March 2010: Maha Kumbha Mela in Haridwar

Khajuraho

Allahabad

Sarnath

Bodh Gaya

Varanasi

We left the boat at 6:45am and went to the train that brought us to Omonia where we left our luggage in a storage box for E3 and walked to Monastiraki Sqaure. On the way we stopped at a breakfast stand for a last taste of pies, natural juices and frappe and continued to walk through Plaka, by the Roman Agora toward the Acropolis. We got tickets for E12/adult (kids free like everywhere in Greece), and we walked up with hordes of tourists that packed the place in a way not encountered in this trip. The hill was swarming and we visited the entire site in the incessant wind that made hard to set the tripod and shoot stable scenes. All nationalities were there but, like in most of the places we visited in this trip you had the feeling that you hear more East Europeans and Russians than westerners. After the Acropolis we visited the Dionysus Theater that I was never able to visit in the previous visits, some cisterns and a foundry in the same area and went to the Greek agora, Hephaestus temple and the Ceramics Museum. We left the agora we went to the bazaar streets around Monastiraki and I took some shots at the Hadrian Library and the folk museum. Latter I left by myself for a 45 minutes in Plaka shoot but after spending days in the beautiful islands I did not find it so attractive. We returned in Monastiraki, bought train tickets for the airport for E6/pers or E10 for two and walked to Omonia to get the luggage. We got in the train and when we had to change at Sintagma I got out and did a quick shoot in the square. I got back in the train, arrived at the airport where we changed and repacked to check in two backpacks and ate in the end at McDonalds because no other place accepted credit cards. We arrived in Frankfurt with a little delay being waited by a guy from Leonardo Hotel who brought us in 20 minutes to the hotel. We slept well; got a superb breakfast, the best in the entire trip, a German breakfast, and left for the airport with the same guy at 7:00 am and arrived at 7:28 at here we are back to JFK at 10:30am.

We packed and got a receipt and left quickly the car being parked in front on some paid parking spots for which we did not have tickets. We left towards Agios Nicolaos following the road to Kritsa. The village is no big deal, touristy with people having their merchandise hanging on the street in front of the store. Laces, leather shoes, carpets and weavings. We left quickly after a short walk to shoot and stopped outside Agia Panagia. The church is renovated outside and does not have that old look but the frescos inside are amazing. Unfortunately no pictures are allowed and they even follow you inside to be sure that you don’t sneak any. They have also a nice icons shop, a great tradition in Crete. On the way back we stopped at an olive oil mill driven by donkeys, a museum that had an amazing shop on top full of natural products. When we wanted to leave and got in the car to leave, a man called us back and introduced to us Dora the donkey that turns the mill. He showed us the process of making manually the olive oil. Outside was a wine press and the rakki alembic. In the end he refused the entry fee of E1. From there we drove on the beautiful Mirabello coast and all the way to Ierapetra, a city of white houses with a beautiful promenade on the shore of the Libyan Sea and a Venetian fortress. I went to visit and take shots in the citadel with great views over the town. At the info center they advised us to drive to Heraklio on the new road on the coast, the same way as we came, this taking 2 hrs comparing with the one through Lasithi that may take 3 hours. So we drove directly all the way to Knossos following back the Mirabello Coast where we parked right near the ruins, the large empty parking lots speaking volumes about the lack of tourists. At the ticket booth we gave the last Euros, less than the needed amount for the entry fee, and luckily he gave us tickets for one adult and one for student. You rarely can pay by credit card in Greece and this makes life hard when you come with no Euros. Knossos Palace is amazing. Now, at my second visit, I enjoyed it a lot, its reconstruction giving a better understanding of life in the palace. The rebuilding done with cement is imitating wooden beams. We spent almost 3 hours inside the ruins and left around the closing time at 6:30pm at the closing time, and went directly to get money from a nearby bank. At 7:00pm we arrived in front of Motorclub in Heraklio, parked the car and went for a walk, shot some video on a commercial street, went to the Venetian fort and stopped at a restaurant on the shore for a quick dinner of baby smelts and Greek salad. At 8:00pm we took the car and we were driven to the port by the guy from the agency to the ferryboat Festos Palace where we boarded and were assigned the cabin, 5-007. The boat was huge with 9 decks, a pool, Jacuzzi, discothèque, many restaurants, lots of shops and even one cinema. We stayed on the deck watching our boat leave followed by ANEK Lines that had the departure at the same time and followed us parallel the entire night. We slept all the way through Piraeus and we walked up when the boat got in harbor, at 5:30am hanging out longer in the cabin because we knew that the boat stays open till about 8:00 am.

The beautiful morning started with walk on the beach. I asked for a receipt and the owner, Dimitrios, a very spiffy gentleman, came and we followed him to another of his places, a bar on the beach, where he gave me the receipt and a business card with a mobile number. We followed the coast towards Malia where we went directly to visit the ruins of the Minoan palace. E4 entry fee. The palace is Interesting and quite large but not really great. It had some nice large pithos and beautiful walls to walk through. We went to the modern village of Malia for breakfast. We parked the car in the area of the clubs, very kitschy and probably a Zoo at night time, and we had a really great breakfast in a bakery, with cheese pies and spinach, frappe and kefir, etc. We left towards Agios Nicolaos where we arrived around 1:00pm. We strolled on the shore and went to the harbor and asked in the info office what else is worth a visit. Agios Nicolaos is not large but it is pleasant to walk. Outside of the town are the village of Kritsa and the church of Agia Panagia that are worth a visit. We continued the walk on the shore to the public beach and went to the harbor and back into the center of the city and to the central lake where we took lots of beautiful pictures. We left at 5:00pm towards Elounda and continued to Plaka on the Spinalonga peninsula and found out that the last boat to the Spinalonga island leaves at 5pm; E8. We chat with a guy from a restaurant who said that there are very few tourists and mainly few Americans and asked me if this might be related with the looming recession. I told him that is related with the $ exchange rate mainly. He regretted their absence because they are considered very good tourists, paying well and consuming a lot. We left towards the lighthouse at the end of the peninsula but the road was a dirt road so we gave up and continued on the paved one. We saw some nice villages where chickens were roaming the alleys. In other village men were hanging out in the main square for an evening chat. We returned to Plaka for a late swim and we drove back to Elounda, 4.5 km to get a hotel and eat. We stopped at Marin who offered an apartment for E50 after a long show and wait and, as the restaurants in Elounda were not on the shore, we returned to Plaka at Taverna Ostria, right on the pebble beach and had a great dinner of mushroom and fish soup with Ouzo and finished with some Cretan rakki, in a restaurant filled with cats. During the night a Brit came drunk, spoke loudly and left his door opened that banged in the wind all night. The island is a vacation spot for Brits.

Lazy morning with a swim in the pool and a longer breakfast followed by a stay on the beach chairs on the black sand. Gave the phone card to the guy at the hotel. Called Thrifty to tell them that I would like to bring the car around 5:30pm and they agreed with no fuss and no extra charge. It is an American company but still it is operating in Greece…. We left at 10:00am to buy tickets for the boat to Heraklio and to my surprise there were cheaper than the prices quoted the day before. There is only one slow boat in the middle of the night but not every night, and 1-2 fast boats leaving late afternoon, 17 45pm, that take 2 hours. Price is E36, as they repeatedly told us, but they sold the ticket for E24. We left at 11:00am to the Red Beach and took a bath in a super crowded and not so clean sea. From there you are able to take a boat, the only access, and go to white sand beach but we did not do it. We left the crowded beach that is really red from the red stone surrounding the area and stop for a beer and some pies at one of the stands near the beach. These stands that abound in Greece are a blessing with fresh cheese and spinach pies and cold beer, frappe and ice cream at relatively low prices. From there we drove around the end of the island and arrived at the lighthouse, beautiful but very windy. We returned at the hotel and spent some time on the black sand beach where the heavy wind that started in the morning was blowing everything away. The wind was present all the time in the islands and it was a blessing toning down the scorching July sun. The previous day was a windless day and it was almost unbearable hot. But starting this morning the wind began to blow wildly and the sea was extremely choppy, a bad day to go with the small boat to the islands. We left the Blue Palace Bay hotel and drove to Athonis Port on the winding road going down the caldera. We dropped the Matiz that had no AC or no inside lights to the guy from Baltimore who said that for E25 it was OK this way. Used car salesman attitude! This is the price on the entire island but the advantage of getting the car from the harbor is that you don’t have to take another bus to return to the boat. The boat was delayed because of the rough sea. Another boat came, going also to Heraklio, but is hard to know all your options when you buy a ticket. .Many times are more than one boat at the same time and prices vary. I had a Greek coffee whose price jacked up 5 times since I was last time in Greece. I got some info about boats coming back from Heraklio to Piraeus in an agency in the harbor but the price that I got the night before in the agency in Fira could not be found on the charts. A cabin for the night ride is around E65. Finally the boat arrived and left with more than one hour delay and after a smooth ride in spite of the choppy sea we arrived after 2 hours in Heraklio together with a large group of Romanians. After some confusion regarding the location of the boat in reference to the city center and a quick discussion with a cabbie who wanted to drive us to Agios Nicolaos, we got on the main street and we bumped in the first car rental place, MotorClub, where we rented a Hunday for E40 per day, double than prices in Agios Nicolaos, bought tickets for the returned boat to Piraeus, and drove on the coast to Kokini, about 20 minutes out on the coast on a highway that did not look for a while to have any exists. In Kokini we stayed at Marilisa apartments E45. We had dinner at a nearby Greek taverna of fish and wine ending with Cretan rakki that no matter that they say is not strong, it definitely is. I took a pleasant walk on the beach, located one block away from the hotel, before going to bed.

After a quick breakfast preceded by a swim in the pool we left to explore the island. First stop was at a traditional settlement, Megalohori, a village with narrow streets with its stones having the ribs painted in white. It was extremely hot, the first day with less wind that forced us crawling close to the walls hoping to get some shelter in the central church unfortunately closed. Old ladies were peaking from behind the blue gates offering a shy kalimera. The village is small and it took probably 1 hour max to cross it back and forth. From there we continued to Pyrgos, an old fortified village, whose streets are circular ending on top on fortifications. Everything is sparkling white with blue window shades and it looks like is repainted every year. We walked the fascinating labyrinth of streets till the top where is located the castle, a fortification from whose top the views over the islands and over the inside churches are spectacular. At the entrance in the castle was an old man with a donkey who was posing for tourists. He was selling also tomatoes, wine and grapa. After Pyrgos we planned to go to Gonia Episkopia and Vothonas but we took the road to Kamari and went directly to the old citadel of the island, Archea Thira. The mistaken road proved to be a savior because it was already 1 30pm and the archaeological site was closing at 2 30pm. It is no entry fee to the site, though but the gate closes. After you enter Kamari, a resort similar with Perissa, you start climbing on a hair spin road like you won’t believe. It takes about 15 minutes to get on top considering that you stop for incoming traffic, and you park the car and start walking up the hill, getting right away to a 6^th century basilica and continuing on stairs guarded by trees bent by wind to the main complex. The site is well dug and interesting but the best are the view over both sides of the volcano. It takes about 1 hour to visit it at a relaxed pace and at 2 30pm we were escorted out and they locked the gate after us. We descended to Kamari and stopped right away, just outside of the village, at the Gonia Episkopi, an old church founded in the 11^th century by Alex Comenus. The thieves attacked the church and stole all the valuables but the frescos and the remaining icons are still beautiful. After that we drove to Vothonas where we tried to locate some sunken houses but nobody knew exactly what we were talking about so we gave up and we drove all the way to Oia on the coastal road. Oia is very different than Fira. Less people, relatively less stores imprint a more traditional atmosphere. Obviously this is relative, Santorini being the top tourism destination in the Cyclades. It is only one street on top of the crater with some occasional derivations going down. The main street is full of shi-shi restaurants and bars and art stores. The blue domes of the churches stick out of the white of the houses. When you reach the end of the street the view is stupendous. It is not the avalanche of houses from Fira but a smaller and I would say much nicer view welcomes you. If you have time is worth exploring all the alleys that descend and ascend and have on them traditional houses. .Windmills, churches and houses covered with flowers abound. The sunset is a major tourist event in the Greek islands and people congregate in unbelievable numbers to see it. They get their seats one hour in advance and you can watch how the all the places that have sunset view are getting literally packed. People watched a beautiful sunset and in the end the entire crowd applauded ecstatically the beauty the miracle of nature. From there we left to have dinner at “Seagull”, a restaurant overlooking some blue domes of a church and hanging in the caldera. After dinner I had a chat with an Polish artist who was living in Santorini and had his art exposed at one of the galleries. He told me many things about the dynamic of the island, about his buyers, still mostly Americans, and obviously about the prices in Euro that jumped even 7 times since the Drahma was replaced. After the evening ice cream, we did not forget to buy water and a cell phone card for the Romanian guy working in the hotel.

When you are sleeping in a hotel located an eastern side beach would be sacrilegious not to wake up one morning to see the sunrise. I woke up at 5:30 and went to the black sand beach in front and watch a magnificent sunrise. It did not look like one but it ended up being a perfect picture sunrise. Latter on a dive in the pool and a quick breakfast kicked off the day. We left before 9 to Accordo travel where we bought tickets for a day trip to the three other islands in the Santorini volcano caldera after that going quickly to do some shopping at the supermarket and pharmacy. A bus came at 9:00 and picked us up from the agency and dropped us at Athinos port where the boat was waiting outside of the harbor. The harbor was full and the boast could not come to the shore so we waited more than one hour in the reassurance of the guide that this would not shorten our trip. So we passed our time trying to make some international calls but it did not work so easily. Finally some ferries left and the boat came to pick us up and we started to sail to the island in the middle of the caldera. The island that we visited first, Nea Kameni, is a national park with an active volcano in the middle, it was formed between 1570-80 in a completely empty caldera. It came out of the sea and the volcano is still going strong today, being spots in its middle when the sulphur presence can be smelled making the ground around green. If you dig a small hole on top it is so hot that you can obviously boil an egg inside. The entire island is looking like a giant dug it from the lava that flowed many times in recent history. The trip on the island last for about 2 hours, on top the guide giving us a entire presentation about the geological and social history of Santorini. From there the boat took us to the older of the two islands in the middle, Palea Kameni, formed in an eruption at 49AD that has in one of its gulfs hot springs at the shore of the sea. The boat cannot get closer to the shore because of the rocks and you have to swim quite of a distance to the shore where the hot springs are. A nice white chapel is located on the shore near the springs. After about 45 minutes we left to the third stop, the larger island of Tirassia, that closes the circle of Santorini. The island is nice and its shore became recently, because of the tourist boats, full of restaurants in spite of the lack of real beach. One of the restaurants has also a remodeled windmill in operation. From the shore, one of the attractions is to mount on a donkey for E5/pers and climb the hill to the top village that is not interesting but commands beautiful views of the shore. You can also walk up in 15-20 minutes arduous walk. The views are stupendous and they justify the stroll or the donkey ride. The boat stays quite long, almost 2 hours, docked on the island giving you enough time to eat and do the uphill hike. From there the boat goes to Oia and dropped the tourists who want to spend the sunset in Oia, part of an extended trip and returned to Athinos port from where the bus picks you up and brings you back to your hotel. We grabbed the car and went back to Fira, parking in the same top parking, for another night stroll and a well deserved dinner in one of the hanging restaurant at Fanari. Great dinner and great views! We were amazed how you can eat hanging over the caldera.

We left at 8:15am and we continued the tour of the northern part of the island passing through picturesque villages with white houses hanging on the mountain slopes. We stopped in one village, named Apiranthos, and we had our typical Greek breakfast with coffee and pies having a pleasant walk on the village winding narrow streets deserted at that hour of the morning. During the walk we entered an interesting sort of antiques/souvenir store situated in a picturesque square. In the café the lady tried to convince me that the water is good that she drinks it for 23 years, a fact that definitely did not convince me to try it. Picturesque old men were having their coffee with a Greek chat in the silent morning. After breakfast we left the village and stopped in the nearby one where we parked and followed the sign to an 11^th century Byzantine church. The stroll to the church was magnificent, through olive and fruit tree orchards, yellowed by the heat of the mid summer. The whole landscape reminded us of St Remy in Provence. The church is looking like it was taken out of a story, the most beautiful church we saw in Greece in this trip, surrounded by olive trees and covered inside by frescos. We took too many shots of everything around, including the charming road to the church. Naxos is a very green island compared with what we saw before, a green that contrasts very nicely with the white house on the slopes or the white chapels hanging in the top of the hills. At 12 50pm we arrived in Naxos Town, after we passed Halki and we stop for a little while in Potamia. The Blue Star ferry was in the port so we rushed to return the car, got tickets and we boarded the ferry to Santorini. On the way to the ferry I was able to grab some pictures in the harbor, including one with the locals offering domatia and I was scolded by one of them who said that is illegal to shoot video with them and they may call the police. I could not figure out why but I don’t think they were very serious about the incident.
The ferries are here like trams but with a very intense and precise schedule. When you see their huge size you cannot imagine that they can keep such a tight schedule on, sometimes, rough seas and they are almost all the time on schedule this being totally unlikely for the trains in LIRR. It was always like this but now you feel that things are way better buttoned up than before, only the prices went up several times, especially after the Euro replacing the Drahma. But comparing with the Western European prices, I can tell that Greece kept a lot of prices at comparable levels, irrelevant of the complains that we kept hearing from the locals we spoke with. Especially the food, slightly more expensive now than before is not as the far cry level of pricing like in Cote d’Azur or Tuscany. And it’s better and tastier…..Of course, you do not take in consideration the exchange rate of the US$ of US$1.6 to E1.

The boat ride to Santorini took 2 hours and we arrived in Athinos Harbor where we were hijacked by a guy renting cars for Thrifty who was Greek from Baltimore.

Eventually he gave us a Matiz for E25/day that is the going price in the island, acting like he did us a favor, but it was not the case. Probably we could have got a much better car for the money. We went to the nearby agency to get a hotel and after looking at the offers the guy decided to show us several so we followed his car to a place that it was obviously not on our liking and we ended up on Perrisa’s black sand, at Palace Bay Hotel where after some negotiations we got an apartment with breakfast for E110/night. The guy who came to arrange the beds turned out to be Romanian, and working relatively illegally in this transitional period till Romania get all the rights in the EU. Latter on he told us several things about how he got there and how things really are working in this business in Greece. We dropped the luggage and we drove all the way to Fira, the capital of the island, about 30 minutes away from Perissa that is located toward the south-east part of the island. .We arrived in Fira at 5:00pm and we were able to park right in the parking place of the upper town. This was surprising everywhere in Greece and was speaking volumes for the low number of tourists. It was July and we expected that everything would be booked, prices would be in the sky but we could find easily accommodation, restaurants at any hour and parking places wherever we went. In spite that we saw lots of tourists, the Greeks were saying that the number of tourists is low, asking us, like they did in Plaka, Crete, where the Americans are, their number being obviously depleted this season. They thought that the recession kept them home but we argued that we thought that mainly the exchange rate was the main cause of their absence.

We walked in Fira, that it may be spectacular with the restaurants and houses literally hanging in the caldera of the volcano, but it is one of the touristiest places I may have seen. Rows and rows of jewelry store, followed by art stores and many other gadget stores were sharing the main streets with restaurants. We stopped in a travel agency, the Black pelican, to check the schedule and pricing for the boats to Crete and we got conflicting information, but the bottom line is that it is not slow ferry except at 2-4am going to Crete so the main option are 2-3 Flyingcats that leave late in the afternoon. The donkeys caring people down the caldera were strolling in town. From there we tried to find a good vantage point to take some nice sunset shots with the blue domes of the churches in front and we were directed to the nearby village, Fira Stefani situated with Imerovigli, another village, a little north of Fira. So we walked to Fira Stefani where we stopped in front of the blue domed church, admiring a beautiful sunset.
Latter, on our way back to Fira, we stopped on the way at a nice restaurant on the road for dinner and walked back in Fira. The view of the houses and restaurants hanging in the caldera is magical in the night when all the lights are on. Latter we took the car and drove towards Perissa where our hotel was located, where the night life was in full swing at the bars lining the shore.

We arrived in Paros and we were brought by a “domatia” guy in the harbor to a nearby hotel, Vila Stratos, kept by an American from Alabama. She moved here a short while ago, bought the hotel and was enjoying the relaxed atmosphere of the island. We dropped the luggage in the large room that they were renting for E50/night and we left for a stroll in town, where the main features are the port and the old winding streets behind the kastro. The town has an interesting church that looks to be quite old, where we saw a baptism ceremony. Right from the square in front of the church it starts the old town, the main commercial street full of shops and some restaurants that winds all the way till the other part of the harbor. We went back and forth, took lots of shots and enjoyed a perfect sunset, maybe one of the best we saw in Greece. We checked the bus station to see how we can go the next day to the marble quarry and it turned out that it was a bus at 8:00am going right there in 10 minutes, so with this info fresh we went for a Greek dinner of fish with tzatziki, etc. with ouzo and wine. Latter I left for a late stroll and shoot in the port promenade where the restaurants aligning the sea shore where full till late hours in the night and returned way after midnight feeling that I was the first to leave the party. In the islands it does not look that the Greeks are going out less than before. In the morning after a quick taste of Greek coffee and tyropita took the 8:00 am bus to the marble quarries. The ride is about 10 minutes but the “marmaria” is not a big deal. However it offers a very pleasant walk in nature by yourself. The place was famous in antiquity, the Paros marble being used in most of the sculptures of the ancient world, Venus of Milo, being sculpted out of this marble. After one hour stroll that brought us all the way to a sort of power plant, we returned and hitch hiked towards Lefkes, a tiny village specked on the slope of a valley. The hitchhike worked only partially because the guy had to drop us not all the way in Lefkes so we stopped a taxi coming our way and for E5 he dropped us in the village. The village has charming winding streets and small squares that are full of restaurants and cafes that invite you for a taste of spanakopita of the cheese pie, or just to sip a frappe in the shade listening to the cycads. We took lots of footage and pictures and stopped in the middle of the village for a frappe and returned to the bus stop at 11:00 to catch a bus or a taxi that would bring us back to Parikia, the way Paros Town is called. It was almost impossible to get a taxi, all being busy and probably having a taxi stand that we did not know about, so we took the bus at 11:20am that dropped me at the stadium from where I walked to Stratos Villa to take the luggage. However, not being clear where the villa is I kind of lost my way and lost some time but eventually I arrived at the hotel where the goodwill American owner helped me to carry all the luggage to the boat and even found a friend with a motorbike to make the process easier. All things considered we missed the boat that was inching out of the harbor when finally I got on the pier and we found the hard way that the Greek ferries do not have any ticket refund for the missed boats. We checked the ferry schedule and luckily in two hours it was another boat leaving for Naxos, a slow ferry, bought tickets for it and relaxed in a harbor café to rest after the events. Paros is the hub of ferry transportation for the Cyclades and here is the best place to switch boats to directions that are not on the main routes. If you check the ferry schedule here are listed the most boats than you would see in any other harbor. The boat came at 2:30pm and we boarded for the 50 minutes ride to Naxos. We arrived in Naxos and feeling weird I parked myself to a travel agency, whose nice host explained me everything is worth seeing in the island, more info than I was able to grab in my current state. We denied any offer of accommodations and we rented a car for E30, not an easy thing to do at 5pm in the evening where most of the cars are gone, and after we checked the ferry schedule for the next day boat to Santorini, we promised to bring the car at 1:30pm the next day. We drove all the way on the western coast of the island, passing nice gulfs, a white monastery and a ruined castle and we arrived after one hour in Apolonas, a tiny village/resort on the northern tip of the island where we got, after seeing another hotel in town, a charming apartment overlooking a bay in sunrise at Flora’s apartments for E60. Driving in the village needs some skills with its very narrow streets. Right near Apolonas is the statue of a kouros, young Greek that represents the god Dyonisos. We visited it and we settled for a 9pm bath in the sea followed by a Greek dinner at one of the restaurants on the beach owned by the locals that all of them are related to each other as Flora told us latter on.

In the morning we walked up and started to pack at 7:00am. We went for the hot breakfast offered by the hotel and included in the room at 8:00am and we were the first in the dinning room. We called a taxi, a thing that we tried the day before with no luck, but now it worked and we left for the town with our luggage. We bought tickets for Delos for the 10am boat and for Paros for the 2:45 pm boat and we went to the ship for Delos with the luggage to see where we can drop them during our visit in the island. This is not such an easy matter, on Mykonos existing only one luggage dropping place that was closed that Sunday morning, and nobody could help us with an advice. The guys from the boats were very nice, such as Greeks usually are, and they offered to keep the luggage on the boat and move it from one boat to another if we decide to return with another boat, a thing that they did because we returned with the 1:30pm boat. The boat ride to Delos takes 30 minutes. Delos is a unique place, a very powerful and important place of antiquity, where lavishing treasures were deposited and temples were built. A kind of Switzerland of antiquity, it was hosting the tax of the Delian federation, the name of the Cyclades coming from the circle these islands are making around Delos. The place was an important sanctuary to the god Apollo and it was a holy island where neither birth nor death could happen, the pregnant women and the dying people being evacuated as a precaution. The ruins have their romance and the entire island is full of them being extensively excavated but still being lots of places in need of more work. We visited the museum and hiked up on Kynthos Mountain, the highest peak of the island. We returned to the boat after nearly 4 hours of walking among the ruins and we continued to Mykonos where we boarded, after a longer wait caused by some delays, a FlyingCat that brought us to Paros in one hour. Hydrofoils are the new way for hopping between the islands. 17 years ago they did not exist and 8 years ago were very fast boat where you could find a spot to see the sun but they were shaking you senseless and sea sickness could happen easily on them but not on regular ferries. The new hydrofoils, the FlyingCats are very spiffy, completely sealed, moving relatively fast and having the advantage of offering a very smooth ride, comparing with the old hydrofoils. The travel time is not half but the price of the ticket is usually double than on a regular ferry. Inside you feel like in a plane and is no way to get outside, so it becomes just a way to move from one point to another and you cannot enjoy sun bathing on the deck or the sea view like on a regular ferry. A one hour ride to Paros costs E20/person, but sometimes prices vary in ways we could not figure out. Besides it turns out to be more companies that you can find out at the booking offices, so if you are looking for a cheaper ride or for a different hour ferry, you have to check more than the regular Blue Star and Hellenic Seaways offices that are a feature in every harbor.

After breakfast we pondered upon what to do in order to take a boat to Delos (3 times a day, 9,10,11 am, E12 RT/person). We left for the town and the boat but we barely dragged our feet so we arrived in the harbor right when the last boat to Delos was leaving, in spite of the fact that the original plan was to get the 9:00 am boat. So we changed plans and went to get a bus to Piati Gyalos, a beach village close to Paradise. The village, a typical vacation village, is full of vacation rentals, but very picturesque on the blue of the Aegean Sea. Shot video, took pictures and took a bath, hiding from the sun that was quite intense. We had lunch at a restaurant on the beach and took more pictures, walks and dives in the sea. At 5:00 pm we took a bus back into town and we started scouting for a good vantage point for a sunset shoot and walking in areas that we did not cover the night before, getting into churches and squares with fountains like the better known Three Sisters square. We walked down from the bus stop to the windmills and to Little Venice, a strip of houses that are right in the water, getting splashed by the surf when sitting at a bar table close to the water. The best vantage point for sunset found out to be the mills that are on top of the town, old ruined mills, one of them still almost intact and transformed in a Folklore Museum. Took a shot of the sunset in a very serene atmosphere, far away of the hustle and bustle of the main commercial streets of Mykonos town, got back in town, bought some stuff from the market and grabbed a cab, this time waiting in line at the taxi stand and got back to the hotel in 5 minutes where we took a shower and I walked back in town for a stroll by myself. I entered an art gallery and I chatted for half an hour with the British artist/owner about everything in the world, and about Mykonos and how it got this way. Continued the stroll, on the main commercial avenues that after a while make you tired of shops and windows and walked back to the hotel around midnight where I watched the Mykonos night sky from its terrace for a while before going to sleep.

The subway was not so full in the morning and brought us in 25 minute to Piraeus and after getting a frappe, the famous coffee specialty, and some snacks for a quick bite we bought tickets, E29.5/adult, kids half, and boarded the boat that will bring us in 5.5 hours to Mykonos. We are on the boat to Mykonos. Two Blue Star ferries are leaving in the morning, one to Mykonos and one to Santorini. Besides them is a full plethora of fast boats, the Flyingcats, operated by Hellenic Seaways, very slick, but you are completely isolated and sealed inside like in a plane, and obviously far away from a Greek island experience. The boat was packed and we hardly found a seat in the 3 deck boat that was full of vacationers who were talking on the phone continuously; in Greece you don’t loose reception on the mobile phone like you do on LIRR….The boat is full of young people that go to party in Mykonos, mainly Europeans or local Greeks, for whom the Greek islands are similar vacation destinations like the Caribbeans are for Americans. Well, they have the cultural value that is missing in the Atlantic. The young boys and girls are dressed in beach attire and they lay down in chairs to absorb as much sun as they can. Cameras flash, a drink here and there, a Greek coffee with lots of sun surrounded by the blue of the Aegean Sea. The ship stopped in Syros and then in Tinos, the most important place of pilgrimage in the Aegean Sea. Many of the youngsters that were looking that geared for the wild parties of Mykonos, disembarked in Tinos pointing that the appearances are always deceiving. Tinos is close to Mykonos and is on the route of the grand ferries, so it can be easily visited. At 1 pm we arrived in Mykonos where the locals congregated in the harbor to offer accommodation, domatia, at relatively reasonable prices, of E100/night/apartment. I am sure that it can be negotiated down from that. Greece is more expensive now than 8 years ago but is still much cheaper than any other country in Western Europe. It turned out that the only way to get to our hotel was to grab a taxi, a highly prized mode of transportation in the island. There are a total of 31 taxi in the whole island so after we waited for about 30 minutes we asked a guy with a pickup truck to bring us to the hotel, who for a three times higher fare drove us on the 7 minutes winding road up the hill to Thomas Hotel, that we had booked on Octopustravel.com. The hotel is isolated, all the way on top of a hill, but superbly positioned. We dropped the luggage and left on foot to the city, on a combination of roads and paths that bring you right in the harbor in about 20 minutes. The first thing to do in the city is to get info about the boats. In the middle of the harbor that is the heart of Mykonos town. We stopped at Paraportiani Church, the famous church of the island, and walked to the emblematic windmills. We stopped for a first bath in the Aegean, on a beach located in the back of the windmills. On the way we got to sample the town with its multitude of shops of all sorts of kind walking all the way till the end of the town, close also to the windmills from where we hopped in a bus to Paradise Beach, the place of the wild beach parties in the island. The parties were on at Cavo Paradiso, with music and dance all day and the dance floor/tables being full with girls dancing on posts. We shot lots of footage at the parties and after another quick dive into the sea we had dinner in a restaurant on the beach. We took reluctantly the bus back into town where we got a long walk in a town flooded in light that you don’t need a flash to take pictures. All stores were open and the ice creams stores were doing remarkable business. The taxi stand is right in the middle of the city, in its main square, but we did not find out this till the next day, so all our desperate efforts to stop a cab being useless. The car access in town is limited, being guarded by a barrier. We kept trying to stop taxis at the barrier with no luck, till the guard at the barrier offered to give us a lift after 10 minutes when his shift was over. Nice guy, and one of the first incidents of nice encounters with the locals. I was wondering if in France anybody might have given you a lift at 11:00pm. He kept his word and we arrived safely in no time in our beds.

