa began. As we got closer the view became spectacular. Vast valleys of paddy surrounded by mist covered mountains dotted with streams came into view between the tall trees lining the mountain road. I was really looking forward to spending 2 days here. To my delight I got a text from Pete - there’s a room available - hooray! An hour later we reached Sa Pa, a sleepy looking hill town which had none of the hustle and bustle of a Lao Cai let alone a Ha Noi. I liked it immediately. The van stopped near a couple of guesthouses where girls ran out trying to sell rooms, with a commission to our man with the umbrella. We wore our backpacks and after a quick glance at the map headed out through the drizzle towards the other side of town - luckily not too far away. After a couple of steep, slippery roads we got to Phan Si street and stepped into Saparooms. The welcome was as warm as the interior - Pete greeted us and offered us breakfast and a nice clean room. Over a warm bowl of Pho Pete showed us trekking maps of Sa Pa and as we planned our activities over the next 2 days our energy returned and we were rearing to go.