July 2008:The plane we got last night from Bucharest, through Vienna was delayed and we landed at 12:00am, hopped in a cab and arrived at the Aristoteles Hotel in Omonia Square at 1:00am. Athens was empty and, when I told the driver that I was here twice before, darted back that the Greece of today is way different from the Greece of the past because people do not afford going out because of the Euro. This is something that I got used to hear in Europe, everywhere I went but this was out of the blue and it was the first of the many conversations I had with people in the Greece and one of their preferred subject of conversation. He was saying that before people were out almost all week and now barely twice a week. Hard to believe, still.Athens built a new highway for the Olympics in 2004 from the new airport to the city, about 40 Km away that makes the ride into the city a breeze, well late in the night… Taxi cost E45 to center city that includes the tip and an airport and night surcharge. During the night the ride takes 25 minutes. During the day is way faster and relatively cheaper to take the train, that runs from the airport directly in the Athens subway system, It costs about E6/person or E10/couple.
But no matter what you take from the airport, you will continuously see a jungle of concrete ugly buildings. It is hard to say that Athens is a nice city. The hotel was OK for $100/night and went to sleep right away and got up at 5:30am to be sure that we can make the ferries of 7:35am. This was actually the plan in advance, because from Omonia to Piraeus is about 30 minutes by train that leaves right from the square.

Nothing much. Woke Up for sunrise but it was cloudy. Walked in to the city for last glimpses of the Caribbean Sea with sun views and hanged a little again tin the hammock at Tina’s in the Vibe Garden. walked all the way to the airport in at the Southern end of the island, a similar affair but lower key than the one in San Pedro and had a great breakfast in Tropical Hotel, bumping into Hans and Georg who were trying to make the 8:30 boat to Belize City. Bought some souvenirs and went back latter to the hotel, packed and left the place and sat on the dock for one hour looking at the sea. The boat came at 9:50am and we left to Belize City where I jumped right away in a taxi. The taxi to the airport is listed as US$25, another rip off, but I was able to negotiated to $20 and I got there in about 20 minutes, bought more souvenirs and some good rum, and at 12:45 I sadly walked on the tarmac to the US Airways plane going to Charlotte, NC. Back to reality and to a very hectic Tuesday. Dreams don’t last.

The day started with heavy winds that I could hear blowing all night and I realized that it would be far fetched a longer boat trip. It was even a little chilly in the morning when I woke up for sunrise, but eventually the heat of the day took over. I had my waffle breakfast with some papaya juice, at Miramar Hotel, and I kept checking with the agency I talked last night for the snorkeling tour, but they kept postponing the decision to do the tour because of the winds. The tour was supposed to start either at 8:00am to Turneffe or 10:30 am to Hol Chan. At 9:30 am it was obvious that nobody would go out for the Turneffe Atol, and I made up my mind to go for Hol Chan Marine Reserve, a day tour that costs B$85. Unfortunately, because of the bad weather only one agency, Carlos Tours went out and they were fully booked so I decided that I will have just a half day tour, in the Barrier Reef, off the coast of Caye Caulker at 2:00pm. This is a three hour tour and returns at 5:00pm for Bz45. This being said I walked all over Caye Caulker, on the main street and the side streets all the way to the South of the island where is the local airport served by the same companies like in San Pedro. I ate some fruit, check the boat for tomorrow, etc. By midday I went to the north tip of the island, actually to the Split for a bath in the warm Caribbeans waters. Caye Caulker is much longer but in 2001 a hurricane split the island in two. The northern part of the island is inhabited by very few people and is basically no tourism At the split is a great bar held by some Jamaicans called the Lazy Lizard. It was such a pleasure just to stay inside the sea water. With so much time on my hands, latter I went for a lunch of tacos and a beer. At 1:30pm I went for the tour that was already fully booked with three girls from Denmark, a Norwegian guy, an English couple and a guy from New York. The coral is not so great in Caye Caulker Barrier Reef because overfishing and mass tourism in the area, and you can see lots of dead or washed out coral. Probably, people who are keen on snorkeling or diving may not find the tour interesting enough but for me was definitely satisfying. The tour does three stops and last 3 hours. The first stop you swim in a guided tour for about 1 hour, and the guide points out to you various fish, or brings some shells out from the water. It is strenuous for people that are not swimming on a regular basis, and because of this they insisted everybody to use a floater. You swim on top of the coral, in the South Channel, an alley that goes inside the coral reef. It is extremely interesting and you see tons of fish. But the trip itself is strenuous because you have to follow the guide for about one hour and you came from there pretty exhausted. The second stop is at the shark and sting rays alley. The sharks, nurse sharks decided not to show up, but they are present in Hol Chan Marine reserve. But the sting rays came in very large numbers paving the bottom of the sea with their large silhouettes. The fishermen used to come and clean the fish in this alley throwing the rests in the sea, a great lunch for the sting rays, so now they are used to come when they hear the hum of the engine’s boat. So they came, in tens, if not close to one hundred and they were swimming, huge and gentle among our feet, mainly under us. At the beginning was kind of scary for everybody, because the animals are really big, but in time you figure out that they will not touch you with their tail so you start taking it lightly. The guide was able to catch one and to bring it out for everybody to be able to touch their velvety skin. But be aware of their poisonous sting….The third stop was at, what they call, The Coral Garden, and here you basically swim by yourself among corals for about 30 minutes. It is beautiful, except that the under current was very powerful today and demanded hard work in swimming. On the boat the guide was waiting us with fruits and water and at 5:00pm we were at the dock. I jumped in a shower and went to see the sunset that was really nice today. I shot a time lapse of it and I stayed late on the dock watching some kids fishing, losing their baits but persistently and diligently continuing. From there I went directly to the Internet, for the daily ritual of email and postings and I went for dinner to Fran’s grill, right on the beach, for a barracuda steak. At dinner I met some great travelers. Hans and Georg from Munich were traveling for a 4 weeks. Hans, now retired, lived his teenage years in Argentina speaking now Spanish fluently, and latter traveled around the world like a genuine backpacker. I gave him lots of tips because he was going to Guatemala. Also, I met another couple, Emily and Simon, who just graduated from University in England and had an extremely ambitious plan to travel for a number of months if the money will last. They would cover Central America and fly to Ecuador from where they will cover parts of South America ending in Buenos Aires. Good trip! After dinner I did not want to go so quickly to the hotel ,in my last night in Belize and Caribbean and I went walking, eventually ending at the Lazy Lizard, the Jamaican hang out at the Split, where I bumped again into Emily and Simon who were with two traveler partners from Israel. I sit with all four for more chats and the Israelis just came back from the Blue Hole, and they were OK with it but obviously not so content. The trip costs $200/person and for somebody who has the Red Sea in their back door,I think that any other snorkeling experience is not so great. At their recommendation we got a drink of rum, watermelon and lime that the barman never heard about. it was sour but OK, just another experience. Latter, around 11:30pm, I went reluctantly to the hotel.

The Chinese owner from the hotel said that he will open the door at 6:00am so I decided to wake up around 5:45 and get the first available bus. The plan was to go with a company called Sartegna, that drops you at the swing bridge in Belize City. where you get on the boat to Caye Caulker, and you don’t have to walk from the main terminal to the boat. But I saw the Sartegna bus leaving just in front of me and did not want to stop to pick me up. I asked around and it turned out that another company named Cello had a bus leaving at 6:30am directly to the Swing Bridge. I took the bus for B$5 and it brought me in 1.5 hours to the Swing Bridge in Belize City. The boat to Caye Caulker was leaving at 9:00am, I missed the one at 8:00am, so I had time to go for less than an hour in the downtown of Belize City. People , local and tourists mentioned to me that is pointless to visit the city, because it is not too much to see and is dangerous. But this place is really depressing. It is not the question that is nothing to see but, is dire and very weird, the entire city looking like bad parts of NY in the night during the 70s, people hanging out and hustling the newcomers. I walked Albert Street , close to the cathedral and I wanted to shoot some video but it was not too much to shoot even you strive. Also, it was extremely unpleasant to walk with a big camera around your neck. or tripod, and have all the eyes pointing at you. At one point I got hustled by some guys and I decided to split and I came earlier at the boat and left at 9:00 am to Caye Caulker. The boat ride, 45 minutes, is beautiful but not necessarily comfortable, the boat being packed to maximum capacity. In Caye Caulker, I went to Tina’s Backpacker, highly recommended by many travelers, but it did not have private rooms, so I was pointed to go further and after I tried several places I ended up in Miramar Hotel. There I finally found a room with private bathroom, what I was looking for, for $25 a night, but the owner showed me another room without bathroom, B$25, that it was so charming and I decided to take this one. Next I went to the first agency to do some investigations for a snorkeling tour, and the options were so numerous that I had to ponder upon them. They have a tour to Tunerriffe Atol, for Bz140, Hol Chan Marine Bz85 and half days trip for Bz45, and several others but all depend again of how many people they have. It was already passed the 10:30am when the last tour goes , so I decided to go to Caye Ambergris and I caught the 11:20am boat for Bz15 one way and I left to San Pedro. San Pedro and Caye Ambergris, is Madona’s Isla Bonita, a song that you obviously hear walking in the island. It is way more built up that Caye Caulker and is large, but in three hours you can walk and see pretty much of it. I met a couple that lives in Seaview, Fire Island, NY one of my top spots on the planet. There are several nice resorts, like Ramos’s or Victoria. If you want to see Victoria you are better off to get a taxi because is pretty far south. The main road is not so nice as the beach front but it has lots of restaurants and many shops. I walked around for about three hours, shooting the nice palm trees from the beach. It looks like that was no massive hurricane here, because the palm trees look very good and extremely picturesque, way better that I saw in other islands. Walking in the city, I arrived in front of a store with a weird name , Tech Transylvania, It turned out that the owners were Romanians, highly educated, and moved there 4 years ago, from the western part of Romania, leaving a country that is not yet capable to offer enough positions for their University graduates students. Romania is still a first world country that is run by a third world country political class and business elite, whose main preoccupation is to get filthy rich and drive the most expensive cars like in African countries fresh after a new coup . Well, being in San Pedro is not bad at all, but still is a far cry from a European country. I had a long and very pleasant chat with them and I continued my tour of the island. I arrived at the airport, that serves the area on small Cessna planes, that for $70 can bring you directly to the International airport in Belize City. There are two companies operating: Tropic Air and Maya Islands. It is very cool to see this airport, and the very casual atmosphere. No metal detectors, no caring belts, nada. Just hop and go. From there I walked on the beach all the way to Victoria, a long and relatively arduous walk but very pleasant, admiring the palapas that are at the end of the docks and the beautiful views. Victoria is a nice complex, very shishi, with manicured lawns and nice cabanas and bars. Because I walked so far, I missed two boats and I caught a last boat to Caye Caulker that was leaving at 4:30pm. I chat meanwhile with a Canadian that lived there for 12 years, involved in a lot of local businesses, cellphone and used books, apparently all very successful. The atmosphere was great, like summer afternoons in Fire Island. The boat ride is half hour and I arrived in Caye Caulker at 5:00pm , took a shower and jumped to see the sunset. latter I went to have a great dinner of Brazilian Pork at Habaneros and went to search for internet and international phone. I could not get a phone, but probably they exist somewhere, but I was surprise at the cost of the internet, at par with all the other high prices. In Guatemala the internet access is between $0.50-1.25/hour and here, in Caye Caulker was $7-9/hour, and they were charging by the minute if you go for more. I posted partially my story and did my email and went for a walk to both parts of the town. The town is small and if you strive you can walk the entire island in 30 minutes, and the center in less than 15 minutes. At 8:00 pm I went to the agency for the next day trip, and they told me that they may have both Turneffe and the special tour to the reserve, and I should come next morning at 8:00am. I browsed the stalls that are like a night market, and sell beads and jeweleries, paintings and crafts and I went to the Seaside Cabanas, that they rent for $120/night, not bad at all for the peak month of February, where I had some pinacoladas, chatting with some guy from Wisconsin who was leaving the next day back home.

This hotel I stay in Akihito is owned by two Chinese, like several businesses in Orange Walk. The owner proudly showed me last night his farm of 40 acres that he just bought that has in its middle a cenote . There are very few people here in Belize, about 300000 people, just a third of the population that existed in the Maya time. What is funny about this hotel is the fact that it looks that was built by a architect for jails. It is very clean, everything is great but it looks like you are in a cell of a jail, no mater what room you get. Also, like many hotels in Orange Walk has a room near the lobby with slot machines. As a mater of fact there are lots of this type of casinos, here in the city. Hotel and casino, like in Vegas! Last night my room was to the front and was noisy and this morning I changed it. I went for breakfast again to Juanita, because I could not find other restaurants. There are some restaurants but the city is kind of a dive and is hard to find things in it. The breakfast was very good with grapefruit juice and a great omelet. I went after that to Jungle River Tours, the agency that runs the tours to Lamanai and I paid for the tour that I reserved last night. The tour costs US$40, inluding lunch, plus another US$5 the entrance to the site. All the tours in Belize are expensive, the country moving his main source of income from sugar to tourism that is very well fleeced. Finally, at 9:00am a lady came to pick me up, I did not know if it was her supposed to pick me up or somebody else, and brought me to Lamanai Retreat, the place from where the boats leave. The boat was not there and I waited for 10 minutes. It came with three other people inside, two ladies from Canada and one guy, Tony, from Barcelona, with whom I had a long and great conversation all day. Tony has a photo/video production and services company in Barcelona and now, the season being slow, he was traveling for 3 months in Central America. Gilberto, the pilot of the boat took us to see some nature till the other tourists came, and we returned to pick up a large group of 15 people that came from Corazal, for a day trip. It proved that the guys were mostly Russians and not very sociable. We left on the river trip that brings you eventually, after 90 minutes to Lamanai ruins. The river trip was really great, because Gilberto continually stopped and showed us baby crocodiles, mid size crocodiles and even extremely large ones. Also, egrets, the Jesus bird and iguanas hanging in the tree. It was extremely interesting also to see , from afar, the Mennonite community, a group of Germans, similar in clothing, habits and religion with the Amish from the USA, settled here in the 50s , that are still the largest producers of vegetables in the country. Gilberto said that there are of three branches: the very traditional ones that do not use anything modern, no electricity or machinery, etc., the Baptist Mennonites that use electricity only for work but no in homes and some tractors and boats and the progressive ones that came from Ottawa, Canada. They do not serve in military, do not want to vote and till the independence in 1981 they did not pay taxes. They are extremely hard working and they were brought here by the British government and given the best land, and they are respected by people in Belize. They represent 3% of the population and produce more than 60% of the vegetable production in the country. On the street they wear some particular hats and the old ones have beards and they look like coming from old Holland’s paintings.The river where we took the tour is called the New River, but he Maya called it “the river of the foreigners”, a prediction that proved to be true. There are many boats doing the tour that is one of the major attractions in Belize. We also saw people fishing, and a boat came very close to show us the catch, Gilberto being careful because you don’t know if the guys do not hide a gun to rob the travelers, a trick that I heard happening in some other countries. We rode the river that meanders and divides extremely spectacular, for 90 minutes and we arrived in Lamanai site, going directly for lunch. Here I had a pleasant surprise because in all the other tours in Belize, the lunch was a sandwich and if you were lucky a bottle of water, but here they prepared chicken with potatoes, salad and salsa, spicy chips and they had lots of soft drinks kept in the cooler. Lamanai, like all the other sites was very large 4.5 square km but very little was excavated and only three locations were uncovered. It is obviously that here they wait for a sponsorship to go further. The ruins are nice and well done, showing the tradition of the Maya, to demolish or cover the house of the old price/king when he dies and build new one on top, the result being that all the houses are well off the ground accessible by a flight of steps. You could see at the Temple of the Mask, the first location, three levels of steps showing perfectly, and he said that there were probably more underground. Also, it was an impressive head of an Olmec, in situ, but it was not covered in fiber glass like in Caracol. Impressive and huge, it occupies an entire wall. The next temple was also the largest, being the third pre classical building as a height in Belize, 125 ft. The building is impressive and it has three levels accessible by very steep steps. The fun part when we were there was that the howling monkeys started to howl, protesting that another group of monkeys, named patrol, came in their territory. It is funny to see how small they are and what a horrific sound they make, that you think that is a great jaguar around. This was great because in Tikal, they howl only in the morning at sunrise, defining their territory for the day and later on is hard to wake them up. We left at 2:00pm and Gilberto drove very fast and dropped the guys from Corazal for a direct bus and continued with the rest of us and showed us more crocodiles and iguanas. Right before I arrived, a swift move made my sunglasses to break and to fly into the river, an offer to the Maya river of the foreigners. We arrived at 4:00pm and I had a final chat with Tony, about his company and FlyingMonk and drank some great papaya juice till around 5:00pm. He had to catch a bus to Chetumal , Mexico and I wanted to shoot a litle more in Orange Walk, if it is something to be shot, and I went to the church and on some streets, getting lost somewhere on the back streets. I found eventually my way to the hotel and tried to post this blog in the hotel computer that yesterday did not want to collaborate. The trip was OK but the ruins of Lamanai after you saw Copan, Tikal and Caracol are disappointing. However the ride on the river was worth it, being different than Rio Dulce. I went to look for dinner in Caye Caulker Bar and Grill but I found out that it got closed a while ago, so I ended up at Lee’s Chinese restaurant, where I had a lobster ceviche and a beer. There are lots of Chinese restaurants in Orange Walk and when I asked the lady from my hotel, she said that this is a country where is easy to come. The population is very low, lots of land and opportunities. Belize is a very young country, just 26 year old and you can tell it. It has a melange of population, of blacks, Hispanics and many Asians. The language is English but the largest majority. more than 53%, is of Spanish-language descent, that entices you to address people in Spanish and not in English. They speak a very relative English and they speak Creole with less Spanish along the coast. There are blacks looking like in North America, and as a result there are several stores on the main road selling lots of white sneakers. It is a country that tries to base its economy on tourism, so they developed lots of eco-lodges and eco-resorts, but it is not so developed, the roads are terrible and it looks that many thins do not work right. Besides, you have a large black population that, as our guide mentioned today, is waiting for the government subsidies. As a result, the hard working Chinese are prospering, creating successful business and monopolizing, like here in Orange Walk , the restaurant business. The stores are held by several Indians. In spite of all these, the prices are very high, in restaurants and stores, everything being way more expensive than in Guatemala or Mexico, at lower quality levels. The trips are outrageously expensive for a country so poorly developed, being at par with similar trips in the USA or even more. The food is expensive, the prices for Chinese food in the Lee’s being higher or at least equal with prices in NY. And more than anything the country, as I encountered till now, is devoid of the vibrant spirit, Guatemala had. In Guatemala, the Maya culture is everywhere, ancient or contemporary. The women that are weaving, the markets, the village life is authentic and rooted in a tradition that did not fade in time and under various occupations. The Maya-Catholicism, so ingrained in the locals is another one of these traits. Everything in Guatemala is flamboyant and you don’t need tours because, the tours are part of the day to day life when you go to a large market. You have the feeling of a culture that is loomed inside a cocoon and no force can rip it apart. In Belize, is the opposite: The trips are the core of the day. Belize is famous for diving and people come here for this. The prices are outrageous but are OK as long as the services provided are fine. Yes, all the trips are exquisite and extremely informative, well done and professionally crafted, but the experience ends when you are dropped at your hotel. It is missing the immersion in the country’s culture and it looks more like a theme park. No interaction and even if you have it, you have the feeling that this population is here not because it belongs but because it happened to be here. So, if it were to compare, the proportion would be exactly the one from the time I spent in my trip 80-20% between Guatemala and Belize..

The today trip was more than a regular trip, but it was an experience that hardly you can match. After the breakfast at Hanna restaurant and the successful change of money in Belizean $, I finished my blogs and I left from St Ignatio, with all my luggage, with a minibus in the trip. The minibus stopped to a resort to pick up two other persons, and we left for 30 minutes of paved road, followed by another 30-45 minutes of dirt road on a derivation road from Teakettle Village. We arrived at the parking place for this trip and, we got prepared to leave in the hike that would bring us to the cave. I changed the group trying to return earlier because my plan was to catch a bus from the paved road to Belize City and from there another bus to Orange Walk, a city in the North. From the parking place you leave in a hike of about 45 minutes in the tropical forest, seeing all sorts of plants, some friendly and some not, crossing through the river three times and getting wet The dress code is bathing suit with a T shirt and sneakers or tight sandals. After 45 minutes we arrived at the entrance of the cave, and Orlando the guide prepared the helmets and the head lights to get inside. The entrance is done through a 12 feet deep pool that you have to swim across, a very shot swim of less than a minute. Inside the cave stalactites and stalagmites welcome you. This cave was, together with 10 other in the region, the place where the Mayas made human sacrifices and blood letting between 800-900AD, in a very dire period for their empire. The empire was obviously decaying and they tried this last resort to make the Gods have mercy and find a solution for the problems they encountered and that eventually brought their demise. At the entrance is a formation that resembles a Maya king. But what is the most interesting is the fact that you have to walk in this cave on the stream of a subterranean river, and you are most of the time in water to your knees, sometimes to your chest, but most of the time to your waist. We walked and scrambled the stones, and climbed subterranean waterfalls, for about one hour, meanwhile admiring the fantastic formation of limestone that the water shaped. Bats were occasionally wakened up by our foray and we kept walking in line inside the cave. If the water was too deep we could swim in the underground pools. This cave and many others represented for the Maya, the underworlds, or Xibalba. The roots of La Ceiba, their national tree, having the roots in this underworld and the branches holding the sky. After about 45 minutes of walking we took the shoes off and we put just some socks, and got up in the higher level caves where the rituals were practiced. Lots of old jars were scattered all around being marked by the archaeologist not to be touched. Fire pits could be seen where Maya were doing purifications. That could be done in two ways: either with the dripping water from the stalactite that was collected in these jars, a practice that I saw it also in Vietnam, or with smoke that was obtained by burning their own donated blood in ceremonies of blood letting. The blood was latter put on fire using also copal as incense for making smoke that was rising to the Gods for results. This ceremony was conducted by a shaman, a preserver of the Maya civilization. From the beginning of the upper floors you could see jars all over but the more you advanced you realized that there were jars all over. Most of them were broken because after the ceremony that was lasting 6-7 days all the vases were broken. Latter on , we advanced to the cathedral, that represents the 5^th level, pout of the 9 level of the Xibalba, But the counting was done: 4 levels going in, the 5^th and the same 4 levels going out, makes 9. The heaven had 13 levels in Maya tradition. The cathedral was majestic; a huge room full of broken or intact jars all over with remarkable sparky stalactites and columns. At the back of the cathedral was an altar where it was in the middle the symbol of corn that was used in the ceremonies and where the blood letting was done. Latter started to show up the skeletons. First a male, followed by other and finishing in the crypt shaped room of the cave, where it was the woman-shaman that is presumed that performed the rituals. Also, there could be found two skeletons of children, 8 and 12 months old. The archaeologists assume that the regular blood letting did not succeed and they started the sacrifices, to be sacrificed being the highest honor. The name of the cave is given from this space where the woman–shaman body was found. After we saw everything we started to return, getting off from the upper dry area, and after getting the shoes on, starting again the hike in the river back to the entrance where we swim again the pool. The cave has 3.5 miles but old artifacts were found only in the area we visited. In total we hikes in the water and inside about 0.5 miles and the entire tour was about 3 hours inside. The cave was discovered in the 80s and it was heavily searched by archaeologists, existing also a film made by Nat Geo about it. This is the reason that is visit able by people, but I think in no other place in the world you can walk and almost touch so old artifacts that are in situ in a cave. At the base camp, that was the old archaeological camp, we got somehow dry and we ate our lunches included in the trip. After that we started to hike back the 45 minutes walk we did before fording the water three times. At the parking I was moved to another minibus that dropped me at 3:30 at the crossing with the paved road to wait for the bus to Belize City. The bus came in 15 minutes and I got in and arrived in Belize City at 5:50pm for B$4. The Orange Walk bus was right near and I jumped into it and left right away, and it brought me in 1.5 hours for B$5 to Orange Walk. Here I got a room in Hotel Ackiniko, owned by some Chinese, that apparently have lots of businesses in this town and I tried to send an email from their email but it did not work. So I went quickly and I ate at Juanita , a local dive with good food, and tried email and blog again from another place.

I got my breakfast of banana shake and pancakes at Martha’s and I came to the agency at 7:15am, waiting for the bus at 7:30am. I played at the internet a little and I was on my way with a minibus to Caracol, the largest Maya site in Belize, famous for its observatory. There were 3 more people in the minibus, two Canadians from Alberta, Bruce and Jilliane, and a guy, Ed, from Raleigh, NC. The road to Caracol is extremely bad and very long. Because of this there were attacks on the road, form Guatemalan gangs coming over the border, at its nearest point, the road being at 8 miles to the border. And because Guatemala considers Belize part of it and they hate each others is no extradition treaty for criminals. Sergio, the driver and guide, told us many stories about the past attacks that happened about 2 years ago, escaping one of them by just by a hair. As a result the Belize officials took note and now from a security point where we had to stop, we traveled in convoy all the cars together, about 4 of them, followed by a car with two soldiers with guns. The road is beautiful, through pine trees, that unfortunately was attacked by a beetle infestation in 1998 and destroyed 60% of the trees that were standing only with their trunks in the air like after a big fire. After that we traveled more through tropical forest, stopping first in a village San Antonio, close to San Ignation and latter to the security point. Considering the time for picking up the other passengers and with all the stops the entire road took about 3 hours and we entered Caracol’s gate at 10:30am. Louis took us in a tour, explaining about plants and trees, the curative features of some of the plants we saw and about Maya, Caracol and demise of the civilization. Great stories! Caracol was a great center of power that was able to defeat and conquer Tikal and Naranjo around 600AD. It is the largest city in those times, and its population at its peak was probably 150000 people, double than the present population of Belize City. But was astounded us the most where the monumental buildings that do not have a par. There are one of the most impressive monuments I saw, especially Caana translated as the Sky Palace, the main palace, observatory, and administrative building. Caracol, that means snail in Spanish, is uncovered, like all the other sites in Mexico, and its plazas are spectacular. In spite of being the largest site , few mounds were cleaned and it has only 4 plazas to be visited. The most spectacular is the one that contains Caana, one of the most complex buildings, if not the most complex buildings I saw in Maya world. The Sky palace is located in a symmetrical square with buildings on both sides and a mound , partially excavated in front. The next square, that was also the most important is the one containing on one side the Palace of the Wooden lintels facing the famous observatory, the place were the priests were making decisions about the crops and such based on the lunar calendar. We climbed all on them, because here you can and saw many other places, in total about 4 complexes in about 2 hours. At 1:15 pm we were back at the entrance, had the lunch that the guides are bringing and took a stroll inside the museum. At 2:00 pm all the cars had to leave, escorted by the same police car with guns. So you cannot stay latter than 2:00pm. On the way back we stopped in two other locations. The first stop was at a magnificent cave that was formed on Rio Frio. The river passes inside this cave full of stalactites and smelling of bat dung. We stayed there 20 minutes and in ten more minutes we stopped again at the pools formed by Rio On, a flat area in the river where you can bath or just admire the river. We stayed there 45 minutes and we got into the water. At 5:15pm we arrived back to San Ignacio where I came directly here at the Internet provided by Pacz Tours, free with trip purchase and I wrote for 3 hours the past blogs. I bought my ticket for tomorrow trip to the ATM cave, an interesting experience and rated as the best thing that you can do in Belize. I tried to eat something after these long blogs but many of the restaurants were closed so I went again to Serendib, where I got a great spicy dish of shrimps. In the restaurant I bumped into Ed, who is a criminal lawyer in NC, with whom I chat about trips and let him go because he was catching a bus at 6:30 to Belize and latter a boat to Caye Caulker, but we planned to meet in the Caye.

The next morning I was waken up by some Norwegian girls in a nearby room that started to chat loudly, probably after some drinks around 2:00am. The bus came promptly at 3:30am and we were on our way to one of the greatest archaeological site, Tikal. The distance from Flores and Tikal is 62km and it takes the bus around 1 hour to get to the ruins in pitch dark. The sky was full of stars a great view from the top of the Tikal pyramids. There were several buses who came there and a lot of people. The guides carried flash lights on their foreheads and we started after some organization with a number of guides to the top of Templo 4 where we were supposed to wait and, mainly, listen the sounds of the jungle waking up. The walk in the forest was not so easy without flashlight, stumbling occasionally, and hearing howling monkeys that were defining their territory. We started to ascend of the pyramid and at 5:45 am we were all, close to 30-40 people on top of Templo 4 where we listened in silence till about 6:20 am the sounds of the jungle. This was an impressive moment. You could hear the howling monkeys, the birds and some other animals, all in the darkness that started to dispel. Unfortunately, inside the jungle you cannot see a sunrise. You may be barely able to see the next temple in front because of the morning mist. The guide, Louis, gave us some instructions and we started to explore the site at 7:00am. He showed us the howling monkeys, that he make them howl imitating them perfectly, a sound that first you think that is from a jaguar. Animal abound: howling monkeys, spider monkeys, all on top of the canopy of the trees, wild turkeys, toucans, parrots, ocomundi, and lots of other animals. Meanwhile Louis was bringing us to various monuments talking about Tikal that means in the local language “the place of sounds”, its history, its disappearance, etc. What is different in Tikal is that fact that only the temples were cleaned and its surroundings and squares. The rest was left as tropical forest and you walk its paths and admire the vegetation. This gives the site a mysterious air, very different from the naked places like Chichen Itza or Uxmal. But everything comes with a price. The major disadvantage of this is the fact that is not so easy to shoot and take pictures in Tikal. The tour lasted 3 hours till 10 am. Because Tikal is so big and it was so early you don’t have the feeling that it was swamped by tourists. We visited all the important monuments and finished in the Grand Plaza in front of the Temple of Jaguar and the temple of the Mask, the only area that was completely uncovered, plaza included. The place is majestic and what is missed in mystery gains in stupendous views of temple architecture. I climbed on temple of the mask and I shot lots of video and photos here where it was easier that inside the jungle. Tikal was a huge city and I was surprised the next day to find out that Caracol was even bigger. Probably in the peak time the population was way larger than is today on a surface of 237 square kilometers. All these cities and their temples together with their civilization went in demise around 900AD for reasons that are still speculated. Louis gave us each a ticket to stay and go when we please and told us that the first bus to Flores is at 11:00 am, followed by 12:30, 2, 3, 4 and 5pm. I started to walk around and take pictures, climbing inside the side palaces and decided to take the 2:00pm bus. I walked to the Northern complex, P, Q, and R and came back tired and soaked in sweat because it started to be very hot. Drank some juice and decided to go to the bus of 12:30 still undecided if to go so early and leave from such a great place like Tikal. The bus helped me because it left just before my eyes so I returned and I went to see temple 6, Templo de Los Inscriptiones, and another Palacio nearby, the last two things that I could not see in the morning from the ruins. For this you walk inside the tropical forest again and is a delight to look at the abundant vegetation. It is obvious that is no delight when you want to clean an area inside the forest……I picked up the 2:00pm bus, after I came earlier not to miss it again and I arrived at 3:00pm in Flores. I took some quick shots inside the town , grabbed my backpack from the hotel, waved a tuk-tuk who for Q5 brought me to the terminal. The night before I tried to find out how can I get by myself to Belize. There are only two direct buses at 5:00am and 7:30 am to Belize City for $20. Otherwise you can take a bus to Melchoir de Mena , at the border, walk over the border and take a bus till 5:30 pm or a taxi latter on. My minibus left at 3:40 pm and stopped in the market till 4:00pm when he left. He was driving like a maniac with 120km/hour the reason being that half the road closer to the boarder is gravel and there he was slowing down seriously. The next day I found out that this road is prone to armed robbery, a driver I spoke with being robbed 4 times on this road in 20 years, a rate that he thought that was reasonable. The bus dropped many passengers on the way, is the local bus, and arrived at the border at 6:00pm. He showed me where to go and when I got of I was assaulted by money changers, who would change money at the official rate $1=2Belize $, the Belize $ being pegged to the US$. I refuse to change and I walked over the bridge and into the Guatemala immigration office that again asked for the same Q10 with no receipt. I went further to the Belize border where I was greeted in English, Belize being till 1981 the colony of British Honduras. No problems at the border and no money to pay. Outside there were guys with taxis, that have posted rates in US$ and Bez$ and to San Ignatio is US$15 that I negotiated right away for $10 and I left with a Guatemalan guys who did not speak English. He did not have a receipt and he was very nice to go to a store to get one. We chatted about Belize and Guatemala and I found out that many people from Guatemala leave here if they can because you make more money, 1Bz$=Q3.5. We arrived in San Ignation very fast, the distance being 12 miles from the border and I went directly to a travel office to talk about the next day tours. There were no tours for Caracol, the largest Maya site in Belize, and the only option was the famous cave ATM, considered one of the most interesting trips in Belize. I asked also about transportation and it turned out that there are no direct buses from San Ignatio to Orange Walk, and buses from Belmopan to Dagriga that run all days for about 3 hours. I had to ponder over the options so I went to find a hotel, and I looked for Martha’s guesthouse that was full and I got a room across the street at Hi-Et guesthouse where a Canadian named Steve, living there, gave some tips for tours. I took a quick shower and went back in town to check the agencies and after some research I found an agency called Pacz tours, where I am now writing this blog, who told me that they will take me to ATM for $75 but do have Caracol either. I said that is fine but I want to see if I can get to go to Caracol, and I went again for a search and research, and when I came back empty handed they told me that a guy just came to go to Caracol and he was looking for me in town. The deal was done and I paid $80 for the trip for the next day, started to write the blog and went to eat at a Sri Lankan-Belize restaurant that was really very good. I did not want to walk latter on in the city because the trip to Tikal and the whole process to come over the border was extremely tiring. I was in Tikal, walking continuously in heat for 8 hours, and this not taking in consideration that I woke up at 3:00am and I did not have breakfast. Meanwhile I read the guide and seeing the difficulties I have with the transportation in Belize, less efficiently connected comparing with Guatemala, I decided that I will skip going to the South to Dangriga, to visit the Garifuma community, and stay in the North, in San Ignatio for two days, one day in Orange Walk and two days in Caye Caulker. Final decision,,,,that can be appealed.

The drive that I had to arrive by night in Rio Dulce the day before paid off and I was ready to go to the famous trip on the river that starts at 9:30 am, all the way to Livingston. I had my breakfast in the morning, a great fruit juice and some eggs and when I came back to pack a vicious pouring rain started. The sky was cloudy and it looked like I couldn’t go on the boat that is opened and it meant complete drenching. I waited for 15 minutes and talked with the host who told me that this was the way in the last 8-9 days that is called “Februar loco”, Crazy February. I went to Sonny who was also ready for the trip and when we kept pondering about it the rain stopped, so we decided to go and if it rains it rains. I went quickly to the Internet and also very quickly to the boat just to find out that it was leaving at 9:30am instead of 9:00am. I got the ticket RT for US$22 and it turned out that the collective boat was the only option of the day in spite of the fact that they say that exist many other tours. The problem in Guatemala is that many of the advertised tour options are depended on how many people want them and if there are not enough they go the default tour or no tour at all. We left at 9:30am with a very fast boat that was speeding like crazy. We stopped without landing at Castel San Felipe that is just a little upstream of Rio Dulce, old fort, latter prison and now attraction. We went down river and stopped in several interesting places, a coconut place, an island that was full of birds of various colors, egrets and such, and where we could see iguanas on top of the trees, and latter to a water lily pond that was so beautiful that we kept taking lots of photos and footage. The ride was extremely beautiful and you can see fishermen, other boats and lots of birds, pelicans included that fly with or around the boat. I had a great time with Sonny remembering Keith’s stories from the night before. The boat ride is one hour direct, going all the way to Livingston, a town on the coast of the Caribbean that is the only town in Guatemala that does not have road connection, only boats. There are two ports to the Caribbean , the second being Puerto Barrio, that has also road connection. With all the stops he did the ride to Livingston took 2.5 hours and we arrived there at12:00pm. We had time till 2:00 pm and we started to explore the small town, home to a population named Garifuma, black guys from Caribbean, descendants of runaway slaves from St Vincent. They looked very Caribbean, some tall and sturdy and a lot of them spoke English. They have a specific type of music, a sort of funk rock with African influences that unfortunately we could not listen because the bars are closed during the day. I walked with Sonny talking about photography and we arrived in 10 minutes of very slow walk to the other side of town on the beach of the Caribbean. The beached are different from Saint Martin, or such, there are dirty, house are very close to the water, houses of poor people that barely hold to themselves. The sand is black and the water can be OK but being close to the mouth of the river is looking a lot like the river, being slightly muddy and not the green we dreamed about. Sonny decided that he shot enough photos and he went to eat and I went a little more to some side streets where I saw fruit stores, typical of the area, and the music bars, looking slightly Jamaican. I went to have a beer with Sonny and the waiter gave us a tip, to go and see the place where they salt the fish. We found it close to the water, and the view was impressive because on long beds there was ton of fish that was salted and given as food for animals. Interesting and smelly place! It was 2:00pm and we left for the boat, that left not before having a chat with a guy from northern Italy. The boat ride was very rough because the pilot wanted to make it in one hour and go home,l so he was jumping waves and went extremely fast. No stomach issues but it were just rough and sometimes we had to stand because it was too much bouncing. It’s bouncy in here! On the boat Sonny started to talk with two women, from Minnesota. It turned out that they were mother and daughter, Denise and Danielle, Denise coming to Guatemala to visit and see her daughter who studied Spanish in Xela for 6 months. We chat with them all the way and helped them get to the bus station when the boat got in Rio Dulce. The boat arrived at 3:00pm and at the bus station I was told that is a bus primera classe that should come in ten minutes. I wanted to stay longer but the opportunity was too good, so I went to the hotel, said goodbye to Sonny and exchanged cards, and run to the bus stop where the bus already came. Q100 from Rio Dulce to Flores I paid right away and I got a front seat in a very comfy bus, not the regular crammed chicken bus seat. A German family was around me, and in the back Danielle with her mom. At one point the bus has a tire explosion on the back and we had to stop at one point to change the wheel. Considering the conditions of the roads in Guatemala I think that this is very common. But I was very surprised how fast they changed it considering that it was the inside wheel from the back, and I remembered the movie “Cars”. We left almost in 15 minutes and we talk about a huge Mercedes bus…..We stopped again right away to a check point where everybody is asked to get down and the bus is checked for fruits and vegetables, a precaution to preserve, El Peten safe of outside infestation. When we crossed the bridge at the entrance in Rio Dulce we crossed also in El Peten , the large Northern part of Guatemala that is jungle, or more precise tropical forest. The old spotty ferry that was crossing the river before the bridge existed represented the connection between civilization and jungle. Nowadays a beautiful bridge spans the river and the roads in El Peten are very good. We arrived in Flores/Santa Elena with no incidents at 6:45pm in about 3 hours from Rio Dulce, instead of the 5 hours that I was told. Flores is an island, connected by a 500 meters causeway, in Lake Peten-Itza, a place that was a Maya town, inhabited by people from Chichen Itza in Mexico, from long time ago. It was destroyed by the Spaniards and transformed in a Spanish colonial town. At the other end of the bridge is Santa Elena, a useful place but where is not so nice to stay. When you arrive you are aggressed by taxi drivers who want to give you a ride for Q5/person to Flores. I shared a taxi with Denise and Danielle and the driver started to ask us what we do the next day. The guy was useful and stopped us to San Juan agency where they had the tours for Tikal ruins. There are buses that leave at 5:00 and 6:00am and many others for Q60 RT but we opted to go in a very early tour that leaves Flores at 3:30am to see the waking up of the jungle. The tour is Q300 or $40 because there they decided to change the US$ for Q7 only. The driver dropped us at the hotel Posada de la Jungla, where for Q100 I got a nice room and the promise to be wakened up at 3:15am. Denise asked me if I wanted to have dinner with them, so I went to the phone that was very close planning to return latter for Internet and we went to Capitan Tortuga, a good restaurant on the shore of the lake, where we ordered two shrimp ceviche and a pasta and chatted about all sorts of things, including Garrison Keiler, till about 9:30pm. Denise and her husband have 6 kids and she works as software developer/project manager for a large corporation, and Danielle, is the fourth and when she finished school came in Xela to learn Spanish before she may begin to study medicine. It was already too late for Internet, considering that I would wake up at 3:00am so I gave up and went to bed.

The minibus came at 4:00am and Estella was up with the phone in hand to be sure that there are no surprises. The moment you left Antigua towards the east things change. First it is not cold at all and you start wearing very light clothing and sandals, the people are completely changed and there are no more traditional costumes. Everybody is dressed in pants and shirts and the men wear a white hat. Occasionally, you may see one or two Maya traditional costumes but so rare that they jump at you. And the buses are no more the regular chicken buses, but boring buses. It is not very hot because there are still mountains but for sure the pleasant temperature of the altiplano disappeared and is a steamier. In the bus I met an old lady from Canada who traveled by bus from Montreal to Guatemala. She was speaking Spanish well that she picked in Spanish schools in Guatemala. She told us over breakfast that she was robbed around Santiago de Atitlan when she decided to go out of the village and take a walk to another village. Also, she met a Belgian guy whose entire backpack with many important papers was stolen. This place is notorious for this time of crime and it is mentioned in all the books that YOU SHOULD NOT WALK BETWEEN THE VILLAGES AROUND LAGO ATITLAN. The minibus run very well and at 8:45 we were at the Honduras border. The passing of the border is just a formality, these countries together with San Salvador and Nicaragua, having a similar deal like in the EU, but it does not work as smoothly. We had to pay at the border a Q10 for the Guatemalans, no matter that it specifically says that you don’t have to pay anything and another $3 for entering this zone, no matter that we were already in it. I changed $20 for lempiras, the national currency at $1=L18. At 9:15 am we were already in Copan Ruinas Village, 12 km from the border, at the Officina of the minibus and after I spoke with everybody there, it was clear that is no transportation to Quiricua and anywhere else except the returning minibus or some local buses. This was disconcerting because if I did not leave from Copan in the same day, the next day would be a full travel day. In order to do something anywhere you need to be there one night in advance to book your tours otherwise you may end up spending the day in the city. The minibus driver asked me to speed up the visit, Copan being a small site, but very beautiful and to come back with him at 12:00 pm and to drop me at the crossing from there I could take a bus to Rio Dulce where I wanted to go. I said that I will try but I knew, that no matter how small it is the site, it is hard to cover it so quickly, and I was right. Copan is located about 15 minutes walk from the village and I got there at 9:45 and got a ticket for $15 only for the ruins, no tunnels or museum because of lack of time. I joined some groups in various languages to listen to the stories and in the same time I shot lots of video and photos. However this was not easy and fast and I finished my tour at 1:30pm, regretfully because I liked the place a lot. Copan is the most beautiful of the existing Maya ruins. There are lots of steles located on situ, some of them copies but most of them original and their craftsmanship is remarkable. They represent one of the kings who rules successfully Copan that at its peak had about 27000 people. It was deserted around 900 AD like all the other famous ruins. The archaeologists opened tunnels under the temples and underneath they found like in many other sites other smaller temples perfectly preserved. The main construction in the place is a remarkable staircase that has on its steps hieroglyphs that tell the story of Copan since the beginning. It is huge and it is like a book in stone. There were many groups, a lot of older people but also many young. In other places I saw small children in Baby Bjorn or carriages. I left the ruins at 1:30pm and I took a tuk-tuk to the village for $1 and there I took several shots in town square who was full of people, all men wearing the white hats. The place looked like a scene in one of the film with migrant workers. I took the first minibus that was leaving at 2:00pm to the border, that leaves when is full. I tried to find out about the connections and I got various responses but these are the facts: The minibus took me to the border, leaving every half hour or when is full, for L 20. If you go only to Copan they just take you the entry paper they gave you in the morning and you are ready to go. I asked the lady to give me some coins from Honduras and she was very nice to oblige with it. On the Guatemalan side was a bus waiting and leaving at 2:30pm, every half hour, that was going to Chiquimula, a larger city that arrived there in 1 hour and 15 minutes for Q20. From there I would have liked a direct bus to Puerto Barrio but this was only the next morning at 6:00am so I took at 4:00pm for Q7 and this one connects to an to Zacata that was supposed to arrive in half an hour. It was an accident on the road so we were delayed half an hour and we arrived in Zacata, I got right away a connecting minibus to Rio Hondo for Q5, the crossing with the eastern route that connects Guatemala City with Petén that arrived at the Cruces in 15 minutes. So at 5:15 pm I was on the road waiting for the bus to Rio Dulce that was supposed in 15 minutes. The 15 minutes transformed themselves in 1 hour and 30minutes, when like in the good old days two buses came, secunda classe with Fuente de Norte, the operator from the area. One of the issues you are concerned about when you travel in Guatemala is security by night. It was getting late and I knew that I would arrived after dark in Rio Dulce but when I asked the guy from the bus office he told me that Rio Dulce is “muy tranquilo” and he was perfectly right. This delay of the bus and later on the nice atmosphere in Rio Dulce convinced me to scrap to return to Quiricua ruins the next day and stay only in Rio Dulce. The bus finally left at 7:00pm and it was supposed to arrive at 9:30pm but it stopped on the way, being a bus going all the way to Flores for the people and the driver to eat. I had my dinner and after we left a pouring rain started, a typical rain for the Caribbean, a sign that we are closer. I arrived at 10pm in pouring rain and I started squabbling under various roofs not to get drenched. I saw a sign of a hotel but was nobody there, and when I had no clue how to find a hotel in that rain I saw a light very close to me coming from an outside bar. I went to the bar, named Sundog café and the atmosphere was in total contrast with the rain. When I got in coming from the rain the four guys around the bar cheered my entrance and followed a great time of stories of travel, with lots of laughing and some beers. The bar was kept by a guy Yuri from Amsterdam. Sonny was from Istambul and moved to the States about 10 years ago or more, first in Atlanta, further studying photography in Santa Barbara University and living for the last 8 years in LA. Now he got on a motor bike and started 2 months ago in a trip to Ushuaia and back that he assumes that it will take about 8 months. Keith was from Australia and in his 60s. According to another guy who was very funny he started to travel around the globe in 1993 and now is at his second tour. He said that he came from Honduras and I asked him when he got there, expecting something like two weeks ago. He answered straight that in 1998! He was in Honduras during hurricane Mitch and lost his boat, got another boat fixed it but sunk it also and now has another one. A lot of people come to Rio Dulce during hurricanes because that gulf and area is protected in case of storms and they can secure their boats. Keith was in Vietnam war and told some stories about using Lariam against mosquitoes. Apparently it makes as much damage to your liver to get preventive medicine as to contact malaria, a thing that I knew before. The stories continued a little after the other funny guy left with his wife and I left with Sonny to his hotel, that we found to be locked. During the time when he wanted to see how to get in, I was asked by a guy from the nearby hotel if I want a room, so I went to this place where I got a nice, cozy and clean room for Q75, waving to Sonny that we will meet the next morning. The rain continued all nice hitting the tin roof but I slept in the tranquil atmosphere of this pleasant town with no stop till 7:00am.

Today were no specific plans. One idea was to go to Guatemala City with a private car for a day. The cost is $30 but depending who you ask can go up to $100. I left in the morning the hotel I stayed because the previous night Senora Estella said that I can stay in her house. Because I did not like the hotel and also the fact that I wanted to be easier to be spotted by the Copan bus that picks you up from your place I took my stuff and moved 4 blocks away. First I did a tour to some of the agencies and to the phones. I took the breakfast with the family and a couple from Holland and Senora Estella advised me to go to Santa Catherina, where today being the first weekend after Ash Wednesday , an event that was completely unknown in Todos Santos, it is Valediction and tomorrow it is a Procession. I took a tuk-tuk for Q20 to Santa Catherina, where, in the church on the floor, I saw a design made out of all sorts of colors, very nice similar with a sand mandala, but with Christian theme and not so detailed. I spent little time there planning to return and go to Guatemala City, so I took the chicken bus and got quickly in Antigua and when I was coming to the hotel I saw Mercadio des Artesanias and this was the end of the day. I planned to do some shopping in Santa Elena market, near Flores, at the end of the trip in Guatemala, but now because I lost a day, there were few chances to do it. So I spent the entire day, visiting markets and stores that I found out to be absolutely beautiful, some of them exquisite, Also, I did not have time to look in any of them when I came first, but now I enjoyed a lot looking for the beautiful textiles and artifacts that they were selling. I was reasonable till now because I did not buy almost any things not to carry them. Besides, when you do this shopping tour you enter beautiful hotels made in old houses with courtyards with fountains in the middle and catalpa and many other flowers all around. It is absolutely charming this town and the best way is to move from one café from another and keep sipping all days smoothies. But it was not the case, because I wanted also to see some things I missed last time, one of them being Casa Popanea, that I found to be close till further notice, and another the ruined monastery of Las Capuchinas. All this took me the entire day. Less eventful and slightly more relaxing but still not too much because I kept going to take pictures in many places that I last time I missed. And there are so many other interesting places Antigua… In the end I went to the house where I stayed to drop the stuff I bought and returned to town and went to see Las Capuchinas and eat in Las Fuentes, a charming garden restaurant inside a patio surrounded by beautiful art studios and shops. I got a nice quesadilla with a Conga smoothie and when I left for home, thinking of buying a belt from Aguacatan, I stopped in a store in Casa de Cultura, right near the cathedral and I bought for a fraction of the price both the Aquacatan belt, a very rare and relatively expensive textile in Antigua and a poncho from Huelhua, or something like that. Guatemala is famous for its textiles that so as diverse as the number of the Maya communities that exist. Some are too garish for our taste but some are extremely exquisite and I found a store in Antigua called Nativo that has absolutely exquisite textiles. They are collection textiles and the price can often be Q10000 but for exquisite work, In the market things are from kitsch to OK but nothing as good. So the fact that I found this in a sort of market stall was surprising. So with all this flurry of shopping activities the plan to go to Guate for the day was scrapped completely. I went home to pack the shopping of the day and now my backpack is full. The next step is the extra plastic bag. I took my official ticket for Copan for 4 00am tomorrow and I left now to try and have dinner in Santo Domingo, a 5 star hotel done in an old ruined monastery, that it was recommended by the doctors that I met first time when I was in Antigua.

I left at 7 00 am to St Francisco el Alto with a local bus from the terminal. One hour for Q7 brings you to this village located up on the hill, from where probably got its name. The Friday market is considered the largest and the most authentic in the entire Guatemala. It is definitely the largest and you can tell it right away because you are absolutely crammed like never before. Rows of stalls are on each side and in the middle of the streets and the traffic jam is continuously. Obviously shooting with a tripod looks a little ridiculous in these conditions but I was able to squeeze some stable shots, using the tables of the stalls, or bags of corn and so on. The bus drops you kind of in the middle of the square from where you have to climb streets to go to the church and further on, on top of the hill where is the animal market. This market is extremely large. They sell everything, like in Vietnam and such, but unfortunately, no matter that there were women dressed in beautiful costumes, in the market there were mainly men dressed in jeans and with baseball caps, with T shirts that spelled I am proud to be an American…. On top of a store that was selling embroideries and posters there were hanging the three major hopes of the Guatemalans: one poster with Jesus, one poster with Mary and one poster with the American Flag. Here when you say that you come from the US you are perceived as an angel coming from Paradise, way different than in France. The market was in full swing and I was able to shoot lots of footage with the animals and close up to some interesting women. I left from there to go to the church and there were more streets full of stalls and when I arrived at the church, there were mainly the textiles that in this market were not great. I went to the church and bought one textile mainly because the woman kept coming after me and kept discounting it. I wanted to stay more in the vegetable market and I walked the entire range of stalls but it was so crowded that I gave up after about 2.5 hours of hassle. This was the last market and to sum up the experience I can tell that the best markets are the vegetable ones that are happening in streets with no stalls, or better like in Zunil, in an open space. For shooting these are real eye candy. The rest are OK but you have to work a lot and you do not get the same sense of color. From SF el Alto I was supposed to visit 3 more places. Totonicapan is at 30 minutes by chicken bus and from there to return to SF and go to other two places. I had to skip Toto because it was obviously, even for my senses late, and I went directly to San Andres de Xecul that has a yellow church painted with multicolor angles, a unique church like this all the others having white facades. I took a bus that brought me to Moreria in 15 minutes, right near Quatro Caminos and from there I took another bus for 10 minutes, 3km, to San Andres. The church looked very interesting but I did not have the feeling that the painter smoked too much as it says in Lonely Planet. It is for sure very different that the other and interesting both inside and outside and worth a detour. The buses from there leave every 15 minutes to Xela and I took one that brought me in 45 minutes to terminal Minerva and from there with a minibus to Parque Central. On the way, right before Xela, the bus was stopped by police who asked all the local men to get off the bus and show some ids. They got back in the bus without any incident. Obviously I did not make a reservation for getting back to Antigua because I did not know what hour I will be back. With all this transport and the roads being continuously revamped is hard to predict. So I went to the agency who told me that the bus they had for 2 pm is delayed and will come at 4 pm and in any case I have to connect with another bus in Los Encountros that is coming from San Cristobal , Mexico. Muy complicado! He advised me to go myself to Transporte Alamo, 15 minute of walking and get a bus there, primera classe at 2:30pm. It sounded better and I went ot my hotel, I got my backpack, passed quickly by the post office and walked the 15 minutes and arrived at the terminal for Alamo at 2:25pm, but I was able to get in the bus. I chatted the first part of the road with a couple from Norway and at 6:20pm we arrived in Chimaltenango, where me the Norway guys got off to get a chicken bus for Antigua because the bus was going to Guatemala City. The chicken buses for Antigua were so full that the second who came did not even stop a rare event in the bus business. The idea is to put as many people can fit regardless if the live or die of asphyxiation. They are many are come very often and we fit in the third bus and in 40 minutes we got to Antigua. Friday Night Antigua was in full swing, so I dropped my bag in the first hotel I saw, Posada de Dona Angelina, OK but not great by any standards and I left directly to the center to find travel agency to but my Copan ticket. But as I said Antigua was in full swing and businesses were closed. I was desperate, so I entered a food store in front of Iglesia de la Merced, to ask if they know any agency opened, and it happened that one the women from the store to work in an agency. She started to cal everybody and eventually found out that there were no seats. We tried to find a private car to bring me to Copan and the next day to Rio Dulce for $125 and amazingly nobody wanted to go, no matter that she tried many. A round trip to Copan on private car costs $100 leaving at 5:00am. After one hour, hungry and thirsty, I gave up and I made a reservation for the next day with a minibus, no matter that she charged way more that the regular service. I went to a restaurant near the Iglesia de la Merced, called Hector Castro, opened 4 months ago and kept by this guy who speaks fluently English and Spanish. It is absolutely great and I highly recommend it. After that I went to the Internet but I was so tired that I gave up and went for a good sleep.

I took the bus of 5 30 am from Todos Santos to Huehue. When I got in the bus I bumped again into Eva who also woke up early and took the same bus to Huehue to go early in the morning to La Messila at the Mexican border. We arrived in Huehue in two hours and said goodbye and bon voyage- me only for another week and she for another two months. The Xela bus connected quickly, in about 15 minutes. Meanwhile, I took several pictures of chicken buses that were abundant in Huehue terminal that is an important hub, trying to avoid a drunkard who was excited about my video camera. In about two hours I was in Quetzaltenango, Xela as is named by everybody, and I took a minibus from terminal Minerva to Parque Central. Here I started to look for hotels and it was not as easy as expected in Guatemala’s second city, but in the end I found a room, only for a day in a very nice colonial hotel, with a charming interior courtyard. They had to clean the room so I dropped my bag and I left to talk in tourist agencies to see how are things, in terms of local movement and movement away from here. It turned out, as expected, that is no direct bus to Copan, Honduras and you have to sleep in Antigua and go from there. I knew that and if you book it from here is way more expensive. Also, I got information about what can be seen around here, a thing that also I knew but I got an exact location of the places to visit, and this was very helpful to decide what to do.
So I went o have my desayuno at 11 30 am, and I studied the situation and it became very clear that I have to do the trips on my own because the organized trip they were not fitting my schedule, among other having time for lunch, I can not stand that, and having too many things to see in one day. In general I need more time for some places that is more to shoot, so I decided to go to the terminal and leave to the south of Xela with chicken buses. Luckily I forgot the tripod in the hotel, because I picked up the wrong minibus. The guys from the hotel directed me to the right place to take the bus, very close to the hotel, that dropped me in 15 minutes in Almolonga, a village famous for its vegetables that today was supposed to have a market. The market was not as big as expected but the people in the market were very interesting and I stayed there shooting for an hour. Meanwhile, a guy who saw me with the camera shooting, told me that he just came from Zunil, the village that I was supposed to go next, and that is a great vegetable market there. So I finished my shooting, I went to the church and I went to the bus and took a bus that was just leaving for Zunil and arrived there in 10 minutes. The guy was right. The market was in full swing and it was charming. The entire outside square was full with women dressed in traditional clothes, selling extraordinarily beautiful vegetables. I never knew that it exists, so nice and big organic vegetables! It was the best market I saw in this trip, just a veggie market, with nothing else and no tourists. I tried to get to some balconies, but all were private houses and nobody let me do it. Even without this point of view I shot tons of stuff from everywhere. I took a break going to the interior market and there was again a great show of veggie and people, everything colorful and nice. I left after an hour and I went to see the church, whose white ornate facade is very interesting. It has also a gilded altar and lots of icons that look very old. From the church I started in the search of Maximon, San Simon, that has here a place, being a protector of the locals. I found it and I spent there about one hour and assisted at two ceremonies that I was able to shoot almost completely. This is an old Maya tradition that in time became part of the CatholicMaya religion that is the local religion in Guatemala’s highlands. As I understood less and less people come to Maximon, who looks and is dressed like Michael Jackson! The ceremony is pagan, if this term means just non-Catholic, and it involves a lot of incensing, candles and lots of smoke that makes the video spectacular. I left Maximon just because it was 4 00pm and I still had to go to another place. I went in the square and I negotiated with a taxi to bring me to Fuentes Georgina. He charged me Q80- round trip, a higher price than normal but I was by myself so it was not too much of a choice. He had to make his money. Fuetes Georgina are some thermal springs, somewhere on top of Zunil about 9 km on the road. It is a very nice place and the two pools are a pleasure to be in. I did not have my bathing suit but I got in shortening my pants and the relaxing feeling you get is unequal. The water is hot, hotter that before, since a mudslide covered the fountains, renovated now, but opened another hot spring. Also, you can do a nice hike up the mountain in the jungle that is also nice and makes the entire trip worthwhile. The fountains were full of foreigners, Xela being also a major place for learning Spanish. I returned after one hour with the taxi guy who waited for me there, and I talked with him about a lot of things, practicing my Spanish that works excelente! The language spoken in Zunil is Quiche and is very different from the other languages from the area, Tzujil, Mam, from TS and Kachichel. He dropped me in the front of the church and I went to Cooperative Santa Ana, a woman cooperative for handicrafts where I found the beautiful bands the women from Zunil were wearing in the market and I bought some of the them. It was supposed to be a bus at 6 30pm from Zunil to Xela, the last one, but it did not show up and I was advised to go to the main road and wait, 10 minutes away. I did it and a bus just came, probably the 6 30 pm that was late, that brought me in 20 minutes in Xela and after a minibus ride I got to Parque Central where is my hotel. I went to eat and I picked a great place, that I highly recommend, The balcony of Enrique, a terrace that is overlooking the entire main square of the town, that is also Parque Central. Mexican pollo con cerveza and planning my trip for the next days because this efficient transportation from Todos Santos to Xela and the visits I did today saved me two days of the original plan. As a result, tomorrow I will go to the north of Xela, mainly to San Francisco Alto, where is a famous market and several other towns that have some interesting sites, hoping to be back in Xela at 2:00pm and take a bus to Antigua around 4 00pm. The rest, email, phone, blog and that’s it. It started to rain and it rained all night.

Waking up in Todos Santos when the sun shines and the clouds are clearing is like being in paradise. It is such a fresh beauty that mesmerizes you. In the morning I woke around 7:00 hearing the roosters and the cows but also the trucks with their powerful horns.The first thing was to go to the terrace on top oh the Hotel Mam, the name of the language spoke by the locals, to take pictures and quickly I went to the market to take advantage of the fantastic light.I shot lots of video in the plaza in front of the church and in the market. The plaza was full of military people, army and police and when I asked what´s about they said that nothing especially, they come and they go. And they vanished at one time. I understood that in Guatemala are 20000 national police and 30000 public police, so is customary to see around many important buildings, especially banks, a lot of armed men in a kind of uniform. This is reaaaal Guatemala, a country village where everybody is dressed in traditional clothes, men wearing some red pants with white stripes, with a typical shirt and a hat with blue band. Actually this is a important here because the men are those wearing mainly the traditional clothes. It is not too much work here and everybody sits and hangs out, so they are perfect target to be filmed. I went and I had my breakfast in a panaderia in front of the church watching the square. I started to chat with one local guy who told me that he was in the States, a trend that continued the entire day. Apparently everybody was in the States and will go again, with or without a visa, and surprisingly one of the most important subject for them are the American elections. All of them told me their stories, where they work and what and how they got there. One told me also the price, very expensive for a person in Guatemala: Q12000 to cross the Mexican border and $3000 for the American one. The last one I met during the day had a video camera and was shooting the village for a friend of his in Oakland. He said that he worked 2 years, and came back and are three families there together. He said he will go back in two years. He said that he spoke English, but we spoke Spanish still. Many of them speak a very basic English, because their interface in the States is only with Ladinos.When I came to the hotel I bumped into Eva who stayed also at Mam and we talked to meet in the market in 15 minutes. I went to the hotel to change some things, I asked again about phone and now at the internet was a smarter guy who said that he has phone and it was actually right behind (last night the girl said that you cannot call international…) and shot a little more in the market and went to the church. I talked with another gentleman about Maya tradition and looked a little at the mesa and when I got out I met Eva who was eating her breakfast at the same panaderia. I met before the Canadians in the market and they decided to go Sendero Madero, but it implies to take a bus for one hour, so I decided after we asked around to go to the tower on top of the hill from where is a beautiful view over the town. The walk is charming , among houses and fields that are worked by people. Like in the country you say Hi to everybody and you stop and chat with them or take a picture. People here don´t have a real problem to be filmed and some of them even ask for it. Still is good to ask first. Going up, at one point a girl of about 17-18 stopped and addressed us in perfect English with an impeccable Southern accent. I was so puzzled, especially by the accent and I asked her if she lived in the South. She said that she lived in the North, but when I asked here where she said that in Northern Alabama. He was great and very friendly and we chat a lot about her after we start again going up. We arrived on top of the hill, after a very strenuous 2 hours walk, but the clouds started to come in and the visibility decreased, but still was great. It became right away a little chilly and we started to go down and go to the village.On the way back we met again the girl from Alabama working a loom in a house balcony and I chat a lot with her. What was funny were her questions that were typical Southern, asking several times the same thing with that slow and wavy accent: did you enjoy, was hard, etc. Her parents came out meanwhile, and when I asked her if she will go back she said that she does not have papers and it´s over.The lover relationship with USA is very strong here. After that I found out from another villagers, I spoke with a lot, that she lived there for 10 years and did the entire school and his father was deported, so everybody waits for a change in the emigration law. Eva went to the hotel and I went to eat in the market, my regular meal of watermelon, and pineapple and after that a hotdog. Eva popped in the market and decided to go and buy some crafts from a store in Casa Familiar and I went to see Santiaga. Santiaga was working a loom surrounded by the entire family. We chat about an hour, about her house that will be different having private bath, something that no hotel in Todos Santos has, about the difficulties of construction, the work they just did, about Olivia, Daniela, the kids and of course the American election, Bush and the emigration law. We chat for about one hour and meanwhile it started to rain and it stopped. She send all the best and I left her after I took some pictures of her and her daughter and walked a little more in the village arriving at the cemetery, where among others tombs made all of cement, one was painted in the American flag and said USA on it. The person who was entombed was 23 and I don´t know if he was in Iraq or he wanted to cross the border in the desert. I left just after the blog to a conference in one of the Spanish schools, about the Guatemalans and USA. It was very interesting, a guy who studied in France presented. Meanwhile, talking during the day with so many locals, I got a pretty good idea and what he said just added details to the story. There are currently 10000 people from Todos Santos in the USA and 30000 in the city. Most ae illegal and can be deported. There are now 30 coyotes only in Todos Santos in comparison with 2 in 2000. The major problem is the lack of education, that like in any underdeveloped country is a privilege of the rich because you have to pay, in the peasants case more they make a month. The minimum salary is $90/month. Obviously when is any need of the Maya there are no money, however Guatemala built one of the most luxurious airports in the word , La Aurora, on which I landed. A lot of the people who go to the States prefer to stay there and not come back because off the intense corruption that exists in the country. After the talk that was till 7 00pm aI went to have dinner in a restaurant that I found on the main street. It is a restaurant for TS standards. I could not have a beer in TS in the restaurants for a reason that I did not understand, the occupation of the large part of the people being drinking. This was mentioned in the conference also, and is caused mainly by the lack of education. They go and worked their life in the US, come back, build a house and drink the rest. y 8 00pm I went back to the Spanish school to watch a movie and it was something about their radio station , the horse race for Dias de los Muertos and the elections. A very good documentary that touched again the same subjects as the conference. I saw there Olivia’a movies that are now mentioned in the Lonely Planet under Todos Santos. In school were also, a guy from England and one from the Czech Republic and a girl who sounded American by the accent. After the film was over I went to my room to read again the guide book and I decided to leave early to Xela the next morning.

The last two evenings in Pana I kept trying to get info about how to reach Todos Santos, and mainly long it Hill take and with what connections. It was impossible to get straight answers no matter that I tried in various agencies. The info that I got proved to be wrong an it was not a question of ill intention, but just the fact that they did not know. The only reliable info is still the info from Lonely Planet. So, not getting anywhere I gave up the idea to arrive in Todos Santos today and I resigned to the thought that I have to sleep in Huehue, with the idea to wake up at 5:30 am and catch the first bus. So in the morning I left at 7:00 to Solola, where it was today, Tuesday, one of the most authentic markets in the country. I left my luggage in Pana because it was no place to store it in Solola. I arrived in 20 minutes with the chicken bus and I started to walk the market. Indeed it is worth it. It is a fascinating local market, where the locals come and sells their wares and vegetables. It is a symphony of colors, everybody, men and women being dressed in colored huiplas in various designs. An advantage of this market is that is not a touristy affair, there are no handicrafts and in the morning there were only 4 Italians who were taking pictures. You could take picture till you run out of battery so many things are to shoot and photo. I sat down and watch the hassle and bustle of this amazing market, going from the veggie area to the wares, and clothing but coming back to the down-on-the-street vegetable area where the pictures were the best because there were no stalls. After I shot as usual too much I decided to leave earlier and take a chance to get to HueHue or even to Todos Santos. So I left the market at 9:30am and I took the first chicken bus to Pana, where I took my bag and went back to Calle Principal to get in a bus. They told me that is no direct bus to Los Encuntros so I took again a bus to Solola and when I got off this bus the driver attendant from the Los Encuentros took directly the bag and I left in no time to Contro as is called. Another 30 minutes and at 11:00 I reached the crossing. There it was supposed to exist, based on the info I got, direct buses to Huehuetenango. Wrong again! You have to take a bus to Quatro Caminos, 1 hour and 45 minutes away, now with the works caused by the road modernization. The bus, a Pullman, came in 5 minutes and I got in and got off in Quatro Caminos, and again the driver attendant from the bus in front that was going to Huehue, fetch my bag from the bus and put it in his bus and it left in 30 seconds. With such amazing efficiency and coordination, we left QC at 12:45 and arrived in Huehue at 2:30 , right for the Todos Santos bus, primera classe, meaning not chicken bus but a minibus, that was leaving at 2:45. The last bus to Todos Santos is at 3:45. The road to Todos Santos is paved most of the way. Only the last 45 minutes are of dirt road. All the way from Huehue till here the scenery is stupendously beautiful. These small minibuses are climbing the amazing steep mountains and you are continuously surrounded by peaks and look down in valleys that have villages. It is one of the most charming roads I saw and for sure is the best in Guatemala. I arrived here at 5:00pm after 7 bus rides. I just want to mention that the chicken buses are actually Ford trucks that have built in the back an enclosure with very basic benches. They are painted in garish colors and they are absolutely charming ….and hard to travel in them. But most often they are regular American School buses, still yellow and some of them having still the name of the school painted on the side. It even say on some of them School Bus on top. The difference is that the seats are way better when used in the USA…. I went to see Santiaga at Casa Familiar, a hotel that is in reconstruction, and took a room in Hotel Mam for Q30/night. The village is charming and I barely wait to explore it tomorrow, when by pure luck it happen to be the market day.When I returned from the Internet I bumped into an animated conversation in the kitchen of the hotel in Spanish. They were three foreigners, one couple from Canada, but the girl may not have spoken English, she was looking Portorican and a girl from Amsterdam. We chat all four of us a lot about markets, Guatemala and what can be done in Todos Santos. They knew about a hike that they wanted to do and it looks good but you have to take a bus also. Finally, I had to eat something because I was on fruit the entire day, but they ate already so I went wit the girl from Amsterdam, Eva to the nearby hotel Todos Santos. The restaurant, if it can be called this was was obviously empty but they cooked for us. We chat for an hour, in English this time. After she finished high school she started tio travel and went in Australia and New Zealand for 9 months. As a result she was speaking English perfectly, and very fast. She came back from Australia with a very strong that she worked to drop, and she did. She speaks Spanish fluently also. She studied Journalism for 4 years and now she travels for 6 months before she goes back to school. Now she is 4 months in her travel and tomorrow she will leave to cross the Mexico border and go in the night to San Cristobal de las Casas. I told her many of my travel stories and about my experience in San Cristobal in 1991. Great town! At 9:00pm we left and going in the market you see that everything is closed and the entire town went to bed. Good night at 9:00pm!

IMPORTANT: During this travel I met one person from Montreal who was robbed when she was walking between the villages around the lake. Also, she personally met another guy from Belgium, that was attacked and robbed doing the same hike. It is highly inadvisable to walk between the villages and is better to take a boat.

Lago Atitlan is a caldera of a volcano. This theory was established in 1980 but you may be able to tell it by the fact that is surrounded by cones, 3 of them. As a matter of fact roughly the entire Guatemala in this troubled area has lots of volcanoes and the result is many earthquakes. After allk the research done last night I took the classical tour on the lake that left at 8:30am. I woke up much earlier and I went to the lake that in the morning is extremely calm and pensive. It is a stretch of water of 5×11 miles and is surrounded by volcano peaks. It is so calm and peaceful that you may not think that is created by such turmoil. After a quick and large breakfast, with eggs and yogurt with fruits, I tried to find an agency to buy a ticket because last night I run late watching the game and the agencies closed at 9:00pm. Finally I found some guys in a hotel who opened earlier and I left to the dock, a kind of overstatement, and I got on Santa Fe boat that does this lake tour. Very few people were present at that hour considering that is another tour at 9:30 am for the same price Q75 that returns with the same boat at 3:30pm. The ride on the lake was mesmerizing in the crisp air of morning. You feel that you are in a very clean and far away territory, somewhere mystical like all the Maya traditions that surround you. I had a great chat with Patty from Chicago who was working for Jimmy Carter habitat for Humanity in Honduras for a while. The first stop was San Pedro de la Laguna, a pretty large town, where I went in the center to visit the church and the market. The church was interesting and it had a ramp instead of steps in front looking even more like a pyramid. The Maya are very diverse and the many tribes who fought among each others are still preserving their dress code, their traditions and way of life. It was not one Maya, but lots of tribes that formed this Maya World and here we find two of them, their names being very complicated to spell. In the market I had an incident because when I was shooting the camera fell together with the tripod, but luckily they are built pretty robust so nothing happened except that something insignificant cracked. From the market I went to the shore where there were lots of restaurants and yoga places. A lot of people stay here, being very cheap and spending weeks learning Spanish, the schools in Guatemala being famous for their efficiency and low price. I met so many Americans, mainly, who are here and apparently all who come here spend at least a week to learn Spanish. The result is that they want to practice the language and they try to speak Spanish with me. I am OK with that but most of the time, 1-2 weeks of Spanish tops does not help at all when you were not exposed to other languages.
At 11:00 we came to the boat and left for the second village, Santiago de Atitlan. This one is different, the local people being dressed in different embroideries and it has a church that had in the middle a hole that according to their tradition it has the entrance to the underworld. Statues of saints are dressed each year by the local women in new clothes and look very hip and Maya women are praying in the church. Close by is the statue of the God of the Lake, Maximon, whose story is extremely interesting and complicated. Is venerated everywhere in the highlands and another location dedicated to him is in Zunil. Maximon liked very much the women and he was castigated by God but was still venerated by the priests. The main result is that the offering he receives is in money, aguardiente and cigarettes. Nothing else! It is a wooden statue with a cigarette in his mouth. I got there after I asked some local people in the church. At the pier, when we arrived, local kids were running crazy to get you there asking for more money than the entire day trip on the lake, but the statue is very close, 3 blocks right when you leave the church. You still have to find it inside a house, of corrugated metal, in a cramped room that is full of candles and incense burning. But when you arrive there the atmosphere is overwhelming you, the place having a mystic like all the other Maya places. If you take picture you have to pay and for my video camera they asked a lot but as usual they cut the price in half and we got a deal. Maximon is not alone, but is constantly surrounded by two men who sustain him. I got out quickly and I run to catch the boat that was leaving at 1:00pm and to reach the third place and the last, St Antonio de Popolan. Meanwhile Patty stroke a discussion with another couple, also retired as far as I understood, on the boat who were going to Honduras where they own an island, and this was because some friends of them bought another island and it was fun! They were very nice and friendly people but I did not have a chance to talk with them. This village was simpler and the only interesting thing was the church and the Maya women dressed in embroidered blouses and men having some kind of skirts. We left from there at 3:00 and we arrived in Pana at 3:30pm. I went to the shore where I watched men collected sea weed that they use to feed the animals. Quite a show to see how they do it. I shot the entire procedure. After that I started my new research regarding how to get to Todos Santos and come back to Quetzaltenango till Thursday night, in order to be Friday to major market in ST Francisco de Alto. One over the other, transportation is sparse and you have to be very flexible or to have so much time that it does not matter. So, the bottom line is that either I have a 6:00am bus to San Cristobal de las Casas in Mexico that will drop me in Huehuetenango and take a 3 hour bus from there, or get a bus tomorrow directly to Huehue from Los Encuentros. I still don’t know how to do it, but tomorrow I will go in Solola for the market. This is a very famous market, one of the most authentic from the country, just one step behind the one in St Francisco de Alto. But the problem is what you do with your luggage when you visit a place where you do not stay overnight? If I could find a place to leave my large backpack in Solola, I would not need to return to Panajachel, but I could leave directly from Solola. I will figure out this mystery tomorrow. Before I closed the day activities I went to visit a museum tucked inside Hotel Posada de Don Rodrigo, a chain of 5 start hotels in Guatemala, very nice but the museum was useless. So, after that, I did my email, phones and got again a great ceviche de pescado from a different restaurant on Calle Santander.

The bus that I was advised to take was a regular bus but a Pullman. I was told to go at 6:30am in front of the McDonald , close to the market to a Panaderia. I went there and I asked and yes, the bus was coming there or nearby. I had my breakfast with Antigua Coffee and pane dulce and some meat pie and at 7:00 I went to the bus, paid Q36 and I was on my way to Los Encunetros. The bus ride took somewhere around 2 hours and they dropped me at the junction. This is actually what this place is. A connection of two main roads and everything is routed through this place. In the airplane industry it may be called a hub. Dropped was the word because all these buses are dropping their passengers and the luggage almost moving and they pointed me a local bus, nicknamed also the chicken bus because sometimes you may have other passengers except people, going to the market. The bus was full. This is an incomplete statement for anybody who traveled with this mode of transportation and this was just my perception. As a matter of fact, after I got on the bus other tens of people got in from different stations and somehow they sat down, sardines in a can. The ride took about half an hour and it was very intimate. We were 6 people on two seats that have a space between them but somehow we occupied the space also sitting on the benches. If you think that is not more space to throw a needle another person gets on the bus, and after the while the bus attendant starts to walk inside the bus to collect the money. He is very delft in this and in the same time he is constantly outside of the bus, in plain speed getting on top, and preparing the baggage that should be returned to the descending passengers. When they get down the bus almost stops and they get off catch the luggage and off we go again, the attendant being on top, or on one of the stairs, leaving one way and coming back the other way. It is a whole show to watch him. Meanwhile the driver is very relaxed on roads in hairpins, answering his cellphone and sustaining conversations. After the half an hour intimate ride I got in Chichicastenango, for the major event the Sunday market. There are two markets a week, Sunday and Thursday, both very active but this one has also the possibility to watch some religious events, and it happened. Chichi, as is called by everybody, is a magical town. It is a Maya town and this you can tell from everything. There are two churches, one in front of each other, that are only in name Catholic. The steps going to St Tomas, the main church look like the steps of the pyramids, and the atmosphere inside and on its entrance, reminded me of scenes from Jokhang Temple in Lhasa. In no other place, except Lhasa, I saw so much incense burning and the entire air being saturated with smoke from this incense. The atmosphere is magic. I spend a lot of time in front of the church, on its steps and inside, where unfortunately you are not allowed to take pictures, and this is not from commercial point of view. The church has plates in the middle of the nave where people come to put candles right on these plates on the ground. Besides them they put rose petals and pine tree pins. There are about 4 plates like these and is a continuous flow of Maya believers who come and pray or thank the Gods for what they achieved. It is mesmerizing and you cannot stop watching. This is true belief and the devotion you see around stays with you. After visiting the church I got out in the market that is right in front of its steps. Maya are coming from everywhere for this market and they come with chicken, pigs, wares, and vegetables among many others. They sell and buy and all are dressed in traditional clothing. After pounding the market, left and right, buying some textiles and having my lunch of fruits, as expected, melon, red and yellow, papaya, mango, and pine apple, I bumped into a building that was the inside market, where the show was magnificent. A flurry of activity with lots of buyers and sellers, a story only the video can tell. Getting out of the market I went to the church again where some petards were exploded. A mystical and interesting ceremony was taking place, with two important floats being taken out on its , now, cleared steps, and ported through the market to Iglesia De Calvario , that is in front. This was done by the Confradias, that are Maya associations that preserve the traditions among many other, but they are invited by the community to be part of it and in spite of the fact that it may cost them money to do it is accepted right away being very prestigious. As a matter of fact, the government has a mayor and a priest for the church, the first elected and the second appointed, but the locals elect a complete body of people that deal only with the indigenes. The locals, Maya, respect the authority imposed but they want to deal with its own elected authority. Petards, lots of incense burning, smoke and magic. They moved the floats to the other church and they performed a ritual, praying and dancing. I got to close with my shooting and I got a scold from one of the top guys so I had to go down and shot from a distance. They prayed to the four cardinal points and move the floats with their prayers and after that they started again to put petards to dispel the evil, and the evil formed from foreign tourist fled forced away by the noise. They danced with a large ball symbolizing probably the earth and when they were done they move back on the same way to the St Tomas church.
I returned with them and I went again in the church from where I took a guide to go to a hill nearby where is an idol, Pascual Abajo, venerated by the locals. He explained me lots of things that I already knew from the book, but he was nice and we chat going up the hill. We passed though Moreira that is a place that have masks used in festivities, Moreira being the combination of Maya with Spaniards. I wanted to buy some mask but I was already terrified to the amount I have to carry so I passed and we went to the idol, a nice 20 minutes walk in a pine tree forest. The idol is heavily used, it looks like a statue from Easter Island and here it got the name from. It was nobody there and he explained me lots of things related with colors and traditions. From the idol we went to the cemeterio, where the tombs of the Maya and the Catholic are separated and clearly distinct. The catholic being larger, with capellas and the Maya tomb being small but caring on top also the cross, a symbol that they were using well before the Catholics came with Columbus. I took pictures and I was lucky to see a ritual of some persons who were asking for good luck in business. Very interesting and eerie. One of the major issues that I had coming to Chichi was to figure out where to leave the backpack because I did not plan to get a hotel in town. In the morning, after I saw that the tourist office is closed on Sundays, I stopped at the Museo Colonial and I asked to leave it there. The custodian had his lucky day and he asked me for Q50 to do it. I was in a rush and I negotiated down to Q25, still astronomical but efficient, and now at 3:00pm I was supposed to go and pick it up because he was closing. I paid Alfredo, the guide, Q40 what we negotiated and I went to the museum where I picked the backpack and with such a heavy weight I just walked a little to look for some stuff near by. I tried to find a direct bus to Panacachel, the town on the shore of lake Atitlan, where I am now but I could not find and the only hope was the same famous chicken bus. It came after about 20 minutes wait and it was full to a level that even they considered reasonably full. So I stand in front near the driver not having the guts to get inside, no matter that still two guys were able to squeeze in somehow. I wanted to take a picture but I don’t know if the passengers have liked it. So I got back in Los Encuentros in half an hour from where I took an other chicken bus, this time empty to Solola, from where I took another bus to Pana, as Panajachel is known, total time 45 minutes. Calle Santander is the heart avenue of the town, full of hotels, restaurants, internet and international phones from where I made a quick call and posted the story from yesterday. After that I went to a travel agency to get info for the tomorrow tours on the lake and many others, like the bus to Xela, and followed by a delicious dinner of a generous cevice de pescado watching the end of the Superbowl and the Giants win.

Today was a tough day. It is possible to see Antigua in one day but how about in half a day. Los Nazarenos was nice but in the evening the water did not run. I don’t know why because in the morning was working with no problems. So I started to walk in the city at 7 30 and tried to see what can I do to visit Pacaya Volcano in the night. The owner of the hotel said that he preferred to go during the day because is clear and no clouds but in the night you can see the lava flow and is spectacular. So I preferred the night and I went into the centro and started to visit the market because it was the market day for Antigua. Interesting for the first market in Guatemala but if you were in other markets.
Lots of people coming to sell mainly vegetables and some other house wares. Aftre I gave it a tour I ended in the bus terminal that was right behind it. What a view to see all the chicken buses colored like is no tomorrow, a treat on the streets of the town. It is not a treat when you travel with them but about this latter. So I took lots of pictures of them, no chickens however.
From there I went to have breakfast and latter to visit the churches from the Northern part of the town. Convento and Iglesia de St Geronimo and La Recolection, both ruined like all the old churches of Antigua. The city was the glamorous capital of the Spanish territory of Guatemala and the Spaniards built lots of churches here. It is impressive to see these monuments completely ruined some of them being in existence for less than 50 years. In 1773 a strong earthquake destroyed the town and its buildings to such an extent that the Spanish kings decided to move the capital further away from the three volcanos that surround Antigua, and they used an old Maya settlement on the current Guatemala City, unfortunately not too far away from the earthquake area.
When you look at the impressive churches ruined and you see the huge walls looking towards the sky, you may have a glimpse of the power this extremely powerful corporation, the Catholic Church had in those days. And it last extremely influential even today, Quite a result of longevity for such an enterprise.
I could not enter the second church because I did not have quezales, and he did not want to get US$, so I went to the centro and after going and asking in different banks who had still long lines in front because of the payment day, I found one bank, suggested by a guy from the States who was living in Guatemala, where after a short wait I was able to exchange money. This problem solved I went to the agency and I bought a ticket for $8 for Pacaya in the afternoon leaving at 2:00pm and returning in the night. With this problem solved and three more hours to go , I started to visit the centre that I pounded the previous night, with its two palaces and the cathedral, and the remaining ruined churches: St Francisco, with its tomb of Hermano Pedro, the only saint recognized by the church from Guatemala, I stopped in Sky Café that I bumped into, the friendly owner brought me on the roof for pictures, to Santa Clara where Maya women wash laundry in some basins in front of the Church to Santo Domingo, converted in a 5 starts hotel and quickly I run to the hotel, to leave some stuff and to get warm clothes for the night on the volcano. I arrived at 1:50pm at the agency just to notice that they were closed and was no bus in site. After trying to ask what is going on, at 2:00pm I went to a nearby agency to ask and I was able to book quickly with them for only $5 and they brought me to the minibuses that were in front of the cathedral. Here everything that travels is full and the three minis were to the capacity, like in Vietnam or Laos. On the way to the volcano I chatted with a woman from Wisconsin who came here with Rotary club in a health mission similar with the one Peter from the plane mentioned. Apparently there are physicians and dentist coming here to help in a lot of humanitarian missions. The hike to the volcano is not so bad but tiring. You can get a horse that are parked in the same place where the buses stop and where you pay Q40 for the park entrance. The groups are very large, from 3 buses, and this is an advantage, because in the past there were robberies on the volcano but now apparently is tranquilo. It is heavy traffic on the volcano this being also a holy place for the Maya. A lot of people come in the night to see the lava flow, and we came down we met a lot who were just started to go up at 7:30pm.
The bus ride took somewhere around 1 hour and the walk took about 90 minutes with such a large and diverse group and we arrived to see the volcano and its petrified lava field. Seen from above it is spectacular but it looks like any other volcano, that has an unexploded cone. Is sending smoke every 20 minutes. We started to climb down to the lava field and we did not expect too much because from above you see some smoke but nothing else during the day and it was before sunset. But when we arrived deep on the lava field, we were up for a surprise because the viewing point is just several meters away from the lava flow that burns, cracks, smokes like a gigantic BBQ. As a result some Israeli guys brought some marshmallows to cook them in the volcano and they hooked them on the top of a walking stick, there were rented by kids at the base of the hike. Volcano marshmallows! I walked in various spots and the closest I got at around one meter away where it was, obviously, very hot. I took lots of photos and footage with the flowing and crackling lava, and it was very difficult for the guides to take us back. Eventually, we left and we stayed more on a point from where you could see, take picture and shoot , the origination of the lava flow that was coming down like a river. If you had enough time you have gone there, but walking on cinders from the volcano is not exactly a walk in the park and you have to be very attentive not to fall because the lava cuts you in no time.
We left and started to go down after the sunset and in the woods down became very dark and luckily some of the guys had flashlights. We took back the minibuses and during a ride I had a chat with Joe from Chicago, a student in medicine for Physician assistant, who was here with the same helping mission.
I arrived at 8:40pm and the surprise was waiting in the agency where I went to buy the bus ticket for to go next morning at 7 at Chichicastenago. The bus was full and at 9;00 all the agencies were closing and being Saturday everything was in party mood. I was at a loss because I had to leave to Chichi the next day to see the market and the cofradias so I went to the hotel to ask the girl for help. She was very nice and called several people and eventually, she told me what to do to take another bus, Pullman, at 7:00 that was going regular to Los Encuentros and changing from there with a chicken bus (local bus). She was so nice that I did not complain about the lack of water in the evening. I was not extremely happy but apparently I could go, so I went to have dinner in Sangre, a place that looks like the trendiest places in Soho or Las Vegas, with a very simple a very cool design, that I saw the previous day entering to see something else. The tuna was great but I was extremely tired after a very hectic day especially with all the problems with the agency that did not provide and the lack of ticket for the next day. Can I make it to Chichi the next morning?
I went to the internet place from the previous night, that I found to be closed on Saturday night, and I went to another one but I was so tired that I gave up and went to bed. This was a very tiring day with just a little food and a little water and running continuously. Not anymore!

Antigua! What a great city. Cobblestones streets. One story houses. Old buildings and ruined churches. A stroll on its streets is a treat for anybody. I arrived here after a bumpy flight caused by the storm from the NE and with several delays. All the flights in Charlotte, NC were delay and I was afraid that I may miss the baggage connection but the connection to Guatemala City was delayed more than an hour and everything went smooth. Except the bumps because there were clouds everywhere. In the plane I spoke with Peter , a physician from Kalamazzzo, MI who comes in Guatemala every year representing a Foundation that helps a local doctor to put some order in the health conditions of the indigenos from the villages of Lago Atitlan. Extremely interesting, because the efforts are amazing and most of the work done by the local doctor is voluntary because the patients are beyond the level of dirt poor. If they pay the visit, they pay $1 but even this is too much for most of them. And we talk health , is just about clean water, and toilets, etc. Peter will stay only there and like many other gringos is taking Spanish lessons in Xela but is not easy for native American speakers to catch the language. From the Guatemala City airport, La Aurora, very glitzy and in permanent construction, I shared a taxi with a couple from DC who wanted to go as fast as possible to climb tonight a volcano. The driver, Daniel, practiced seriously his English on us and spoke very nice about his country. We asked for several tips and we got them.
The road from Guatemala City to Antigua is about 45 km and it should be the same number of minutes but the traffic is intense and it took us about an hour to come intot Antigua, and he dropped us in front of Casa Cristina where the guys from DC had a reservation. I wanted to stay there but they did not have any rooms so I took a room in the nearby Los Nazarenios, a beautiful place, close to Iglesia de la Merced. I dropped my bag and left to the city to exchange money, quetzals, but today was a day of salary payments for Guatemalans so all the banks had such long lines in front like I did not see since the fall of Communism. Hundreds of people were lining up to get their payments and the result is that tonight a some of them were drunk. Luckily only few of them. I did not see in my life so many people lining up in all the banks in town, like the bank were going under. I gave up the idea of the bank and I tried an ATM but it said something and refused to give me money. But is no problem because obviously you can pay in US$. I walked the streets to get a sense of the town, that is not large is easily manageable in one day. When the evening came, I came back to Parque Central and I stopped to eat at Fonda de la Calle Real, where I tried the local dish, Pepiano Pollo, a sort of molle poblano but without mole and something else on top. Good. I tried also an interesting dessert whose name I forgot. In the night, after the restaurant close, 11pm on Saturday, the bars stay open till 1pm and the city is pretty alive, but I saw more young Guatemalans than gringos. During the days is gringotown. Everywhere you see foreigners and they of all the imaginable nationalities. It´s true that Antigua is a major destination and if you come to Guatemala you cannot miss it.
After dinner I got my fleece and I went for walk, in some shops selling souvenirs and artefacts, not as nice as I expected, and here I landed in this internet café. Good night!

This was my third visit to Bangkok and I decided to revisit the area around Rama I Road where I was last time in 1994.
After hanging out for a while on Khao Sarn Road and having a breakfast, I got a tuk-tuk that dropped me in the Pratunam market close to Baiyoke Hotel for 100B, quite a lot but I did not have the energy or the time to haggle. I gave him $3 that was roughly what he asked for and I found myself near the tallest building in Thailand.
I checked the market that was selling mainly for locals and I went on the streets and alleys nearby that are like a bazaar, lots of stalls selling tons of clothes mainly foreign brands counterfeit or possibly extra stock. I went back and forth, doing some shopping and I walked up latter to Ratchadumri Avenue where is a grand mall, Central World Plaza, adorned with huge pictures of Mr. Bean right in front of a Ganesh shrine where lots of people come to pray in a continuous flow. I wanted to see and shoot a little in the grand hotels, and first I went to Bai Yoke Hotel, the tallest building in Thailand, that has a restaurant on its 84th floor, but the time of the day was wrong and I planned to come latter in the evening, a thing that did not happen. Latter I walked on to the Grand Hyatt and further to the old Hilton, bought recently by Raffles, that has an interesting “linga” fertility shrine on its grounds. Obviously, when you are in that area you cannot leave without doing some shopping so I bought lots of gifts from the streets stalls, maybe too much.
I walked on Rama I Road and took the metro to Oriental and Shangri La, where I hang out in their restaurant and lobbies to cool from the outside heat and after a short walk in the area I took the boat on Chao Phra, a ride that I always enjoyed that brought me to a restaurant on the river’s shore, close to the main temple area, a place where I spent some hours every time when I was in Bangkok, where I enjoyed the sunset with a cold bottle of Singha beer.
The clock was ticking and I had lots of things to do back on Khao Sarn Road so I had to start going but on the way I passed through Sarang Luang, that was full of people running kites in the sky, a famous pass time in Asia, in a show of carefree living and enjoyment that hardly you can see in the West. I watched it mesmerized for a while, flying kites with the palaces and temples lit on the background and reluctantly I had to rush to pack and make the final arrangements for departure. This was a smart move, because there were many things to prepare and last minute purchases and, I found out in shock that the ride to the newly built airport, that I did not know about, takes now 90 minutes. So instead of 10pm I had to leave the city at 9pm and I rushed through everything I had to do, skipping dinner and most of the last moment shopping but still I went to buy a new Paul Auster book for the 18 hours direct flight to NY. The hourly airport minibus from Khao Sarn Road drove very fast at 100-120km/hour on the newly built and glitzy highway that connects the city to the airport and we arrived at the airport in 50 minutes due to lack of traffic at that time of the night.
The airport was packed like I never saw before. The line to the Thai check-in was as long as the size of the terminal and I was really lucky that I came one hour earlier because I had to wait more than one hour to do the check-in, that trickled down to a huge line for passport check and a last one for security, at the gate. So, no matter that I left Khao Sarn Road at 9pm I was able to enter the plane at 12:15am and all this time I kept waiting in lines……At the check-in, being obsessed by the long flight, I asked for a door seat and, by miracle, I was able to get one and this saved the day for two reason: first I got a great seat to stretch my legs and second I got a very pleasant travel partner in Tasha with whom I chat a considerable part of the flight. After dinner with a little wine and a shot of scotch, the previous sleepless night on the bus from Vientiane kicked in and I was able to sleep for 8 straight hours being awaken by the steward who was bringing breakfast.
Tasha was coming from Bali, another 4 hours flight, and was going to Boston, another 1.5 hours with some 4 hours layover in NY. Quite a journey! She is a jewelry designer her work being shown and sold in her mom’s gallery in Ipswich, MA and she works as a bartender in Boston to make some money trying to find her pace and sense in life. We had a great conversation and the time passed like they were just 3-4 hours. Thanks Tasha for the great time we had in this flight! I watched the movie “The Queen” that was great and soon they announced that we are landing on JFK where the temperature was 37F and we were still in sandals and silk pants…..Wake up. The dream is over. Back to reality!
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It is said about Vientiane that it may be the most peaceful capital in the world. The streets are calm, the traffic is limited and lazy and is hot. The dinner I had at Cote d’Azur was great with soup of fish cooked provencal by made out of dried fish and some kind of beef flambee, very tasty. I walked latter on the streets and I got to see the new hotel, Don Chan Palace, built with Malaysian contribution, the only tall building, besides the stupas, that exists in Vientiane. It is located off center, on the Mekong but inside it looks “Chinese luxurious”, meaning kind of bland and with no traits. Just a lobby with nothing, so different from the hotels built by Europeans and Americans architects. I left the hotel and went to take a walk on the Mekong, not a good move because is dark, so after a while I met some guards with a gun who asked me to go back because it is dark and it may be a little dangerous , no matter that in Vientiane crime is almost non existent. So I walked back and continued to walk to the hotel on the main promenade, towards my hotel that was closing the doors at 11:30pm. When I booked they did not have single rooms and I asked for a double room with bathroom, so they looked suspicious and they told me that the hotel closes at 11:30pm and …. no visitors. Laos, like most of the countries in SE Asia, is a major destination for sex-tourism and after dark, like In Thailand or Vietnam, the street is populated by a different crowd that congregate around the guest houses and hotels frequented by foreigners. During the evening I was trying to book a train to BKK for the next day but the offices were closed. I was convinced that is no problem to find a berth and I was wrong because the next morning when I started more convinced to do it, there were no more AC berths available, just with fans. I hesitated and latter on when I checked there were none left, the entire train being booked including first class. So I bought a bus ticket, that had some advantages, one of them was that brings you directly to Kao Sarn Road so I did not have to schlep my luggage from the train station.
In the morning trying to find seats on the train, I got to a guest house where I tried to make a booking. One guy who was at the reception asked me where I want to go and I said that I will go with a tuk-tuk directly to Pha That, that is a stupa famous in Laos, the symbol of the country that is also on the national flag. He said that he will go with me for free on his motorbike because he is a student in English and wants to practice the language. So, still waiting for an answer for the tickets, we left and visited the stupa located in the northern part of the town. Very interesting and beautiful, the stupa was full with people from Thailand who came in a weekend visit to Vientiane. I shot some video and I noticed a blemish that I did not notice before on the filter. After I figured out how to clean my viewfinder I noticed that the blemish is still there so I had to replace the filter with the UV one and shoot again. We visited also the two temples nearby and we left to their Arch located in a park close by, that is the symbol of the city. I climbed in the arch for a great view of the city, that as I assumed is flat with no tall buildings. After this visit we left back to the guesthouse fwhere he dropped me and left to school and I continued to investigate for my ticket. In the end not finding anything I bought from my guesthouse a bus ticket, that also had the advantage that instead of 15:00 they were picking me up at 17:00, extending my time in Vientiane for 2 more hours. I started around 11:00 the tour of the city, that is small enough in terms of attractions to be covered in 4-6 hours. I went to the market and I had some great shakes, looking through the overpriced items sold there. In Laos the asked prices are much higher than in the other countries in Asia, and you have to bargain hard to get to the real price. I bought another milk shake and I went to visit two importnmat wats, Wat Phre Kaw and Wat Si Saket. the first housing now a museum of religious objects and the other is the oldest wat in Vientiane. Most of the wats in Vientiane were destroyed in various wars in the 19th centuries and rebuilt in the 20th century, sometimes in a different style than the original. From there I continued to see an old stupa and several other temples, chatting with the monks that are kids getting their education in the wats, this being for many of them, country boys, the only way they can afford. All of them study English hoping to become guides and they want to practice, so they come to you to talk in English, asking mainly the same questions, where are you from, how many days in Laos, etc. I chatted with them everytime the possibility came by. Following my way to the other temples, that more or less look and feel the same, most of the having the “sim”, main building, built in Siamese style, I passed by a handicraft store where I purchased on the spot a great hmong wedding jewelry. Great stuff that I could not find anywhere else! I got another shake to cool off the heat, it was very hot in Vientiane, and continued my tour and at 4:30pm I went to the hotel to change, pack and be ready for the bus. The minibus came at 5:00pm and picked me up and several others to the border, where we exited Laos and got in the no main land. We left our luggage in the bus that is a two tiered one with super AC and reclining seats and we waited one hour tlll 7:00pm for the bus to leave. I chatted with a German student from Mainz and two Japanese sisters from Okinawa, one of them impressed me a lot because she spoke English extremely well with the high school vocabulary all the kids in America have. I asked her if she studied in the States and she said that she studied one year in high school. The kids are like sponges and they absorb right away. She was not perfectly fluent but she had an American accent and ALL the expressions of kinds in school: “amazing”, “actually”, and a lot of “like”s. The funny thing is that the German student was speaking in the same way without ever being in the States. He got it from movies I guess, but obviously the attraction of America is fascinating among young generation.
We left at 7:00pm and we stopped in Udon Thani that is the border to Thailand, we crossed after a passport check, got on the bus and stopped again after 15 minutes in a place on the shore of Mekong where they fed us, some veggie rice. I chatted with a girl from Vancouver who was on a long journey like most of the people here, going now for the wrap up to Pukhet and with one middle aged Italian from the Po delta who was traveling also for a long time, telling me that he suspended his job for 4 years (!) in order to travel. After that the bus stopped only at 12:30, a classical stop for all the buses for the driver and the assistants to eat. This is not great because they wake you up and is hard to get asleep after that. The ride was great, the entire way on highway of several lanes where the buses are driving very fast. The bus was very good, (yes, we are finally in Thailand), and we arrived in Khao Sarn Road at 4:30am, much earlier that planned. The street just started to wake up, only the girls and the other “girls”, the boys, where pondering it looking for late customers. I left my luggage at a hotel, shaved, washed, got a quick fix with a watermelon and I am ready to go for a day in Bangkok. My flight is tonight at 12:35 am

Vang Vieng is quite of a place. It is populated with young backpackers and is surrounded by karst peaks with tons of caves inside. Also, the river that crosses it represents its major attraction for water sports and the mountains are enticing for biking and rock climbing. It is an outdoor sports place like Moab, UT or similar. Meanwhile, the place is full of guest houses that charge ridiculously cheap prices, around $5/night, and is full of restaurants that have these style table-beds with pillows like in Dahab, Egypt, with the difference that the pillows are not directly on the ground/sand, but on these elevated beds like in the chaikhanas of the Middle East. So all the “falangs”, foreigners, and locals are stretching their bones on these beds, eating on a small table in front of them and watching a large TV that is playing mainly “Friends” or soccer. I knew about all this but I said that is worth seeing to believe it!
Most of the backpackers are hanging out there for many reason one being the cheap accommodation and food, the great crepes on the street very popular in the night and lots of sport activities , that make many of them to stay for at last a week in Vang Vieng.
In the morning after I had my breakfast of eggs and coffee, I started to explore the places around and what better way to do it than by bike. So, I rented a bike for $1 and I went to see a cave on the other side of the river Nam Song. The cave was interesting but no big deal, but the beauty was the nature around, with the beautiful river and the karst peaks that were magnificent. I biked around, in the forest on small paths where the legends says that the entire area is populated by spirits, and I came back in town, going again on the other side to see a beautiful guest house a German woman on the way mentioned it to me. The guest house named Maylin, held by an Aussie I guess, is charming with adorable gardens and cottages on stilts and everybody living there were like living in paradise. It was funny that I got to talk with two Irish. She was laying in a hammock and was so sorry that she had to leave because the whole setting was marvelous. She kept saying that she is very sorry and very sorry, but she has to be in BKK by tomorrow. I consolated her telling that I have to go to work myself and I asked her where she has to go from BKK, expecting something like Dublin, but she said that she has to go to ………..Sri Lanka. I felt her pain into my soul! What a trade off: Vang Vieng to Sri Lanka. I said good bye to them and planned that we will meet at the bus stop because they were taking the same 1:30pm VIP bus to Vientiane. Meanwhile I talked in the guest house with a couple from Vancouver who were already traveling for about 4 months, 3 in Vietnam and they were going for an entire year.
From Maylin guest house I went directly to the bus station to buy my ticket and when I arrived the guy from the booth asked me if I want to go with the local bus at 12:30pm for only 25000. The price was irrelevant but because I had nothing special planned, I went back and dropped the bike and took my luggage and I made it in time for the 12:30 local, on a bus in a very bad shape (where I met the Irish couple) but it did the trick and reached Vientiane in exactly four hours, at 4:30pm. The ride was good, with all the windows open for fresh and non-AC air. A tuk-tuk brought me for 15000 kips to the Mekong promenade and after choosing between two guest houses I ended up in Joe’s Guest house where I have AC and I am right on the Mekong for $14, quite expensive for Vientiane standards. I walked a little and found all sorts of Internet places and overseas call centers and I plan to eat tonight at Cote d’Azur, a French restaurant and after that, to have a beer on the Mekong.

After I finished my blog I left to my guest house, Hoxieng, to drop the bike and pick up my Romanian passport that I left it as guarantee. The guy was astound when he saw the passport because he never heard about Romania and now he saw somebody from there. But before I was able to reach home I bumped into Hunter in the market and we started chatting. He told me to go to the agency because the guy was concerned that I did not show up today to pay so he did not know if I will come with them the next day. He told me a little about himself, studied System engineering, that is applied math for solving engineering problems and he worked in MA for a defense contractor till last year when he left for Thailand, where he liked it a lot and decided to try to live and work there, so he posted his resume on a website in BKK. A high-school in Phisanoulok found it, called him for a math teacher position, interviewed him and offered the position at the interview. He was the only applicant and they offered him around $900/month a large salary for teaching in Thailand. The job was easy because the expectations are very low, just to be presentable and to be able to get along with the other people, so they liked him and they wanted to raise his salary and offered him another year to teach, but he decided to return in the States where he wants to teach math so, after his return, he will apply for the certification and start teaching math in high school. He found his way in life in Thailand!
We kept chatting about my own family connection with math and I had to leave him to solve my immediate and non-math problems, in any case we would have met next morning for the trip. I went to the agency, I paid and I dropped the bike and eventually I took the passport latter in the evening, because the guy was not there, and I left to visit the night market for the last shoppings, that are always a lot and the result was that I filled up the new backpack I bought in Vietnam with things from the market….
I went to sleep at 11pm and next morning, the host started to knock in a door and woke me up around 5am but I did not get down from bed till 6:15am when I went to see again the monks, but just the ones coming near my guest house. I packed and I went for a coffee that was good this time at Joma, reading the paper to see what is still going on with the hazy air that was settled over the city and country in the last days, caused by the fact that the peasants are burning the rice fields to clear them for the new plantation. The haze is terrible and it is also over Chiang Mai in Thailand causing a number of people to check into the hospital and obliging the Thai government to spray water from the planes to try to clear it. I paid the guesthouse and I asked them for an extra receipt, and I got both stamped by the travel agent, and they give me some water and bananas to have it on the way. The van was in front and the driver loaded my luggage and we went to pick up Hunter and Dana from their guesthouse and at around 8:15am we left towards Phonsavanh, the capital of the province Xieng Hoang the place where is located the Plain of Jars. The trip was more than awful because was on a continuos winding road the same way as the one when we crossed from Meteora to Metsovo, the only road where as a driver I got nauseous. But this road was not one hour like the other one, but 7 hours and continuosly winding. We stopped several times to get air and all three of us were kind of nauseuos. Each time I had to stretch on the car bench to calm my stomach but in the end none of us threw up. At least this! Obviously that the landscape was beautiful, we continuously crossed mountains, the country being very mountainneous. Winding road with lots of hair pins going up and down for almost 7 hours! And if this would not have been enough, on the way Hunter mentioned to us that the road between Luang Prabang and Vang Vieng was listed in February 2007 on US State Department Advisory list as a no-go destination for Americans. There were attacks on buses that happened in the past and the road was listed as unsafe. The Hmongs conducted a guerilla war against the government forces that lasted since 1975 till 2004 when they gave back the guns but in situations like this, many guns still remain available used by wrong doers. These guys were coming from the mountains and attacked villages and buses but the book said that these incidents did not happen for a long time. Still on the way, in each village we saw at least one person carring an AK47 but when we asked everybody told us that they were government soldiers guarding the village and we should not worry because the road is very safe… Finally at around 2:15 pm the road got to be in a lower plain and we arrived in the nondescript town of Phonsavanh at 3:15pm. I got a room for 70000 kips at “Nice Guest House” and we went for lunch of sweet and sour fish and rice. After lunch the sun was towards sunset so we went for a walk in the market that was full of unknown products and we tried some of them. Hunter has a passion for languages and he learned German and studied some Arabic and in Thailand learned Thai so he was able to talk with people here in Lao, the languages being very close to Thai. He knew a lot about the world, traveled in Eastern Europe also and he impressed me by the fact that he knew that my name is Romanian. Dana grew up in a farm in CT and he was a horse trainer. He went to the university on a scholarship for polo, a sport she told me many things about, and she worked in Hawai as a polo player and horse trainer. Now she wanted to play polo just for fun, staying away of the glitzy crowd that populates this game, and to work more to train horses . I lost them in the market and when I finished my visit I started walking the main street but it was nothing to see, just a beautiful sunset, so I sat in a restaurant to have a beer and read my book. The restaurant named symbolic “Craters” is located near the MAG office, that is the office sponsored mainly by New Zeeland to do demination here, the main danger in a region that is littered with mines and UXO, all sorts of detonable devices from the American war and also from the war between the Vietnamese and Royal Lao Forces. The area was bombed to oblivion by the US because the Vietnamese setlled here and they were running the front from this area, so the number of sorties was extremely high to the point that the capital Mueng Sai was completely obliterated and after the war was over, they had to move the capital of the province in Phonsavanh, because there were no buldings left standing in the old capital. MAG did the demination of the main sites in the Plain de Jars and the sites can be visited since 1990 but still you have to walk only on marked path, being a slight possibility to still exist undetonated explosives. The number of bombs that were thrown from planes was so large that their cases are used for decoration in town, “Craters” having four tall cases standing in front of the restaurant and there are many more in Bomb Cafe and other. You can see all sort of bomb cases, both from aluminum and steel, the ones from aluminum used to make pans and pots by the villagers. I had my book and beer till 9 00pm and I went to the hotel earlier for a shower and a good sleep but unfortunately I was awaken latter by some noisy guests.

Next morning I woke up at 6:00 am I packed and I went outside in a nice sunrise for a quick walk and breakfast. I met Hunter and Dana and at 8:00 am the driver came to pick us up in the hotel. I went to the bus station to buy a ticket for tonight bus, (VIP bus at 7:00pm – 6 hours to VV , local bus at 4:00pm – 7 hours to VV) and I noticed that the price dropped considerably at the bus station compared with what I spoke with people in the city! No surprise! From there we left for Plain of Jars, an area that has a lot of jars, huge stones sculpted inside used probably for storage, but about which nobody knows anything when or by whom were built. It is a megalithic mystery of Laos, the only place where these Jars/stone exists. There are several legends, each minority having his own, but the bottom line is that nobody has a clue. There are about 60 sites in the area with jars like this but only 3 are visitable being demined. The bombs thrown from the American bombers left many craters and destroyed many of jars in the area named in the war, PDJ, a French acronym for Plain de Jars. We met or guide, Mr. Yeung who joined us latter on, and we visited Sites 1,2 and 3, all being relative close to one another but still you have to go by car. What is interesting is the large concentration in each of these sites and nothing in between. The supposition is that the jars were used by the villages for storing various things, including people , alive as jail or dead as in a cemetery. Some jars have lids but very few still remain. Mr. Yeung gave us all sorts of stories and we visited also a cave used by the Vietnamese army as a hospital. Some jars were short but several were as tall as the height of a person. The whole visit was short, maybe about 2-3 hours and it proves that it can be done in one long day RT from either Luang Prabang or Vang Vieng but the agencies want to do it in no less than three days. Because we still have lots of time on our hands we went to visit a destroyed Russian tank and the old capital, the obliterated city of Mueng Sei. The only 3 things that remained standing was the old French Office, the old temple dating from the 16th century and an old stupa. All three are kept as they were with no renovation, a relic of the bombardments. We visited all three and we went back to Phonsavanh. On the way back, realizing that we have a lot of time left in the day, we decided to change gears so Hunter and Dana asked to be driven that day to Eastern Laos, instead of the next day, an me , after a short stint at the Internet Cafe to complete my story I picked up a tuk-tuk for $1 and I went to the bus station where I changed my ticket for a local bus at 4:00pm, and they even gave me 10000 kips back. The other local bus in the morning at 9:30am did not leave because of lack of passengers. Because I felt so nauseous the other day when we came by minibus I was horrified by the prospective to take again the same road, even for only half of it. So I did not eat and drink anything all day, except some fruit in the morning. I had a bottle of water with me and that’s it and I kept pondering if the VIP bus from 7:00pm would be better that the local, that has small seats and no AC. But to my surprise the ride to Vang Vieng was very smooth with no problems and no nauseous feelings. I understood once again that these minibuses, that are great because they pick you up at the hotel, are a pain because they drive faster and you are less comfortable in them. After a good part of the way with the local bus when I saw that I feel perfect I ate a sandwich and bananas and drank some water. I chat with two Dutch girls from Rotterdam who were traveling for 3-4 months and they plan to visit so much in SE Asia that even I thought that is a little exaggerate. We talked a lot about Burma where they wanted to go but they were reluctant. The VIP and the local bus takes the same 6-7 hours to Vang Vieng and I reached Vang Vieng at 10:30 pm, the bus station being on a long Airstrip built by the Americans in the war, Lima site 27, and right away I got my luggage to Nana guest house very close to the bus station, that for $5 gave me a spotless room with two beds and a perfectly clean bathroom. I did not have too much time, people in Laos go to sleep early so I went right away on the main street, got a crepe with chocolate and a beer, weird combination, watching in awe the restaurants and discotheques that populate this town, where people are not sitting but they lay down on some kind of elevated tables, with another table in the middle, similar with what they have in the tea houses in Central Asia or in Dahab, Egypt on the beach. I watched a snippet of Friends, that runs on all TVs in Vang Vieng, a snippet of a soccer match of Manchester United and went to bed. During the night it rained twice, strongly, but when I woke up in the morning the rain was over.

Laos is the dream come true. I spoke with many travelers in this trip, here and in Vietnam who were in Laos and all of them went more or less through the same experience: they planned the trip in Laos for 1-2 weeks based on what they were able to read in the book and all of them ended up extending their visa and no necessary because they found much more to see or explore. It is just the atmosphere of, probably, one of the best kept secret in SE Asia.

Sabaidee! This is the salutation you hear continuously from everybody. It is for “Hello” and “Goodbye” also and it is used also by the foreigners and is nice and comfortable to hear it. In Vietnam everybody says “Hello” or “Hi” and everything is very pro-American, surprising after such a difficult past, but maybe the new market economy makes people try emulate America. Here a lot of things remained French, including the inscriptions on the major institutions, like the Post Office, but still the salutation is local.
Last night, after I had my email done, I went for dinner to the oldest restaurant here in Luang Prabang, dating from 1960, and I had Stuffed Bamboo shoots, a very good and interesting dish. Inside the bamboo shoots they put some meat and they fried it, the dish being delicious. As a matter of fact the food I had here is exquisite, maybe caused by the large number of tourists and travelers who can afford to pay just a little more on dishes. Not the same thing is in Vietnam, where if you want to have good food you go to the best restaurants, that comparatively with the rest of them are slightly more expensive, (still very cheap comparing with USA or Europe). Otherwise the food in Vietnam is repetitive and unappealing.
After dinner I walked on the main street and I bumped into Susan who was nursing a beer in one of the restaurants. We chatted for two hours, a great discussion about many issues. After she raised in Virginia her two daughters, who just finished college, she retired from a job of photography, graphic design and product conceptualization and marketing, sold her house and she began wandering throughout the world. She got a voluntary position with Peace Corp in Essaouira, Morocco where she lived for two years working with the Berbers who were making handicrafts, helping them promote their products. She learned one of the Berber languages and when she was done she decided that she will keep traveling. So, now she wants to spend half of the year traveling in SE Asia and other places and half of the year working with the guys who bought the Silk Mill in Pittsfield, MA, who want to create there a artist commune with work, living and exbition spaces. We are invited to the opening of the first exhibit in June.
I left Susan at 10:30pm and I went home to take a shower and go to sleep because I had to wake up in the morning to see the monks. Again!

The monks did their tour of duty the same like the day before, long rows of yellow robes, taking their rice in silence and peace. I met Gunther and I walked with him, losing him latter in the crowd. From there I went back home to dress for the day and I went to have breakfast on the Mekong, Lao black coffee, banana shake and omelette with a Mango cake that they sell in the city. Plus the views over the Mekong in the morning! When I left the restaurant I bumped in a middle aged Aussie that I met yesterday on the boat. She was telling yesterday about the hellish experience she had riding the bus from Hanoi to Vientiane. The bus was crammed to maximum, having a bench in between the chairs to fill it to more than capacity. It was an AC bus, so the windows could not open being sealed, but….the AC did not work and inside was like in steam bath. The entire trip took…23 hours, leaving at 8:00pm and reaching the border at 8:00am and entering Laos at 9:30 am. She said that she would not wish it to anybody, but she was lucky because…. the other day the bus broke down and the passengers missed the border opening so they had to sleep in the border town and it took …45 hours to get to Vientiane. So I guess that my one hour flight did the trick !
She will travel till her money run out, somebody was renting her house in Australia implicitly paying her mortgage, and she traveled a lot when she was young but she told me regretfully, with no too much interest in those times for cultural travel. And I know what she talks about because I see many young travelers who are here to have a great time, not knowing most of the times what great opportunities they have to see these great sites. It is just about hanging out and living in a cheap place where money is running longer and they chill more without work. Obviously, most of them are not like this and they are deeply involved in seeing, exploring and understanding the culture of the place.
After I parted with the Aussie, who was going to live in a tree house for three days to see and hear gibons, a successful ecotourism program that she decided to join, I went to rent a bike for $1 a day and I start exploring the city. I did not have any plan today and I wanted to wander with no checkboxes or lists of to-do things. I saw several temples that I missed last time but this was not the intention, I just bumped into them. I crossed a bridge trying to get to a place and I found a meditation temple, about which I read but I had no idea how to reach it. It was looking and feeling like the one we saw in Chiang Mai, with inscriptions on trees but his time just in Lao not in English. It has a beautiful gilded stupa on three tiers.
From there I came back in town and biked lazily to other places and I visited two more temples. I stopped around 2pm in a very hip coffee place, Jabo, close to my guest house, a sort of local Starbucks with pastries and nice assortment of coffee, but the frappucino I had was more than disappointing, so I may skip it tomorrow no matter that I planned it for breakfast.
After that I stopped in several stores to buy some things and I went on Mekong to cross it to see some temples on the other side, not very convinced but still… But maybe the weather noticed my visiting mood so it started to rain and I took refuge in a store waiting for the rain to stop, forfeiting my plan to cross the river. The rain continued and after I got some info from an agency for the next time I come to Laos, to go to Mueng Sing, I biked through rain stopping in some other stores. The stores are expensive here. They know that the ones who are buying from them have to have money so they jack up the price ridiculously. I bought a hanging from Sapa for $4 that here they try to sell for $62!!! The same one! There are also very beautiful stores with remarkable things. I found extremely beautiful weaving that they sell, different ones, in the market for $4-7 but in this store they were, of a different quality and an exquisite taste, for $300-650. Eventually, I decided to go to eat something so after I stopped at the guesthouse to take my book to read I went to a great restaurant that I saw on some ads named Tamarind, that makes traditional Lao food. They served me sticky rice, that you eat with your hand making a ball and getting the food with it. The food was more than delicious, was an experience in itself on all sort of spices and dishes from Luang Prabang, a seaweed from the Mekong that they dry outside with sesame, garlic and tomatoes, eggplant salad cooked in a different style, coriander as salad that I never ate before and some sweet tomatoes all with a local hot sauce. They are specialized in these kind of specialty dishes and they do not serve dinner so I told them that I will link them to the blog http://www.tamarindlaos.com , one of the best culinary experience I had in Laos.
When I finished lunch/dinner it was almost 5:30pm and the monks in the wat across the street started to chant, a thing that all monks do at that time. I joined them and I shot some video inside and moved latter for more chants and more video and sound recording in another wat nearby that I missed to see inside. I wanted not to miss any more the chance to call home so I came and at 6:30pm I spoke with Victor who just woke up and was very happy when I told him that we will play together soon.

Last night after I wrote the blog I walked a little in the night market where I bought several things and I was pondering what to do. I kept entering in agencies and talk with guides to see if I can go to the North. Apparently, the guy who gave me the first information, was misinformed and the night bus ride to Luang Nam That, that he told me that is 7 hours is actually around 10 hours and the ride to Muang Sing that he told me that is 1.5 hours is actually 4 hours and not back to back, Muang Sing being all the way in the North at the border with Burma. These are the ways you have to deal on travel, especially if you go on sites that are way out of the beaten path and no information you receive, including this one is not guaranteed. So this destination was out of question and I started to investigate for the original plan with the Plain of Jars. I found two guys leaving today and coming back to Luang Prabang in 3 days but that did not serve me at all, no matter that it was a possibility riding a night bus to Vang Vieng, so I put it as an option and I thought that the morning will bring something and it did.

The monks are the heart of Laos. When the Commies took power in 1975, sweeping in victory the entire Indochina they banned the offering of alms to the monks, that represent the core belief for Buddhists. As they got in trouble, because one year later there were riots in the streets, they had to reinstate it and live in a communist system with religion on the side. Still they banned many children for going to monasteries and introduced the indoctrination in temples but the alm offering remained. I was in the morning at 6:00am and latter at 6:30am to see this alm offering and is a spectacle by itself to see a long row of monks aligned on the side of the street coming from far away to the place where are seated people who give them rice. A long row of yellow robes with a large bowl of rice that they open and accept the offer. Begging for monks is a major element in Buddhism in order to make you humbler and acept that you don’t mean anything. This alm offering is important both for the believers but also for the monks to strengthen their religious education. The long line of yellow robes passed in front of my camera, impressive and silent, the whole procession that lasts somewhere around 15-20 minutes happens in silence in the dark light of the early morning.
On the sidewalk were lots of people aligned on straw mats with bowls of rice giving each monk a little rice…. And throngs of tourists to see the show, some of them making also the offer.
It finished around 6:45am and I went to have breakfast on the shore of the Mekong, coffee and omlette with the always present fruit shake. Right after breakfast trying to get in contact with a guy from an agency with whom I spoke yesterday, I entered another agency and I asked about the trip to Plain of Jars, a place that is quite out of the way and few people go because is not cheap. The guy told me that he has two Americans going there on Wednesday and continuing to the border with Vietnam. No matter that in my mind was to leave there on Tuesday, tomorrow, I found it very convenient and I decided in my mind to go with them. Actually, returning to the agency later today for the day trip I booked, I met them in the agency: Hunter teaches Math in Physanoulok, Thailand and is from MD and Dana is from CT at the border with RI, close to Cape Cod. I chat with them a little and they were happy latter on in the trip when I told them that I may join. The trip of today, a classic of the area is a two part trip. In the morning we left with a long boat on Mekong admiring the life on its shores with the fishermen in full action. We arrived, after we stopped to a village that makes whiskey, as they call it, a typical tourist trap, to some caves, Pak Ou, where the kings of Laos brought every year statues of Buddha as offers, most of them standing, Luang Prabang style. The statues are small and they fill several ledges in the cave and the whole experience would have been great if I did not visit the Buddha cave in Kalaw , Burma, where the statues are huge, gilded and you walk through them like through a forest. So for me the cave was a total disappointment. There are two caves and the second one, in spite of being dark was more interesting than the first. The good thing was that the caves are somewhere up the cliff that confers great views over the Mekong.
From there we returned directly to Luang Prabang. I had lunch, papaya salad and two(!!!) fruit shakes and I left for the second part of the trip that visits a waterfall 30 km out of Luang Prabang, Keung Si. I did not expect much, I saw enough waterfalls to be weary of them, but what was there enchanted everybody. It was a tropical forest with cascades that were falling one from another in blue small pools of waters, like you may see in movies and the guys from Las Vegas try to recreate in Mirage Casino. Actually the first impression when I got there was that I saw this in the lobby of Mirage Hotel!!!!! If you keep walking up you get to the main cascade, so tall and beautiful on several tiers falling from one to another, each in a blue pool. Absolutely everybody was more than enchanted to see it and is hard to describe in words and maybe even in pictures, the impression that lasted on us.
From there we returned directly to Luang Prabang and we did not stop in a Hmong village as the schedule was. I met in the bus an American, Susan, who will be for 3 years in Pittsfield, MA where some guys bought the old silk mill and try to convert it in an art space, for the artists to show their work. She is the artist that will conceptualize this conversion. I went home took a shower and came back in town , crossing the busy night market, bought some scarves and came here for the phone and internet. Latter dinner and tomorrow I want to rent a bike and go around the town. You don’t want to leave this place!

Luang Prabang is magic. It is Thailand 20 years ago, because Thailand now is so touristy not being anymore the calm paradise of the forgotten hippies. Lunag Xueng Prabang was the capital of Laos till the communists moved it to Vient Cheng, the “sandalwood city”, renamed by the French, Vientiane. The king built here a palace, that was originally supposed to be the French governor palace, at the beginning of the 20th century and ruled the country from here. But the roads were terrible and Mekong unreliable so a trip on the Mekong from here to Saigon took longer than an ocean crossing to Paris. So Luang Prabang remained unspoiled by times and modernity and just recently the road got renovated and you can get to Vientiane in 10 hours by bus on a switchy mountain road. It looks like a larger village but is full of temples called wat like in Thailand, built in a similar style, and lots of restaurants, bars, internet cafes and outfitters who wants to take you in all sorts of adventures, by bikes, elephants, rafting or kayaking. I woke up early but I laid down in bed and I had my breakfast of fruits with yogurt and sandwich on French bread finished at 9:00am and just after that I left in exploration. I visited most of the wats in town, the town being small and if you rush a little you definitely can cover in a day or two. I took it very easy, chatting with monks and visiting slowly the sites and the Royal Palace. The king, after was appointed by the Commies “Supreme Adviser”, on the same model they did in Vietnam, was jailed in a cave and he died in the 80s of malnutrition and lack of medicine. Officially…. it is not official version but his picture, statues and portraits are all over the palace, that look exactly the way it was when he was evacuated from it. His two daughters are living in Paris, two sons in the USA and another one of them, the Crown Prince is here in Luang Prabang in his previous residence that is transformed in hotel nowadays, after Laos also adopted market economy policies. I walked the entire day through the wats, on the shore of the Mekong and his tributary, Nom Kham, Luang Prabang being located on a sort of peninsula between these two rivers. I stopped at lunch for a cold beer in a very shi-shi bar Kili Wine Bar, rested a little and after that I climbed the steps on top of the hill, Phu Si, to see the view of the city, unfortunately covered in a sort of smoke the entire day that makes the visibility limited. It gives a hazy look to the sun. Coming back to the main street I tried to call again at “bunici” but to no avail and I had an early dinner of Indian Food, not so good like the great Lao dish of fish I had yesterday in Tam Tam Bamboo. Now I will go in the night market, something similar with Chiang Mai with the difference that it closes around 10pm because the entire city does not stay late at all, except several bars for foreigners. I tried during the morning to arrange a trip to the Plain of Jars but it is not so easy. If you go by bus it takes one day each way and you spent one day there. I tried to go by minibus, just two days but I have to find other people to do it and it may be more difficult. So, if it does not work out I may skip it and do something else in the North in an area with markets and many other minorities. It is a great difference between Laos and Vietnam, a difference that the French tried to ignore and failed. The Annamite Line separates the two people and this mountain range is actually the demarcation between the Chine influenced people and the Hindu influenced people. In spite of the fact that Champas were Hindus they were complete absorbed in the Vietnamese state that had a huge Chinese heritage. Everything there is Chinese, starting with the temples that look and feel like in China, with the Buddhist tradition that does not have the Buddha statues we were used to, the Confucius influence that is the core of the belief and finishing with the people that act like the Chinese, but being more gentle and nicer that the Chinese, with the food that resembles the style of Chinese cooking, that after 3 weeks I could not take it anymore and I went for an Australian Steak…. Besides, the Chinese influence and the new market economy made Vietnam the new capitalist Mecca, and people act this way. Everything is business, calls for ” buy from me”, “cheap”, money photo”, “one picture one dollar”, “give tip”, “sama same…but different” are regular and all the foreigners are amused or annoyed by them. They made it as logo on T-shirts and the worst place is Sapa, where the Black Hmong are the most intense. The tranquility you expect in SE Asia has nothing in common with Vietnam and the worst is in the big cities where the traffic can make your life a hell. But after a while, maybe a little more than 1 week, you learn to walk in the middle of a hellish traffic thinking about your stuff, ignoring and being completely oblivious at the cacophony of sounds that surrounds you. Absolutely anybody who has any form and size of a horn, be sure that he will use it continuously and after a while in your mind the noise disappears… Maybe you were able to stop the world! When you land in Luang Prabang the shock is huge. The fact that the buses are not pressing the horns and nobody is peddling towards you is so surprising that you think that you landed in paradise. Everything is very slow, like the flow of the Mekong, people do not smile all the time but they are extremely nice and very polite, the time stops and you realize that you landed back in time, maybe sometimes in the 60s in a dreamy Thailand. Everybody who stays here, stays much more than they need, hang out, take a bike, nurse a beer, or chat with others. This looks to be the place where everybody comes to relax after a “tour of duty” in India, Vietnam or China. And me too also, because now my vacation starts from here!

Last day in Hanoi was dedicated to the the Old Quarter, named also the “36 street quarter”, the old area of the city that housed the old time guilds of the city, 36 guilds in total that gave it its name. I forfeited the breakfast in the hotel and I went to a restaurant for a breakfast of fruits and a delicious shake of a mix of fruits, something that I don’t know if it can be so good in any country from the North. After that I started to walk the quarter. Each street that carries the name Hang, that means in Vietnamese “merchandise”, was the place where in the past that particular item was sold: there are streets for rope, clothes, shoes, religious items, silversmith, jewelers, blacksmiths, funerary stones, etc. I started the tour at the Hoang Kiem lake that sits in the middle of the city and it has on in its middle an island on which is located a temple dedicated to a national hero, this being very “in” in Vietnam, the same like in China. There are many temples dedicated to kings, generals, scholars and heroes. From that temple I started to walk the guild streets that now-a-days do not sell anymore always only that merchandise but for sure it exists a concentration. I followed a tour that is recommended in the book and I reached interesting places, and several temples and pagodas located inside the quarter. The streets are charming being shaded by trees in the entire Hanoi, but unfortunately the spring mist that started in the morning became more and more annoying and was becoming a real drizzle. I kept walking, arriving at one of the old city gates and following the street on which there were selling funerary items, I got to the mysterious place where they sell the fake money, stashes of copied hundred dollar bills that they burn as offering in temples in the main kang, oven. These and many others are part of the offering for the dead part of the famous Confucian tradition of worshiping the ancestors, the core activity during the Tet festival of the Lunar New Year. From there I went for a little longer walk to get on the famous bridge over the Red River that was the main target for the American aviation during the war. It is the major artery that connects Hanoi to outside at it was bombed 8 times but repaired easily by the Vietnamese. On the bridge was a group of “short haired” Americans that were on a tour to various sites related to to the American War. They looked like Marines and their guide was talking only about sorties and how many bombs can destroy an objective. He had also the same hairdo! The bridge is impressive, apparently was built by a student of Eiffel. Currently is still a main road, being in the center of the city and is crossed by train and motorbikes. It was getting late , almost 10:00am and I had to be back at the hotel at 12:00 the latest, when the taxi for the airport was coming, so I hit directly to see Uncle Ho laying down. The drizzle from the morning became rain and I did not have anything with me for cover, even a cap, but there were 21C so was no big deal. I thought that it was easy to see Uncle Ho, but the line was impressive even in the on and off rain. I checked the luggage, because you are not allowed to enter the tomb with any kind of cameras or cellphones and I proceeded to stay in line, sometime around 30 minutes. I was able to make it because the tomb is open only 5 days a week between 8-11, and I did it right before 11:00am. I got drenched in the rain and inside was AC but the view is very short trying to accommodate so many people that came in trips to see Ho. It is better done that the tomb of Mao in Beijing because you walk around the crypt. Ho was quite a character and no matter what bad things he may have done, he will remain in history like a great figure for Vietnam. Seeing the amazing cult for ancestors the Vietnamese have, especially the ones who made a difference inn the history of the country, you realize that Ho achieved both the independence and the unification of the entire country. So any missteps, and even disasters of the communist experiment, will be easily forgotten by anybody balancing these great achievements. And all were corrected now when the country is moving ahead to a market economy of the most capitalistic nature. From Uncle Ho’s tomb, that ended symbolically my visit in Vietnam, I went thorough the unceasing drizzle to the hotel but before I stopped to a store, in the way, where I bought something the other day to get a receipt. At the hotel, I packed and repack because the whole issue about this flight was that I must have 20 kg. So I took a lot of stuff on me together with all the books and I crammed as best as I could all the stuff in one bag hoping for the best. Besides, I had another package that I bought in Dalat. I paid the hotel and took some receipts from them, chat a little with some Aussies, originally from Vietnam whom I met the day before before I left to Tam-Coc and I got in the cab that was waiting in front of the hotel. The airport is far and it took him an hour to get there but the check-in went smoothly and it turned out that my luggage barely did it, being somewhere around 19kg. After quite a wait I got in the bus that brought us to a plane that looked tiny near a Boeing 777 but it did not look so tiny latter on. It was a propeller plane, the first time I flew one of these guys, ATR 72 made in France and did pretty good in the 1:15 hour flight to Luang Prabang, the old capital of Laos. The plane had 70 seats but I guess that there were maybe 20 people in it. We landed in Luang Prabang at 4:00pm right in front of the airport building and we got out and enter the airport and I got a 15 days landing visa on the airport. For the picture they scanned the passport… I did not catch in time because if I entered on the Romanian passport would have been cheaper…..The formalities were a breeze comparing with Vietnam and I found myself outside together with 4 French people with whom I shared a taxi-van for $1 each and we got into the city right away parking in front of a guest house. Right away you realize that finally you arrived in SE Asia. Vietnam it may be located geographically in SE Asia but culture wise is more in China, the 1000 years of occupation and the new economy of the country changing aggressively their culture. The tranquility of SE Asia does not exists there, everything is a rush and a humongous cacophony of sounds and noise that make people completely immune. In Vietnam absolutely everybody who has a horn is using it fully and the entire pedestrian, animal and motor traffic does not hear it anymore, because is more than a second nature, it became the background noise, so you can press the horn behind somebody and the person does not even flinch. We were surprised that the minibus that took us to Luang Prabang does not continuously press the horn and make a big fuss! I tried one guest house where the rooms were charming but they had only for one night so I left my luggage there and after a quick search I found a similar one, with AC and beautifully shiny floors, in all houses you have to leave the shoes at the entrance. I repacked my luggage and I went in town that is small and charming, similar with Sukhotai or Chiang Mai, the Lao people being named in history Thai that creates a big controversy nowadays. The culture is similar with Thailand and does not have any relation with Vietnam. I ate in a very nice Lao restaurant TamTam Bamboo, a dish of fish, chatting with Gunther, a German from Stuttgart who works for Lufthansa and here I am at the Internet Cafe to make a phone call (in Romania nobody answered again!!!!) at home.

I woke up in the morning with the idea of posting the text about Halong Bay that I wrote last night but the internet was still not working, so I decided in the last moment to leave for the trip to Tam Coc in spite of the fact that the sunny weather predicted on weather.com did not happen. The group was very small, with two girls from Geneva and a couple from Saigon, very artsy , the guy trying to talk on a slik cellphone the entire trip. The trip, that took about 2-3 hours, no matter that they say that it takes mostly 2 hours, was to Hoa Lu, the first capital of the unified independent Vietnam, unification obtained by a king in the 10th century, after he was able to get rid of the Chinese who came in the 2nd century AD and forget to leave for 1000 years. So it can be worse than with the Russians! The unified part was just the north of the country after which they started to move south in areas occupied by Champa Empire and in the 17th century were able to absorb the entire Champa kingdom of Danang. Hoa Lu was the first capital, a citadel in those time with temples and palaces. The first king had three sons, and his beloved one, the third son, was killed by the first one out of jelousy and fear that he may lose the throne. So, at the death of the king the queen did a swift move and married the commander of the army who became in this way the king instead of the fraticidal son. This second king is credited also with major victories against the Chinese and is also commemorated in Hoa Lu. The only things that remains from the old citadel are two temples dedicated to these two major kings. The temples are interesting from the historical perspective more than anything else and they are restaurated in the 17th century. But people come here even today with offers and prayers. After the visit of the two temples we boarded the bus and went to Tam Coc for a mediocre lunch and right after that we got on boats to visit this site. Tam Coc is named also “Halong Bay on land” or on the rice paddies. It has the same limestone rock formations like the ones we saw in Halong Bay and is looking closer with Yangshou, being placed on a river. The river is smaller and to visit it you board a boat that is rowed by two women, that takes you through a stupendously beautiful scenery of peaks and green rice paddies tilled by peasants. The river crosses through some caves and the boat ride goes inside these 3 caves where you have to duck your head not to hit the ceiling. After about 1 hour you get to the end of the trip and you start touring back. The boat trip is popular both with Vietnamese and foreigners and the river is full of boats, the rowing women trying like in the entire Vietname to sell you something else while you are a captive audience on board. We arrived at the harbour and after a short wait for the two artsy Vietnamese, we left to Hanoi, where before we reached the center of the city we slowed down to look into the dog meat market, a specialty that only in Vietnam is consumed. However, even here it looks like is eaten only by poor people and is looked down on. The market was depressing, or this was our perception not being familiar with this type of food, but probabily the same would look any other meat market for a vegetarian! Finally, we arrived in the city and right away I started to pound the streets to cover some ground before the tomorrow’s departure. I shot some video in the center and I arrived in the glitzy part of the town, where the Opera built by the French is located surrounded by the best hotels: the old Metropole now owned and managed by Sofitel and the new/old Hilton. The area around them is full of chic bars and restaurants, and there are also all the label-stores. I entered Esprit that was full of employees and no customer and one T-shirt was selling for half million dongs, same price like in the US! From there I went directly to see the Hanoi “Hilton”, the way the POWs were calling the jail of Hanoi. The person who was named the first ambassador in Vietnam in 1994 lived there for a while. The jail is still there but only a fraction of it, transformed in museum, because most of it was demolished to make space for a highrise with conference centers and luxury apartments. Times change and the place was primary real estate! I finished my tour with a visit to the St. Joseph cathedral where I stayed a little at the mass in Vietnamese and after that I went to find Cafe des Arts, a glitzy French restauranbt were I wanted to eat in the last two nights in Hanoi but because I was too hungry I settled each night for a closer place to my hotel. The food was great, and the dishes were very interesting but I went for beefsteak tartar, something that rarely I eat but they boast that theirs is the best and it was!. All watered with a bottle of Halida local beer! After dinner I tried to call home but nobody answered so I gave up and now is late, and I am retyping this posting because I lost the first one, and I will go to sleep. Before going to the hotel I passed by a Frech pastry place and I got two great cakes and I stopped to ODC travel to pick up my plane ticket for tomorrow. It is very difficult in Vietnam to get exactly what you want because the command of the English language is very poor for the majority of the educated people. They are able to communicate but in simple lines, if you get them in subtleties they are lost and they don’t understand you at all. It turned out at the agency that the ticket is not on Vietnam Airlines but on Lao Airlines. First time they told me that is the same plane and they code-shared and latter they told me that they do have separate flights. Either I did not understand or they have no clue, and both are possible. In any case you cannot get the difference between: the same plane and the same flight! And they are completely lost in this! And this is ODC travel a pretty established agency but the employees are similar with many other agencies. The difference is made by the fact that some of them are more polite and look more professional in their neat offices.
Finally I got to the hotel and I was able to post the last night post and write and rewrite this one. When I was in the middle of the first draft, Emin, the Irish guy from the Halong Bay boat, just showed up from his third day on Halong Bay (we did not know that we stayed and stay in the same hotel) and told me that the weather today was even worse then the other days, the boats were stopping and had to honk in order to keep in contact with each other because of the heavy mist.

Halong Bay is the jewel of the crown, the best site the Vietnamese have and for good reason. It is an area close to Haiphong, a bay in the Gulf of Tonkin, where the legend said that the dragon who left the land to go into the sea, smashed the earth with his tail and broke it in many pieces, before disappearing into the sea. So the bay has many island, somewhere around 1600, and it would take a long time to see all of them. There are trips of 1-4 days to see something and they cater to all categories of travelers on boats that sail the gulf. I left around 7:30am from the hotel, and in the bus I found an eclectic group, mainly French with some Malaysians, an American and an Irish. The bus ride to Halong City, the newly developed city that is the hub for the bay cruises, was about 4 hours with a stop in between. We arrived at 11:30am and at 1:00pm boarded the boat and after some unexpected delays we started to cruise. The weather was not good at all, something that we understood is typical for this time of the year, especially for the month of March where a sort of continuos drizzle is hanging in the air, but is so thin that you don’t get wet on your clothes just on your hair. The immediate effect is that the visibility decreases considerably and everything floats in a kind of mist. I knew about it, a very similar weather with the one we had in Yangshuo several years ago, and the landscape is identical. The boat was pretty big, with cabins for sleep, very comfortable and, as usual in Vietnam, very clean. We cruised for an hour, with limited visibility and we arrived at some beautiful caves and got down to visit them. All sorts of legends and stories abound about these grottoes , most of them fabricated by the guides, talking about dragons, princes and princesses and their 100 children, but the bottom line is that they are very beautiful limestone caves, unfortunately packed with all the tour groups that visit them in the same time. After this short visit we got on the boat again and we cruised to a floating fishing village, floating platforms in the bay where the fishermen live, the plan being to buy fish, but in the end nobody did it. We continued to a place where they were renting kayaks but again with no clients from our side and finally we stopped on an island, from whose top the visibility was great, or as great as can be in the misty weather. The weather started to improve and in the evening it cleared out, and you could see even stars on the sky. The entire landscape is made out of rock formations that sprout out of the sea, peaks, higher and lower, with vegetation on them and you navigate through this maze enjoying the beautiful view. In spite of the bad visibility, the clouds and fog gave a more mysterious look to the place, and you had more chances to see the dragon that people repeatedly said they saw coming out of the sea. I did not see exactly the dragon, but I have to check what is on video, and maybe, maybe…Meanwhile the crew of the boat fed us, gave us the keys for the cabins, and at 5:00pm we got electricity and hot water, so we went for a quick shower. Most of the people were intrigued about my camera, usually the Westerners are more intrigued than the locals who think only that is very expensive, and we started to talk, the French, from La Rochelle, proving to be very nice, however they could not stop mentioning the Romanian gypsies who are prowling the people in France. The two dinner tables were organized by languages, the French at one table and the English speaking at the other. Again, I was impressed with the Malaysian couple, Chinese descendant, who were speaking very well English, and he told me many things about the politics in Malaysia, where the Chinese and the Indians do not have too much of a say in politics, that is controlled completely and very authoritarian by Malay. This is the third couple from Malaysia I am traveling with and I cannot say how impressed I am with their command of English and I say this in comparison with the Vietnamese, who even if they speak very well, especially the guides, it’s almost impossible to understand them and nothing that require a little more finesse in term of tenses is understood by them. In the end, I chat with Emin, from Ireland, a very nice Irish boy who did not want to go to Sapa because there were no Irish pubs and Saturday is St Patrick’s Day, a very important event for any Irish person. He told me that he watches every year the NY Irish parade broadcast in Ireland. Also, it was Aaron from Boise. ID, who was happily traveling since April last year, part time in the US and part time outside, but he was feeling that the end is near and he should come back, but it was still a chance to extend the trip to meet some friends who were going in the fall in Nepal. We had a long chat followed by a game of Switch, a card game Emin taught us and we had great fun playing, sometime late after the French and Malaysians went to bed. But the fun had to stop because at 10:30 pm the engine was supposed to be cut off and we still can enjoy everything but in the dark. Emin and Aaron went to sleep and I got on the top deck of the boat. It was magnificent!. The clouds cleared and you could see far away Halong City. We were anchored in the middle of a bay surrounded by peaks that were poking out of the water, and also surrounded by other boats that all were drifting at anchor. It was so quiet and beautiful that it took me a long time to decide to go to sleep in my cabin. It was warm and you could stay on the lounge chairs on the deck, close your eyes and feel how the boat drifts. All the boats, or most of them , had the lights off. The whole experience was magical. Finally, I decided to go to sleep, not for any other reason but I got asleep several times on the lounge chair. After a night sleep in the village followed by another in the sleeper train, here I was sleeping on a boat. I went directly to sleep and I woke up in the morning, hopefully for a better weather but the clouds were even worse than the previous day, so after we ate our breakfast we cruised back to the harbor in Halong City where we arrived at 11:00am as scheduled. We had quite a long lunch and after some delays with the buses, during time the pearl sellers were prowling on us to purchase their wares, they succeeded to cram 21 people in a minivan and we got on our bus for the 4 hour trip to Hanoi, where we arrived at 5:30pm. Here the weather was a little better but not very different and in the evening the same drizzle came over the city. As a result I had doubts if to go tomorrow to a trip or not, but I checked the weather and tomorrow is supposed to be sunny, so I will go. Here , I had to solve several issues and the first was to see how I will get to Laos. Investigating further they told me that it may take 17-22 hours by bus and everybody gave me a different estimate, so I figured out that is not a pretty set deal and you may get stuck in customs for a long time. So I decided for a flight, that I’ve crossed it before from my options when they told me that I can have only 20 kg, but you can have more than one pack. But balancing with 22 hours, I went for the flight, and after doing a research on the Internet for the type of plane they use, ATR72 ( French) that in my mind was confused with IAR72 (Russian), I bought a direct flight to Luang Pabrang, Saturday at 3:00pm, for an one hour flight. Nobody knew what planes they fly and neither who makes them! This took a while, and after that I had to go to the store where I bought the jacket to ask them something and quickly to the Water Puppet Theater, a famous tradition in Hanoi, where by chance I was able to get a ticket for the 8:00pm show, everything else being sold out. The Puppets were very nice, the show was color full and entertaining. They have these puppets in a pool of water and they manipulate them horizontally from the back of a curtain, different that the vertical way that is in use everywhere. Stories, traditions, legends with music, etc. I was starving and from the theater I went and ate in a very nice restaurant on the shore of Hoang Kiem Lake that is in the middle of Hanoi, at the base of the Old Quarter. After dinner, it came the phone moment, unfortunately the connection was not great and, before I got to the internet in the hotel, I stopped to one of the many bootleg CD places and I bought 6-7 new CDs. Last night when I finished to write this I tried to post but the internet in the hotel died. I saved it and tried again this morning still to no avail, and I hope that now it will work.

The plan for the last day in the North was to go to another market in Cok Ly. I pondered upon the idea because it was an alternative to go to another market that was different, in another province, but unfortunately, it was a slow day for that market, named Bin Liu, the high market days would have been between Thu-Sun.
There are many minorities in the area and it was fun to see their customs and the dress they wear. On one side of the mountain are the Flower Hmong, Liu, Tay and Dzay. On the other are the Black Hmong and the Red Dzao and in another province are the Red Hmong and the Black Dzao. Probably there are more of them but is hard to identify them, after just several days of walking in the area.
I was able to see the first group in the market in Bha Ca and Cancau and the second group in the market in Sapa, so Bin Liu market would have been perfect for the third group but in the end I decided to keep with the original schedule to go to Cok Ly. We woke up at 6:00am, said good bye to our hosts and left to meet the jeep (Russian) on the road. The village was awake and the water buffaloes were roaming the alleys. We arrived at the road but no sign of jeep, Bang called and eventually woke up the tour operator who sent a jeep with one hour delay. The way to Sapa is just 17 km from the place we were and we arrived when the clouds/fog started to lift and the views over the city were marvelous.
You could see the city out of fog but the fog was still lingering under the city. Great view!
I had breakfast on the Bamboo restaurant and left to the Sapa market, and do the last shoppings I planned for, some things that I already saw and wanted to buy and I had to pick up the custom made blouse-coat I got for Cristina.
I went again to the market, where there were not too many Red Dzao like the day before and I went to see the church and a local temple. At 10:00 I went to the hotel, pick up the luggage, got in the jeep and we left for Cok Ly market on a road that on its last 17 km before the market, was all dust and all our luggage and our lungs got dusted to a level like I never saw since I was in Tibet. The market itself was disappointing, very small with the same minorities. Organized travel in Vietnam is OK but the agencies do not have the creativity of advising people what to see and this is an issue when you don’t know the local customs. Instead of seeing three markets on the same side of the mountain, I would have opt for another from the other side. I walked a little in the market and I settled for some roasted peanuts for lunch, forfeiting my official lunch with Bang.
But still I picked up this trip because after the market it was a boat ride on Chai River that it turned out to be very nice. I was very lucky that the weather improved in the last two days, and the cold spell from the last week went away, so I did not need my newly bought Armani jacket at all. It was warm for T shirt and extremely pleasant on the boat, that was going through canyons with caves and we stopped eventually to visit a Tay village. We had tea with the people in the house, a custom here, and always when we stopped somewhere people were offering Vietnamese tea that like their coffee is strong and bitter. They showed me the upstairs of the house, the Tay house having a lower level for animals, that they partitioned and made a living room also, and a top floor for sleeping. I wanted to go to the bathroom but no matter that they showed me where the location was I could not figure it out. It was a pig style there and some other huts but nothing to resemble what I know to be a toilet. And obviously I did not expected tiled ceramic walls and toilet paper! But still I could not figure out which was the toilet!
We left the village and board the boat admiring the beautiful flowers of a local tree, called rice treat, and we rode the boat for another 30 minutes till we got to the road where the jeep was waiting for us. Another cup of tea in the shade, it was already very hot, and we left for Lao Cai on a beautiful sunset, cruising around the Vietnamese shore of the Lap River that is the border with China. In Lao Cai we went directly to the Chinese border and I looked to the constructions from the other side but I could not go there because I did not have a Chinese visa and neither a return Vietnamese one.
Bang showed me the market building in the Chinese city and told me that the first floor is occupied by merchants and the second and third by the “Meat market” , prostitution in China being legal, (not in Vietnam). All the girls are registered and pay taxes. Two full floors in a large building! The Vietnamese can cross the bridge anytime for a day trip and if they want to stay overnight they have to arrange for a permit. Bang said that is cheaper in China that in Vietnam, in terms of food, accommodation and transportation. The buildings in the the cities are impressive, the Vietnamese built a Commercial center, business center that looks very modern and on the Chinese side was built up pretty seriously.
From the border we left to the railway station, where I went in a hotel to change, arranged by Bamboo/Sapa, I tipped the driver and I had another discussion with Bang, who told me that he may try to immigrate to USA, the dream of any young person in Vietnam. I told him about the visa lottery, that he did not know about and we promise to keep in touch. One stop, after Bang left, was to the Internet to post my story and do the the email but the computer/network was so slow that I could not post, so I saved it, email it and posted this morning.
My stomach got a little upset yesterday, not bad but enough to have some shrills, and I got on my steamed rice and water cure that works miracles, better than any fancy drug, so till this morning everything was supposed to be in order. The train was leaving at 9:15pm. I got in the compartment with a German couple from Munchen with whom I chat for about an hour. Friendly! I told them that I lived in Munich a while ago and turned out that they live very close from where I used to live. We went to sleep, the same uneasy sleep of the sleeping couches, and we arrived in Hanoi at 5:30 am, took a motorbike and arrived in Camellia Hotel to wake up the host who was sleeping in the lobby.
I did all my repacking, because I bought a small backpack for local travel and I had breakfast, did my posting and email and I am waiting for the bus that will take me at 7:30 am to Halong Bay, a two day trip where I will sleep, tonight, on the boat in the bay. So no Internet!

The crowd from the Trekking Cafe was very interesting: Daniella was from Australia and came in Sapa several days ago. The moment she was hitting Australia’s land she was getting bored right away so she traveled almost continuously for the last 10 years living 4 years in India. Roelf was from Amsterdam and he was the third time in Sapa. Mongolia was his preferred country of travel and in Sapa he was doing some voluntary work with the minorities who knew him very well so they invited him the next day to a wedding. Abas, or something like that, was Moroccan living in Switzerland and studying in Laussaune but mainly he was traveling and was in lots of places. I chat with them till 11:00pm when I had to leave and go to sleep. The plan was to leave in the trek early morning but I wanted to visit Sapa, so I woke up again before sunrise. The room I had was magnificent, covered in windows on two sides, like the entire hotel, The Green Bamboo. I had breakfast and I left for the market. Saturday and Sunday were market days in Sapa but still the market had plenty of Black Hmong and Red Dzao who were pounding the streets. I got inside the market where the local people sell and the view was fascinating with lots of materials embroidered and beautifully decorated dress, like I did not have a chance to see with the Flower Hmong, who may be a show in themselves but their taste is far from the European style. I bought more than I wanted to do and I kept walking the market and taking shoots. These tribes are more aggressive, being in constant move to sell and they harass foreigners to buy and also they ask for money to have their picture taken, so the task was not so easy but with the lot of experience I had in snatching pictures it worked in the end. I spent in total about 2 hours in the market and around and I was at 11:00 am at the hotel where I was supposed to meet Bang. We left for a walk, a trek they call it because the range of tourists/travelers is very large, and after a short walk on the road we started to go through rice paddies and beautiful landscape. The weather was sunny and the views were magnificent, with terraced valleys and hills covered in mist. We walked very slowly because I took so many pictures. On the same road we met an American woman from Seattle, whom I will meet latter in the village, and lots of Black Hmong who were going to and from work. Around 2pm we stopped at a beautiful hut located on a river cross and we ate some cold cuts and a beer that there costs more than in the most expensive restaurant in Saigon, 25000 dongs. We continued after lunch to the same slow pace and we arrived in the village. Meanwhile we crossed two villages of Black Hmong, in one of them I bought a water holder. The Black Hmong are very good artists but they are dirty and illiterate, based on what Bang said. They do not have electricity and are pretty impolite and aggressive. Basically they come after you and they keep pestering you to buy stuff from them, mainly cheap souvenirs. This is the reason they are not liked by the guides and all the accommodations, home stays as they call it, are done in the next village that is a Dzao village, another minority very industrious who send their children to school so they are smarter and better educated. The school is free for the minorities but not for the Vietnamese who pay a pretty hefty tax. The moment we got home, around 4:00pm, the guide and the hosts started to cook and the dinner that happened around 6:30-7:00pm was a festine with about 5-6 dishes. Obviously they are very generous and their tradition probably obliges them to cook so much but most of the travelers cannot eat the astronomical quantities they cooked there. Before dinner I went for a walk in the village in sunset and I kept thinking about our quick and constrained life in cubicles and theirs, outdoor. Obviously they would give it up easily for more cushy jobs but the atmosphere of the village was so idyllic that I could not stop thinking about this comparison. I sat on top of the hill and watched each household with its own flurry of activities, working in the garden, bringing back the water buffaloes, or planting on terraces and listening to the barking dogs or at one point monkeying with two girls from the village, a 13 year old that was as tall as Victor and the other of the same height being 8. I thought that the first girl was 8 but she was very mature for the age. After the walk I went for dinner and we ate, four of us, the owner of the house with his son, Bang and me, and drank a couple of glasses of Happy Water, the corn brandy they prepare in house. The dinner happened in the kitchen, on very low stools, maybe two inches from the ground and the kitchen was roamed by the house dogs and cats they were shushed outside when they were expressing their desire to have a bite. The after dinner tea is always a moment of relaxation in Vietnam and I had a long chat with Bang about all sorts of issues and about his travel groups and experiences he had with them: the most difficult by far are old Germans and Israelis. Germans are demanding and very impolite and Israelis want to get everything possible for the least amount of money paid. It was very interesting to hear this from a Vietnamese guy and to match in a way my impressions of travel, these two categories being the most difficult for me also to deal with. Of course there are exceptions, but they are just exceptions and not more than that! I had to cut short the discussion with him because I passed by before dinner to the nearby home stay where was a large group of travelers of all nationalities and I promised them I will join after dinner. When I arrived the discussion was in full swing with Kristin, a journalist from Seattle perorating about the American domestic policy and journalism in the USA. There were also two Danish boys who just finished high-school and they were traveling for the first time in life for 4 months, the last one being in the USA, so I obliged to give them some hints for which they were in desperate need, a very funny Spaniard from La Rioja whose dream was to go in the honey moon to Las Vegas, a guy from Manitoba who was going to teach English a month in Cambodia, a girl from England and two girls from Switzerland, all of them, except Kristin, traveling the following night with the sleeper train back to Hanoi. After Kristin gave up the podium, the others started all sort of more mundane discussions and I chat a little with Kristin. She came with her mom to Hoi An to make her wedding dress (it is very inexpensive there) and she was getting marry soon but her boyfriend had to work so he could not come with her in Vietnam. The discussions run late and at 11:00pm I went to sleep. The beds for the guests are in the attic, a sort of “duplex” apartment but basically like a barn. On this second floor there were about 15 mattresses each one with blankets, pillows and a mosquito net for the summer time. It was very clean and you have to take your shoes off when you got there. I slept till 6:00 but I heard all night the dogs barking in the village and in the middle of the night it became very cold. The walls are made out of lumber but not tight fit so you can see outside.

I woke up in the morning in the first horn of the traffic before sunrise and after packing and a quick breakfast where I was joined again by the Aussies I left for the market.
The market was a little slow at 8:00 am but started to get animated a little latter and around 10:00am was bustling with activity. The tourists were in a row with lots of cameras and tripods and early in the morning it looked like a shooting stage with lots of Flower Hmong women on one side and photographers on the other side. Latter on the number of Flower Hmong exceeded the number of tourists by a comfortable margin so the westerners and local photographers were lost in the crowd.
The market sells everything, there are blacksmith making hoes and carpenters making the plouws, Flower Hmong buying and selling embroideries, Vietnamese selling dogs, pigs, cows, water buffaloes, horses, etc.
I took lots of beautiful pictures like everybody else and I tried to find vantage points for great shoots but most of the time I admired the hustle and bustle of this magnificent market. The Cancau market was smaller but it had the advantage of being almost completely populated by Flower Hmong, here you find all sort of other vendors. I saw also Black Hmong but very few because most of them live in Sapa on the other side of the mountain. At 12:00 I left the market, I met Bang at the hotel and we left in the afternoon for a trek to see a village that is very close to Ba Cha. The village has all the mountain cut in terraces for cultivation and the landscape looks very interesting. We were able to get inside a house, something that the agency has arranged with the locals in advance, and the owner, who was Flower Hmong, gave us to drink something that he calls corn wine but is actually a very perfumed corn brandy, very strong, a sort of palinka, that I could not have thought that you can do from corn. Also, he played for us from pan flute a traditional song and dance and gave me a tour of the house, the major production being the corn brandy. After that we continued to another part of the village where there were houses of another minority named Tai. We returned to Ba Cha for lunch and we left at around 4:00pm with the jeep to Sapa on winding roads crossing rice fields where people were working their fields with water buffaloes or planting rice. Great views! The road takes about 2 hours from Ba Cha to Lao Cai and another hour from Lao Cai to Sapa, crossing the mountains that they were still covered in clouds and when we arrived in Sapa the fog/clouds was extremely deep that we could see only at 3-4 meters. I got a room in Green Bamboo Hotel and I went for a walk in town, a stark contrast to the other villages, with lots of sleek stores catering mainly for tourists, selling nice weavings all priced in US$. The people did not looked so friendly, probably fed up by the number of tourists and Black Hmong women were pacing the streets and asked everybody if they want to smoke ganja. A sort of Jamaica in the mountains! I went a little to some of the stores, had my dinner and tried to find a internet store to make a phone call home. Tomorrow I will leave in a trek that will end up with a night sleep in a village house watching what the local family does in the evening and morning. So no internet at least for tomorrow, if not for the other day also when I will take the night sleeper train to Hanoi.

The tourists that travel Vietnam are a different crowd that the ones in Burma, Tibet or even Cambodia. There are backpackers and travelers but most of them are on tourist groups. A lot are French looking very bourgeois and their age is the best in the 50s but mainly in the 60s, comfortable tours with all inclusive. Travel in Vietnam is organized very well and I think that exists tons of tours offered in the Western countries. So the interaction with other travelers, caused also by the magnitude of the two main cities and the main attractions that are around Hanoi, is smaller, not like it was in Burma or in the village of Siem Rep. But still I was able to find lots of people I interact with and Sapa I think is such a place where you can make contacts. I am now in this Internet cafe called Traveler Cafe, surrounded by travelers that just chat exchanging all sort of stories of travel.

We walk up around 6:00 am when the train got to Lao Cai, a city on the Chinese border. A guy from the agency was waiting for us in the train station with large billboards carrying my name, and they brought us right away to a restaurant for breakfast, that like any other meal in this trip is included. The surprise was that they did not gang us up together but there were two jeeps with two drivers and two guides, one for me and one for the Aussies, so after the breakfast we said goodbye, starting to drive over hills and mountains to the first market in Cancau. We stopped several times to take pictures of fields full of rice and of peasants plowing their fields with water buffaloes, the main mean of subsistence for these families. Nothing is mechanized and it looks, watching them work and barter, like we live hundreds of years ago.
The clouds were very low and it was a little chilly but not colder than Hanoi. The area where we are now is lower than Sapa, the main town from the area and the main touristic center, that being at 1600m may be very cold, but supportable in March, this being one of the reason that I did this trip starting in Saigon and going towards the North.
The Cancau market was in full swing when I arrived with almost no tourists, that started to come latter, and lots of Flower Hmong people that were selling their wares and produces.Their customs are spectacular, completely embroidered in joyful colors that makes them the major attractions of these markets. There were some other people, like Black Hmong from Sapa and Dzao. They were selling also dogs, horses and water buffaloes, and the women were carrying their children on bundles stuck to their back. I spent at the market about 3.5 hours and left to Bac Ha, the major village in the area where tomorrow will be a major market. In Bac Ha we stopped to the house of the old ruler of the village during the colonial times, a large and elegant French Mansion. The Hmong ruler named Hua, was called by its people The King and he left with the French in 1954, probably in France and latter in California where his descendants are living nowadays. Again I spoke with Bang, my guide, about the American war and I got more or less the same answer. “The past is the past and we are looking into the future”. They love Clinton who did the opening with Vietnam. We came to the hotel where I booked a room, included also in the tour, and I left my luggage inside, after that coming downstairs for lunch. It came to be around 2:30pm when I finished lunch so it was no time left to go around so I went to the internet and I checked the email and do the blog from yesterday trip, hoping that later in the day I’ll do the second part. I went for a walk in the village, that is very basic, with some hotels and restaurants for tourists, but not too many tourists come here; they prefer to stay in Sapa and come here just for the market. I went to the market, bought some mango and when I was going to the internet I met some Dutch people and we had a very long and interesting chat about travel in Southeast Asia. They were also on a tour that went in China also, and they did not have too many good things to say about China, but they enjoyed Vietnam and Laos, who they told me that became the newest backpacker paradise, with places la Vang Vieng full of shops, disco music and large TVs in outside lounges.
Finally, I got to the internet and I published part of the story but I had to go to the hotel to meet Bang at 6:30pm for dinner. In the hotel I bumped into the Aussies, with whom I had dinner, and latter on the Dutch guys and their wives showed up. I tried to go back to the Internet but I was up for a big surprise: both internet places in town that have in total 30-40 computers were completely taken over by the village’s kids who were playing games and chatting. I tried to go from one to another but the girls who were managing the places told me that is “Full” and is nothing to do….Latter! So I watched a typical touristy traditional dance show in one of the hotels and I got the idea to check in the hotel where I found out that they have an internet computer (only one!) and is working but very slow. Hope tonight to go to bed earlier, maybe 10pm.

Hardly you can find such a great day trip like the one I did today at the Perfume Pagoda. Everything is spectacular and by being in the full festival of the pagoda it made it ten times better.
After I finished all the dealings with the travel agents to see what can be done and how, I went in the evening to the hotel and I booked a day-trip to a place outside Hanoi, called “Perfume Pagoda”. The next day, promptly as usual, the minibus came and picked me up at 7:45 am from the hotel and we drove for about 90 minutes plus a short stop to a place from where you have to board a boat The canal, where the boats are located was packed with small boats, hundreds of them easily, that were carrying people to the base of the mountain where the pagoda is located. The place is an important pilgrimage place, and it happened that one month after the Lunar New Year, called Tet here, is the festival of this pagoda and everybody flocks there in hordes. Even if this is a major tourist destination, barely you are able to see the foreigners in the mass of Vietnamese that pack the shrine.
When arriving at the harbor, everybody boards boats that are rowed by two women , one in front and one in the back and the river gets crammed with row boats in the most spectacular show. Some boats have 2-3 people but some can have over 30 people. The boat ride went for about 1 hour and we arrived at the entrance of the park, where we got a ticket, paid in advance by the agency and started climbing the mountain. The climb is also packed with pilgrims and aligned on the sides by stalls selling everything imaginable. It is a typical pilgrimage place, with religious artifacts but also all sort of food used also for religious offer. It exist also a cable car that does the up and down rides, but I preferred to do the walking pilgrimage for the uphill part. The bad part was that the rain of the past days made a slimy walk and I got mud caked on the sneakers and pants. After the one hour walk, that you cannot shorten because the road is packed, I arrived at a point where I had a stalled humongous line in front of me that was waiting to reach a gate in front. Eventually, this happened after about 30 minutes when I saw that after the gate there were steps going down to a cave, where in about 15 more minutes I found a huge crowd. All the pilgrims congregated there with offers that were brought to the three altars inside the cave. They were making the offers, praying, giving money to the shrines, they were rubbing money on the rocks and wash with the beneficial water drops from the stalactites in the ceiling. The spectacle was astounding and I watched it for more than half an hour and shot lots of video.
At around 2:00 pm, when I was supposed already to be down in a restaurant with the group, I left and I rushed to the cable car, that brought me fast down the hill. We ate in the restaurant and we chat about the events and the whole experience with the guys in the group: a couple from Amsterdam traveling 3 months, another from Switzerland biking Laos and Vietnam for about 4 months, a couple from Malaysia who showed to uss all the animals that were ready for dinner, like deers and mountain mouse, etc.
After lunch we left for the boats, where the water rides increased because most of the pilgrims were leaving and the river was even fuller of rowing boats, and further to the bus that brought us to Hanoi and dropped us in the center. Priority number one was to go and buy a jacket because everybody in the group told me that in Sapa is very cold and I did not have anything with me except a sweatshirt. China and Vietnam are the major countries for manufacturing western goods, so I got in a store, like in China, that were selling excess production for North Face, Armani, Tommy Bahamas, Polo, Lacoste, etc. After I pondered with a North Face jacket, I found a very slick Armani jacket made out of silk and I don’t know what else, and I decided to get it and got dressed with it, a perfect match to my mud caked sneakers and my dirty pant. Armani himself would have had a heart attack if he saw me! I went to the agency to be sure that they will not forget about me, especially that half of the city, but not on contiguous blocks (!) was on blackout and I checked again with them for a flight to Laos, that I found out that is code shared between Lao and Vietnamese aviation and they fly with small propeller planes (70 max), but they have flights directly to Luang Pabrang that is something, saving about 32 hours on the bus. I don’t know yet when to do and I still have to do a little more research about this issue. I went to my hotel, that was in blackout also, (so no internet!) and I booked my Halong Bay trip on Wednesday morning, two days on the famous bay so beautifully depicted in the movie “Indochine”, with one night sleep on the boat. So, the plan is to arrive from Sapa on Wednesday 5:00 am and to leave at 7:30am to Halong Bay.
The minivan from ODC Travel came to pick me up and dropped me and two Aussies at the train station, the guide giving us the tickets and asked us to be very careful about them because you hardly will be able to find others. The trains are packed and the agencies have their share of the seats. As a a matter of fact, I did some research about this trip and it turned out that the deal I got from ODC Travel was great. Sure, $222 for Vietnam sounds very high (only if you are here you understand this statement, it’s very hard to spend money in Vietnam everything being extremely inexpensive so $100 has a very long run here), but counting that is very hard to get soft sleeper seats and you have a guide for trekking and a jeep that carries you everywhere all the time is very helpful and makes your life easier. Other agencies or individuals that try to arrange the trip made higher offers with lower services, and investigating locally in Bac Ha for the price of a jeep it came with astronomical numbers.
The train ride was good, the sheets clean, no matter that the sleeper carriages, even being privately owned and invested, were kind of dingy, old and rugged. The Aussies, at their first outing abroad, were terrified of theft and they were locking themselves completely inside. We traveled also (4 in a compartment) with a Vietnamese who was living in Lao Cai and who studied in Sorbonne social studies. Extremely educated, it was a pleasure to talk with him, unfortunately the Aussies were not so enthusiastic about him and it was late and we went to sleep, the rough sleep on the sleeper carriages.

I booked one night in Hotel Camellia ($13) and I went directly to investigate what trips can be done outside of Hanoi. I saved my days during the entire trip because in a trip like this you never know what may come up and the most important asset is time. Even if I wanted to stay an extra day for leisure or extra visits in one place, I still decided to leave in order to save time. And it was worth it because in this way I had time for trips around Hanoi that were really worth doing. I asked the girl from reception of the hotel, who was a little lost in the landscape, about the available trips and she was able to make a list for me for the trip in the North, in Sapa and Ba Ca plus a little trekking, something that is not easy to arrange because you have to visit some markets open only in some particular days of the week. This was the reason I wanted to arrive here on Thursday because the markets are happening mainly during the weekend but I found also an extra market on Tuesday. The girl said that she will give me a quote for the trip but when I came in the evening she was not up to snuff, and obviously she did not know how to do it. Luckily, I contacted another agency on the way back to the hotel, that had exactly what I wanted to do and in spite of being a customized trip, and implicitly more expensive they arranged it and hopefully I will leave tomorrow at 8:30pm; four days in the North, 3 of them in different markets and one on hiking, with 5 nights, 2 of them with sleeping coach on the train. Beside this trip, I had to arrange two other one-day trips and a two-day trip to Halong Bay, the place that I saw first time in the movie “Indochine” with Catherine Deneuve. Also, I had to make arrangements for going into Laos, the bus being somewhere around 20 hours, so a flight would be advisable. Plus visa for Laos, plus, plus…..So, I spent in the morning and in the evening a lot of time with these arrangements, at least with the research and, finally, in the evening I paid $222 for my Sapa trip, in the North with the minority tribes, the highest amount I spent in Vietnam till now! You cannot spend money here, everything being so inexpensive! Meanwhile, I visited the main sites in Hanoi, that has some interesting things but less than expected. I will spend another day at the end in Hanoi, probably next Saturday. I went to see “The Temple of Literature”, that is a temple dedicated to Confucius but also the siege of the first University, the school that was producing mandarins, the representatives of a meritocracy imposed and introduced by the Chinese for administering their country and foreign provinces. This university was founded in 1070. I wanted to see Uncle Ho in the mausoleum but it was closed but I visited the Ho Chi Minh Museum, pretty interesting if you see it as a tourist and not involved in the local politics, and a set of other pagodas and temples located near by. The terms of pagoda and temple is reversed in Vietnam: pagoda is a place of worship and the temple is used to worship the ancestors. A family may have a temple and a village may have a pagoda for worship. I walked a lot and ate some veggie lunch and in the evening, after I finished my bookings, and after I ran around to no use to find a internet phone (because only Maria picked up and she was in a rush to wake up Guvi who was still sleeping at 7:55am), I went to have dinner of fish with ginger in a fancy restaurant. I tried to reach another restaurant, Cafe de Arts, pretty fancy, but I could not find it quick and I was hungry and, as usual, I did not have time. During dinner I started to study about Laos from a Lonely Planet in xeros copy bought in Nha Trang, these copies widely available in South East Asia, to see what I have to do there and if I have to skin a day from Vietnam to add it there, but I think that I am OK. It’s late and I am sleepy.

By reaching Hue I left the tropical area of Vietnam. It is raining, sometimes extremely intense and the palm trees disappeared. It is slightly cooler.

Hue was the imperial capital of Vietnam and the first question was if you can visit it in only one day, but because a lot of people do not even choose to stop in the city I thought that this may not be a problem. During the previous night dinner, that ended majestically with the flaming banana, I spoke with one of the guys from the restaurant who said that they do customized tours in town on motorbike. The next morning after I read more attentive the guide book and I noticed that most of the visiting sites are actually not inside the city but some of them are far out, I went to him to make arrangements. It exists also a tour by bus but I tried to avoid that, and I still don’t know if this was a good idea. The guy I spoke with was busy but arranged with a friend of his, and meanwhile I did my email and checked the blog and saw a show done by Victor and Claire after I emailed Cristina that I am looking at them. This is not easily done everytime because very few computers have Java installed. My guide came and first brought me to the post office to call home and I talked with both Victor and Claire. After that I mount the motorbike and rode through rice paddys worked by peasants, to a Japanese Bridge, similar with the one in Hoian, but its location was very pleasant. Latter, he brought me to a pagoda that had a mass and the chanting and the atmosphere, with lots of believers swarming the place who came to pray, was very interesting. Here, Buddhism is the major religion and is very baroque, sometimes too baroque for my taste, extremely flamboyant and visual, so is good to shoot it on video. Buddhists are a majority and this was the reason why they entered in direct conflict with the Diem administration of South Vietnam who placed in top positions the Catholics. The mass was very interesting and from there we went to visit one of the imperial tombs. The emperors from Nguyen dynasty , began at the beginning of the 18th century to built majestic tombs outside Hue. They built them in places they enjoyed and frequented during their lifetime and this lasted till late in the 19th century, before Bao Dai, the last emperor, came to power. He died in France in 1997 so he did not do anything like that. The tombs are impressive and is hard to believe that these were done so recently. The funny part was that the royal tomb is a very complex assembly with walls enclosing other walls till you get to the coffin, but the emperor is buried in another unknown place because he was afraid of theft, and all 200 people who help in the burial were killed. Unfortunately, I was able to visit only one tomb, the other being further away, and this is common in many day trips, you may have to choose what you see if you don’t want to stay more days. From there, we stopped to some Chinese tombs located nearby and further we visited a pagoda, where the monk who self immolated in 1963 lived. He was protesting against the Diem Regime in South Vietnam and his act was on the front page of all the newspapers in the world. We visited a fishing village and another pagoda and finished with a visit to the citadel, that was originally large and it had its own Forbidden City, purple, for a particular reason, nowadays disappeared completely. The citadel named “The Imperial City”, was bombed heavily by Commies in the Tet offensive in 1968. Whatever was left intact, the Americans bombed at their turn, trying to dislodge the Viet Minh from the citadel, because they were able to hold the entire city under their rule for 3.5 weeks following the offensive. This bombing campaign happened during the battle of Hue in the American War. Still , the Vietnamese restored a part of it and is still enough to see but on the location of the Forbidden City Purple and two other palaces in the back is just grass and some bronze jars left. After the citadel we returned to the hotel , around 5pm, because at 6pm the bus for Hanoi was supposed to leave.
I went to eat right near the hotel, some fish, and when I was eating somebody came to me and told me that the bus broke on the way from Hoian to Hue and we don’t know when we leave. I kept eating my fish when another guy came to me and told me that we should get quickly in a bus to go to another part of town to board the bus for Hanoi. I ate quickly the fish, the chips and the beer and jumped in the minibus, with the same group that followed me more or less : the girls from Malaysia, Sarah from London who was traveling now with an American girl and two boys from England. All 7 with lots of luggages in a taxi: you could not breath. The taxi brought us somewhere else in Hue and we boarded a bus from another company, that amazingly did not break. It stopped 3 times in the night, for dinner, pause and breakfast and brought us in 12 hours in Hanoi, but dropped us not in the Old Quarter but somewhere near the University. So, again we boarded a taxi all 7 and we got in the Old Quarter where we dispersed in various places and we may meet again. The way to Hanoi showed that we move towards North; it rained and it was cold and here people are dressed with scarves, jackets and cover their faces but is not so cold. It is chilly but not so bad, probably in the 16-17C.

I booked for the 8:00 am tour to MySon, so I woke up at 6:00 am, packed my stuff, left it in the hotel and I went for a walk in Hoian before the tour left. The target was the market , that in early morning was buzzing with activity, the women, all wearing the Vietnamese pointed hats were packing the fish market. I spend a lot of time there and I shot lots of video but it was hard because there were so many women there and so busy the market that they were bumping into me with baskets full of fish and shrimps. After a while I realized that is late and I had to rush to the hotel, where in the lobby I found the Italians, father and daughter, from the Nha Trang trip. It turned out that he, Leandro, knew Romania very well because he lived 4 years there. He knew far much more than me about the country and he was in places I never wanted to go. But he was there for business, apparently he was dong some exports. I did not ask him more but I may meet them again on the way. This is typical in travel when people follow the same itinerary. As a matter of fact, today I met Sarah, from Mekong/Cambridge, we rode in the same bus, and also a old lady from Wisconsin that I met before and two girls from Malaysia, one living in Australia and the other in Singapore, with whom I was in the broken bus the other night. So I talked with the Italians, Leandro and Medea, and had breakfast together and waited for the bus to bring me to MySon. It started to rain, pretty serious at times, but it turned out that was a short rain and the weather became OK latter on. The bus came at about 8:30am and after a heartful goodbye to the Italians, I started to MySon. Myson was the religious center of the Champas, the population that occupied this central area of Vietnam between 2nd and the 15th century. They were pirates, mainly, and because of this unfriendly job they were in constant conflict with the Vietnamese and the Khmers, being assimilated latter on, in the 17th century, by the first. They built impressive monuments, tombs for their kings and MySon is their center, a center that lasted between 4th and the 13th century far longer than any of the other centers in SE Asia, Angkor, Ayuthaia, Bagan, Borobudur, etc with which they were on par. Angkor in comparison lasted only 300 years. Unfortunately, after great efforts were done by the French to restore the monuments, the area was a free range zone during the American war and many bombs were thrown here destroying most of the monuments. The trip was interesting and short, just one hour inside the monuments but enough for what is there. I expected much less than what I found and, no matter that there were many tour groups, I was able to see and walked unhindered by others. The rain stopped and the sun came out timidly. On the way back to Hoian I was pondering if to stay the afternoon the Hoian, that is charming but basically was not much else to see, or to go with a 2pm bus to Hue. I arrived in Hoian at 1:20pm and eventually I decided to move ahead and I booked for the 2:00pm bus. The open ticket system works very well , especially in a country long and thin like Vietnam. Also, they arrange tours and trips like a science, and all the tours are arranged , or can be arranged in such a way to match the departure of the open buses. Also, there are more than one open bus system, and this should be checked because some of them are offering a much larger flexibility, schedule wise, with more than one bus a day. I returned to the hotel , got my backpack and left it in the bus office and to town, to get a receipt from the travel office for MySon and to visit a little more for the little time I had left. So I took several pictures on the river, and I went quickly to a folk museum and got back to the bus right before it was ready to leave, and I just been able to buy a pineapple and some water and peanuts. The road was beautiful, most of it being right on the coast from where you can see empty beautiful undeveloped beaches. We stopped at one of them Lo Cai, very beautiful in the shining sun, and this just after we crossed a 11km tunnel that I thought that will never end, like in the Durenmat story. After about 5 hours we arrived in Hue, where the bus brought us in front of the hotel Thang Long and they invited us stay there probably getting a pretty hefty commission, this being a common scheme in Asia. But, it is between them so the travelers are not bothered. I got a room with a beautiful bathroom and AC for $10, I took a shower and went in the lobby where I bumped into the Malaysian girls. We decided to have dinner together in Xuang Trang cafeteria, famous because they posted a sign in the 90s saying ” It should be in Lonely Planet” and they got there eventually, so now they changed the sign to “Listed in Lonely Planet”. The girls told me a lot about Singapore, where people work a lot, 12-14 hours a day and Australia, where life is great and sunny. But the funny part was that we tried to find a restaurant, and we wanted to go to the river. Unfortunately, not knowing the city, we got in the wrong direction and the rain started heavy on us. We got drenched and we could not find a place to eat and after an intense walk, we realized in shock that we arrived in front of our hotel, exactly from where we started, so we ate in Xuang Trang that was great and I had fish cooked in a clay pot and flaming banana, something that was great. The rain stopped during dinner but now, the girls went to do some shopping and I write this blog and it’s pouring like in the movies or better say like in Asia moonson time, but this is typical weather for Hue.

There were not 10 hours. There were 17 because the bus broke in the middle. This is a common thing in SE Asia. I read about long trips like this many times, on blogs, travelogues, travel books, etc. but is the first time when I experimented directly. The bus had something when we left around 8pm and it stopped after a while to fix it. I got asleep almost from the beginning and I just sensed what was going on. I sleep well in these buses because I don’t have any worries and they are comfortable. I woke up when he stopped again at 12:30 am for the late driver’s dinner, in one of the bus stops in the way. There were two other buses and another that came after us, and all of them left and we stayed. At one point I got upset and I went to press the horn to call the driver to senses and just then another bus came, who was heading to Nha Trang. The driver asked us to exchange the buses with the other passengers and we hoped that he did this because we had problems with ours but the surprise was ours when the new bus we mounted could not start. It had something with the transmission. The driver tried several times to no avail and went to work on the transmission. The results were not positive, and he gave up and went to sleep showing me on his watch something like 6:00 am. I hoped that he talked with the office to send us another bus but , probably in Vietnam this is not an option. So, all of us, Vietnamese and westerners went to sleep in the bus and we slept very well and I woke up at 6:00am. Right away I went on to wake up the driver because the others were quite shy and I asked him to give me his cellphone to call the office. He was not happy but complied and I told the guys from the office the situation we were in. The driver continued latter to talk with them and I don’t know what they talked because he started again to work on the transmission and and to our surprise he fixed it in 15 minutes and at 6:45am we left to Hoi An where we arrived at 1:00pm. We lost 1/2 day but it was no big deal because the city is small and manageable in 1/2 day. The advantage was that driving on day we were able to see the rice fields and also I could read a lot from my book, Sacred Willow, that gave a little more insight in the history of Vietnam.
HoiAn is a port and used to be an important harbor and city at the par with Melaka, and Macau. It is the only city in Vietnam that preserved its old architecture, sometimes altered by the French colonial buildings. Otherwise, is a town left behind in time, that makes it very charming. Is also the capital of the tailors, having lots of shops that make suits and shirts. It’s an artistic city also with lots of galleries catering for the immense number of tourist who come here in huge groups. It is the first time in this trip when I see so many tourists and so many groups. I strolled the city’s alleys and small streets looking for the old houses, assembly halls and pagodas that were marked in the book to be visited. In town they have an interesting scheme: you pay 75000 dongs and you can visit one of each, but if you want to visit a second of the same, let’s say another old house you have to pay again. But everything has a work around and there are several ways to do it here also. So I visited several assembly halls , one 200 years old house owned at the 7th generation, temples and pagodas and lots of stores. I went to the market that is spectacular, being, beside others, a fish market and I paced the streets looking for an internet phone, this time discovering the post office and finding out that the regular call on land line is almost 10 times more that an internet call. It is still not expensive!. I called home, I ate some Lau Cao that is a specialty on Hoi An, a sort of noodles with meat and crumb bread like a cracker, all in a 5 course meal and I chat with some older Germans who were traveling with a group. Tomorrow, I wanted to wake up at 5;00am to visit My Son, the old capital of their Chama kingdom, but the minibus was full so I will go with a regular bus at 8:00 coming back at 1:00 and, if i do not change my mind, get a 2:00 pm bus to Hue.

I had to see the sunrise if I stay so close to the beach, so I woke up at 5:30am and went to the beach. I thought that I would be alone but the surprise was beyond me to find, before the sunrise, the beach and the waterfront full of people who were jogging, caring their squash rackets, playing soccer and doing Tai Chi. It was a rush of activity that hardly you see later in the day when is hot and everybody is dozing in the shade. I watched the kids playing soccer on the beach in the morning dark and latter I watched the sunrise and went to eat the same delicious omelet with crusty hot French bread and crepes, all with a fruit shake, for a good morning start. Packed my stuff, paid for the room and got in the bus that took us to the boat with which we went in a tour of several islands ($10) where we will see some touristy stuff, but over all the whole experience being in on the water was great. First stop was to to see ostrich that we fed and we took lots of pictures of them to show Victor the bird. Latter we moved to see some white spotted deers. Again a close-up on ostrich! We saw an elephant and a walked to a waterfall on the second island and we had a great lunch in an international companion. But before lunch we went swimming in a water so warm like I never experience before. These seas are warm and extremely pleasant. I used my short/long pants for this deep, like I did in Easter Island and it worked again like a charm and getting dry back in no time. After lunch we went to the third island of the day: The Monkey Island, an island full of monkeys that were eating from your hand where I took lots of pictures again , to show both Guveti. They had also a show with animals, kind of a circus but I don’t like these kind of things. At 4:00 pm we were supposed to be at the hotel, but I stepped down from the bus earlier and I took again a walk on the promenade of Nha Trang, a very pleasant walk where you can see how the city grows but also you can see the slums creeping by the water. Paradoxically, in Asian underdeveloped societies the rich are on the hill and the poor have waterfront properties! I had some great chats today: two Russian guys from Vladivostok who told me that is cheaper to get a flight to Asia than one to Moscow, with an Italian father who came to join his 24 year old daughter in Vietnam to do a vacation together, the girl traveling in South America for 1.5 years. The guys were from Bergamo and the father, who was older than me took a two months vacation, “a normal thing in Italy” and he gave me important tips for Laos travel, including the Plains of Jars and the Hanoi connection. Apparently it takes shorter than I expected for the bus rides, or he is just optimistic! Further I met a Vietnamese from Saigon TV, Diem, who has a weekly show on air. He came with the girlfriend for a stroll in Nha Trang. Finally, I met an Amerasian, a daughter of a Black Vietnam vet with a Vietnamese woman, who left Vietnam in 1989 after she finished high school to come to the USA to her father who was living at those times in Philly. Now, the woman came back to Vietnam to visit some relatives. But the major event of the day was that I was able to fix my travel book pouch I bought from Lijiang in 1999. It was ripped for a while and I saw last night a shop that had a sewing machine so I gave it to the lady. Today was done and it was so insignificant for her that she did not know what to charge me so I gave her 5000 (30c) and she was very happy. This was great because I walked with the bag ripped for days and things were falling thru. Now I am waiting for the bus and hopefully a good night sleep. 10 hours to Hoi An.

The minibus was extremely punctual. At 7:30 am when I was finishing editing the blog was right in front of the hotel to pick me up from Dalat and bring me to the main bus office to leave for Nha Trang, a city on the coast of the South China Sea. The road was through mountains and pine forest for a good part near Dalat and it took 4 hours to reach the main highway of Vietnam , Route 1 that crosses between Hanoi and Mekong. Those 4 hours plus another 2 hours made the six hours that takes to get to Nha Trang. On the way we stopped 3 times, one of the times to visit some Cham towers, Cham being a civilization that flourished here between the 2nd and the 13th century being absorbed latter in the 17th by the Vietnamese. It was influenced by the Hindu civilization, who made South Vietnam in those time a Hindu area, latter being Sinizate. The Champas adopted at the beginning Hindu religion, Sanskrit as language and Shiva as a deity, that you can see on all their towers/temples. It was quick visit but the towers were close by, 5 minutes walk and I went in the close to 100F heat. We arrived in Nha Trang at 2:00pm and I got a room in a hotel, incredibly spotless with all the amenities and a view to the sea, just 2 minutes walk outside to the beach, for $9/night. I started my quick visit quickly by going to the tour agency to find out about the next day trips for tomorrow. I booked my bus for tomorrow night, a 10 hour experience arriving in Hoian at 6:00am and I jumped in the back of a motorbike with a guy who was waiting in the front of the hotel to visit the several sites in town I was interested in: a temple, the cathedral that is impressive and you think that was built in medieval times, and a set of Cham towers located in town built in the latter Cham centuries. The temples were magnificent and they were full with believers who were burning incense inside making the atmosphere almost impossible to breathe. But the smoke and the fire gave a good background for shooting so I stayed inside breathing when I got a break from shooting. I went to visit all 4 of them , but one of them is the most important and large. There are one near each other in a complex located on a promontory that confer a great view over the sea and the harbor. The motorbike guy dropped me to a far beach after I told him, to his surprise, that I want to walk back to town. They do not think that foreigners can walk! I stayed there till the full moon rose over the sea and chat with a group of guys and girls who came to chat with the “foreigner”, in spite that they did not speak English. But we made jokes and had a great time in spite of limited communication. People are so nice that sometime you are embarrassed that you cannot treat them with the same openness and joie de vivre that they have. You are rushed, between trips and tours, buses and planes, with the time on the limit and sometime you forget that the most important thing is to smile. The globalization works, and a guy, looking like a peasant boy, (not a city slicker, that you are able easily to recognize even here in Vietnam) came to me and said “Hello Motolola” and when I answered to him “Hello Moto” with the accent of the cellphone, he was delirious with laugh. So, here are two guys from two parts of the world communicating through the gadget language of the gizmos. Cellphones are everywhere in Vietnam, practically everybody has one, it’s just unbelievable because people do not make a lot of money but all talk on the cellphones. The greatest joy I had in Vietnam is to hear all the phones ringing and to know that none is mine…. At least this means to be in vacation! Also, I spoke today, in one of the bus stops, with a Vietnamese who left the country when he was 6 and lives in Australia and he told me a lot again about the corruption and about the money the rich guys have in Vietnam. It is unconceivable for the western mind to understand it how the Commies were able to transform the society. People are paid almost nothing but when you see the quality of the hotels, restaurants and many other places you realize that somebody is making tons of money that do not even trickle to the poor masses.

Anyway, after the chat with the Vietnamese guy I went for a stroll on the beach back to my hotel and I stopped to eat some fish at one of the Four Season restaurants on the beach. There are no other restaurants on the beach but these four and all are named, extremely creatively, “Four Seasons 1,2,3,4″. This is a pattern because you see hotels named like this everywhere. Not too much imagination! In front of the restaurant is the Casino named Gold Coast where I was shocked to see that the gambling is done exclusively digitally. The cards are generated digitally and displayed in front of the player both for blackjack and baccarat and in roulette you have both a display of your bets and a exact digital replica of the betting table in front of you, where you put your fingers and touch for your bets that probably are taken directly from an account. A little weird but I think Asian, who are number ONE gamblers in the world know better. In ten years in Vegas I did not see this. For the end of the tour, between telephones and internet, I strolled the city streets and I chat with a great painter. I would like to buy one of his painting but when I think about carrying them home I may give up. But I have his card and can get them on the Internet. Tomorrow I booked a tour to some islands, one of them has monkeys on it, I try to wake up at 5:00 am to see the sunrise, leave in the tour at 8:30 am and come back at 5pm to catch the bus to Hoi An at 7:00pm.

Dalat is a town at 1450m, developed by the French in the 19th century as a hill station, to get them out of the sultry weather of Saigon. The town is charming and is surrounded by so many interesting things like I never saw before. Trying in the morning to call the agency from which I had a brochure, I could not get through and one of the guys from the hotel ask me to mount his motorbike and to go to Kim’s cafe. There, the tours already left but this turn to be for the best because for several $ more I got a customized tour on motorbike and I was able in this way to go wherever I pleased. This was an important issue because none of the tours were stopping in all the locations I wanted to visit. I had a great time riding the motorbike through pine tree forests with Huang who was my guide and motorbike driver, a graduate in tourism from University of Hanoi. The sites we saw were stupendous, Valley of Gold, a beautiful lake and forest that is the reservoir for the city, an embroidery historic/traditional village built by a doctor and artist, who I happen to meet and congratulate because I like enormously his place. He put his own money to built something that in any other country would be done with absolutely huge government funds. He created a museum/collection/embroidery shop in an ambiance that recreates the old Vietnam , so serene and exquisite that is hard to explain non-graphically. it is the closest to the old literati places I ever got to see. It has a shop and I decided to buy an embroidery that is astoundingly beautiful and the effort these girl are putting into it is immense. Waiting for the packaging, that is quite big, I started chatting with Huang, and the first topic was obviously his thoughts about USA and the American war. He laughed because he said that everybody ask this question and he explain that for them that war is just history. He explained extensively and after a while I realized that for him that war is what is for me the first or even the second world war, a sad event but not of any concern. As I may drink a beer with a German and chat about soccer with no second thoughts about the past is for him the relation with the Americans. As a matter of fact, every time when I was asked where I am from and I responded, USA, the answer was “USA, Great country”. He said that even people who are now older and they were part of the war feel in the same way. He found funny that Vietnamese who left and marry Americans are baseless terrified to return in Vietnam being afraid that they may face retaliation, but it’s no resentment, in his view, and as usual as in many other parts of the world, the youth would like to go to America or Canada if possible. Unfortunately, this is not possible because the government ask for a bail of $35000 for granting them a visa, beside a hefty tax of $500 for the visa itself and these money are out of question for most Vietnamese. A good salary in Vietnam is around $600-700/month with architects, doctors, lawyers making over $1000/month.We talked a lot about the current politics and the Communist Party that like in China transformed the country in a super capitalist state where the social net is ZERO. If you lose your job you have to stay home with family and hope for a new job. No social security, pension, free education, free health, etc. University costs around $1000/9 months, an astronomical sum in Vietnam considering that the Cambridge chick, Sarah, told me that tuition used to cost in the UK &1000/year and now they raised it to &3000 and everybody is up in arms. However, corruption in Vietnam is rampart and if you need anything from the government you have to pay a lot to get, the example he gave me was about permits to build a house. If you don’t “oil” the officials you will never build anything and just stay with the land. Sound familiar, isn’t it? So for the Commies in general, they have just contempt but as a matter of fact they don’t care about them as long as they they can make money. Exactly, like in China! After we got the embroidery we biked to a Koho village where the head of the village, dressed in traditional dress, gave me an entire spiel about all the minorities in a combination of English and French and I was able to tape the entire “deposition” on tape. The guy was very cool. We roamed a little the village towards the church and such to find stuff to shoot and bought a nice traditional manually made embroidery, but with a device whose name I don’t know in English. From there we went to see a pagoda, and I expected nothing just the regular, another one. Same, same. The shock was immense the the only thing I can say is that pagoda is absolutely spectacular , and this word is a major understatement. Snakes and dragons were covering the entire interior, exterior and roof with a huge dragon made out of 10000 beer bottles but if he did not point out I could not have figure it out. Inside was a mass, that happens once a month and he said that we were very lucky to see it because he never saw it before. Most of the attendees were old women with interesting faces, singing Buddhist hymns. I shot tons of video with music and I barely was able to leave from there. I saw many temples in many parts of the world but nothing like this. We continued our bike exploration by seeing a beautiful cascade, the place being full of them and from there we went to another monastery built by a very driven Buddhist monk who was also the abbot. We were supposed to go tomorrow morning at 3:00am for Zen meditation but the monks could not receive us because they have a mass and they were busy to prepare food for the people. From there we shot directly to the last stop, the most famous in Dalat, “The Crazy House”. This place is hard to explain. It was built by the daughter of the second president of Vietnam, Thun Chu, who studied in Moscow 14 years architecture where he got a PhD, and returned to Vietnam and settled in Dalat. Now, she is 67 and she started in 1998 this house that is used also as a hotel, and is build like a huge tree with no straight walls. She is heavily influenced by Gaudi in the architecture but she does not have the his elegance, all the walls being curved and “pouring” the place looking like a combination of fairy tale, grottoes and tree. The house is remarkable and, besides this one, she did several other very controversial things. She lives inside the house and the entire project will be finished in 2010. This is quite a place.

From there we went to the agency and after that, quickly to eat because neither of us ate that day, neither breakfast nor lunch. I invited Huang to a restaurant and he picked a Vietnamese restaurant, where we had a hot pot of fish soup and Vietnamese medicine wine, something that is not served to foreigners or you can find in non vietnamese restaurants. Extremely interesting. The soup was delicious and we kept chatting for an hour keep adding medicine wine, that is made out of roots besides many others.

Last day in Saigon. Great city and leaving it is done with sorrow. I left in the morning to see the two main sites related with the past. The Independence Palace was the seat of the South Vietnamese government, where the first North Vietnamese tanks went through the gates on 30 April 1975. It is a modern palace built in the same style as Palace Hall and the TV Station in Bucharest, the architectural style of the time, being built between 1962-1966 on the location of the old French colonial palace. Diem who ordered the construction did not live there being ungraciously shot in the church where he hide in 1963, so it was only the residence of President Thieu till his unflattering departure on April 18, 1975. He died in Boston in 2001 and the Viet Minh would have shot him on the spot if they have caught him. The palace is frozen in time, kept exactly how it was when the Viet Minh conquered the city, with the war maps, the bunkers, and the halls for receptions, bedrooms, etc. It is a little eerie but it is a great relic. Now is used as a museum and for some receptions but the new openness in Vietnam took all the propaganda away and is just history. Next stop of my visit was to the War Remnant Museum, a museum that has pictures of the atrocities from the American war. It used to be called the Museum for the Crimes of the Chinese and Americans but nowadays it blandly shows pictures from the American War skipping the atrocities the North Vietnamese did against the Southerns and reverse. It is impressive till the level of tears and makes well the point that war is senseless and it is just destruction for both the winners and the losers, if they are any definable. Actually it creates just losers. There are pictures of persons affected by Agent Orange, phosphorus bombs, killing and destruction in a stupid war. If the Americans would have figured out that Mao would die and China and Vietnam would change to the worst capitalism that exists on the planet they may not have sent their boys to die there. Because nowadays, Vietnam is growing on an unbelievable pace, with lots of investments from all over the world being poured here, US being one of the most desired investor. The country does not have any resemblance of the poor nation many people associates with. In any way, after you leave the museum you start question the soundness of the human mind, how can sentient humans can do this to their own kin, what can drive them so mad. And here are not described the atrocities committed by the Viet Minh to the southerners and reverse. In any way when you think at Iraq and senseless killings that happen there you realize that the humanity is as stupid as a doorknob, nobody freaking learn anything out of what was going on in the past.
I left from there to see the most beautiful pagoda in Saigon, (the city is called by everybody Saigon, except the official name changed to Ho Chi Minh City after the takeover), Jade Emperor, an astounding place even after the Cholon tour gave me a pretty good idea of the style. It is located somewhere in the northern part of the city and is quite of a walk or motorbike ride till there. I spent some time among incense sticks and fumigating sticks clearing my mind of the evil, admiring the superbly carved statues and decoration. The atmosphere in these temples is heavy with smoke hanging constantly in the air from these fumigating sticks, very eerie.

From there I walked back to the Center, through the hi-rises of the new Saigon that eclipse the old French building, most of these investments being probably mainly Asians, HK Singapore etc. but also American, USA after the openness in 94 being one the best partner with Vietnam. The Commies courted the Americans a while before Clinton gave the green light in 1994, and surprisingly like anywhere in SE Asia being American is as cool as before the war. Go figure! These guys turned the other cheek in an amazing way! And not all of them are Catholic, not that Catholics do this, except on paper. People are so nice that sometimes is embarrassing especially when you figure out that they don’t want anything just to chat and help you. (One guy just brought me a coffee when I was writing this, for no reason….). We are freaking conceited and self-centered in an fake universe that we surround ourselves with, in our “civilization” of papers and money and no soul. I passed by the new American Embassy, the old one was razed and a brand new one opened on the same location and is surrounded by the typical anti bomb blockers, the only site in Saigon I could not take pictures of. There were guards in front, who when they saw me coming with my big camera started to freak out. Quite embarrassing! From there, I went to walk and take pictures in the center that is so clean and glitzy that is embarrassing to think about Bucharest. Huge new building sport on their facades, “Gucci opens soon”, Louis Vuiton and FCUK are there and all are coming to embrace the new opportunities. I stopped in a new cafe Coffee Jean’s, a type of Starbucks with atmosphere and good coffee, to get away of the sweltering heat, and the surprise was immense. The coffee was wonderful, ten times better that Starbucks, a place that I enjoy, (OK, everybody has its weakness!) and MORE expensive! In Saigon when a dinner with beer can cost 30-40000 dongs(16000=$1) a coffee was 70000. And the place was packed with several foreigners but mainly with cool Saigonese. But again the coffee was so good, because was not made with ice and mix, but with coffee ice cream and coffee. I really enjoyed the place and shot video inside and was able to cool off the close to 100F that were outside. I strolled through the center, on the river among the nice cafes and hotels all looking like being brand new or yesterday renovated and ended up for a beer on the terrace on top of the Rex, regretting that I have to leave such a great city, and quickly to Pham Ngu Lao to get my backpack and zip to the bus that was leaving at 5pm. I bought a ticket to Hanoi on a Open bus system with Kim’s after I looked again to some other guys who sell it but they all pool together and commission other company to do it and they just skim on this. The open bus system gives you the opportunity to stop for how many days you want in the core destinations on the way between Saigon and Hanoi. There are about 5-6 spots to stop with variances and in any case you would not have times for more or anything else is secondary to be seen. The ticket is somewhere between $20-25, again prices in US$, for the entire route and you can see with it all Vietnam. My stops are Dalat, Nha Trang, Hoi An, Hue, Hanoi. There are day and night buses and you can customize the way how you want to go and you just have to tell them one day in advance that you want to book a particular bus, for them to come and pick you up from the hotel the next morning. Is is a great system. The bus ride was very good, comfortable and got asleep being in AC after the 100F and got in Dalat at 11:30 pm and in the hotel , they book it in Kim’s for me, at 12:00. The hotel is impeccably clean and nice, typical Chinese/Vietnamese hotels, no European frills but everything is there, with TV and fridge stashed with cooling drinks and snacks, free internet access, like the one I stayed in Saigon and all for $14/night. Now I have to go to book a tour in the city, I woke this morning at 5:30am and now is 7:10am.

Today was great and it compensated for yesterday. Not that yesterday was bad but it was not my style, too relaxing and less involving. All day eating, biking and admiring palm trees, maybe sounds good by not for me. In any case the Mekong Delta, that in my imagination looked something like in “Apocalypse Now” is completely different. The Americans never bombed here because it was super populated and it still is, Cantho being a huge city, with university and such. It is not by any means the tranquil and isolated place that was in my imagination. I left in the morning from my hotel after I fought last night with the guy from reception because he wanted to overcharge me for the AC. I went to see the sunrise, but not a clear one,and a lot of action on the Mekong at that hour. At 7:15am we got into the boat and we arrived at the Cai Rang floating market at 7:45am. Great market! Full of boats and great commotion around them. They put us on a small boat to go through all the anchored boats and after that we took a panoramic view from the top of the large boat we were in. Great footage!. There are hundreds of boats in a market that aggregate every morning of the entire year, with the exception of 3-4 days during Tet festival. Everybody buys ans sells and there are no souvenirs or any kitschy stuff, just veggies and lots of fruits. What they sell is displayed on top of a bamboo stick planted on top of the boat. The boats are mainly motorized and large, but there are also standing row boats. Very nice and interesting! We stayed there for about 2 hours, I guess, and latter we went again on the canals to a rice mill where they explained how the rice is getting cropped and refined. We returned for lunch in Cantho where I chat with an Aussie, Ralph, teaching English in Cantho for a number of years already, and with a guy from Paris studying law here for one year. Also, on the boat I chat with two guys from Berlin, one of them is a project manager for Daimeler-Chrysler in Stuttgart and they told me lots of stories about the brands and the emergent possibility of a split between them. Yesterday I met two couple from France, one being the typical French, and a Kiwi girl named Rachel, speaking with British accent.

The bad part is after lunch nothing more happened and we took boats and buses and arrive in Saigon at 7:30pm after about 5 hours in the combinations. The traffic on the outside roads is very intense and they drive slow being afraid of the police, the fines for speeding being very high for the income, the vicinity of $50-100. When I got back, I called home, I went to my hotel where the lady held my luggage, got back in my room, and I made my arrangements for the bus to go North. I need for the first leg a bus that leaves later in the day and I found two agencies that have some and even more so I will go with either of them, most of them having just a morning bus to Dalat per day. The plan is to visit Saigon’s center tomorrow and to leave around 3:00pm to Dalat, a 5 hours ride. After all these, I left again in the center, where it was an amazing Chinese festival with lots of lights and music, in front of the Independence Palace, the old residence of the president of South Vietnam. Pretty active! I walked near the palace that I want to visit tomorrow and to the American Embassy now Consulate, the famously infamous one, that Americans razed it completely after reestablishing new relations with Vietnam and built it fresh. But you cannot see anything inside, the fence being too high. It is impressive how the center looks, new large hotels, chic bars and restaurants, all these being built and developed since 1984 when Vietnam opened for investments. People look happy and extremely friendly. The Commies failed in their known style bringing the country to famine and changed gear meanwhile filing their own pockets to the elbow. I ate somewhere outside in the market some Thai clams with Saigon beer and got back in the backpackers ghetto for the internet nightly activity.

The breakfast is great. All sort of exotic fruits with yogurt and a banana crepe with a banana shake. Beats anything! I will try and see what I’ll get tomorrow. The rest of the food is OK and sometimes predictable, but the breakfast is the best and you can get breakfast anytime during the day . And if you want traditional, you have to thank to the French colonialists that introduced the baguette and the croissants and crusty rolls. It goes a long way.

After this magnificent breakfast, I left for the bus and at 7:45am I left towards the Mekong delta. Huge group, an entire bus. Lots of French, arrogant as usual and convinced that the world’s civilization rests on their hands and Germans bored to the level of the bench that they are sitting on. The previous night I watched a couple, probably very well to do, at the Korean BBQ. They were bored to the bones, she was playing the entire dinner with her cellphone and they barely exchanged more between themselves than I exchanged with the waiter to order my dinner. Money obviously do not make people happy and it can be a curse if you don’t have the brains to know what the hell you are doing with them and with you.
Anyway, long drive, about 2 hours to the delta, but not too many to tell. We had a quick stop iin a place that had hammocks for water and toilets and we reached the boats that took us in a floating market in Cai Be, no big deal because we were made aware that the market is slow today, but I have the feeling that is slow everyday. Overall the entire day was quite uninteresting, the river is flat and lazy and the canals are nice but the temperature was around 95F. We had lunch after which we got bikes to ride around, again on boats and latter on a bus ride and a last boat ride to Cantho, the largest city in the delta, where I am now. I had an interesting dinner of Fish-Squid-Beef dipped in boiling vinegar in a business restaurant built for the new money, that is right on the shore of the river, actually on stilts inside the water. The dinner was not great but interesting. Worth a try in any case! Many times I asked people here about various places and they have no idea. I heard a discussion in Cantho at the table where the locals did not have the knowledge that the city of Cantho is the largest and many times I ask people where a temple is and they have no idea, no matter that in one situation you could see it on their window. But they could not care less. And everybody is picking on the Americans that they don’t have a clue! After dinner I passed by the staue of Uncle Ho, the largest in Vietnam, a little Internet, and I went to the hotel for a good night sleep.

The preferred currency in Vietnam is the US$. Surprising , Isn’t it? All major prices are in US$ and the only reason you may need dongs is that sometimes you have to pay under 1US$ and probably coins do not go. The higher rank hotels and restaurants quote first in $ and latter in dong, the local currency. Finally I went today to the bank and I exchanged $200 in dong, in this way being easier to buy pineapple or papaya on the street. Even in such a situation, in the market or even on the sidewalk, the change may come in US$ and dongs! The Americans are still in vogue in spite of the war and the past sufferings, Saigon is swamped by foreign investments. The inflation is high, the rate being somewhere around 1$=16000 dongs so today I got 3 millions dongs from the bank.

I decided to stay in the city for the day. The first part of my visit, that ended up taking almost the entire day was Chinatown named here Cholon. It’s a large area in District 3 that has lots of temples, Fujian style most of them, that are spectacular. I saw many other temples before but I think these are the best. All of them hang on their ceilings fumigating spirals and the fumigating sticks are everywhere giving a spectacular and mystical look inside. Also, they are the khang, a sort of oven outside, where they burn offering papers for the dead, this is being part of the ancestor cult where you mainly offer fake money that you may have to buy in advance. Even here the most desirable are stacks of copied US$100 bills that you can buy in the stores and burn in the khangs. I started a walk but eventually I hired a cyclo, samlor in Thailand, that brought me for a long drive to Cholon market. He dropped me in front of the market, and I paid him $3. He schemed me with the typical fifteen/fifty but when I was in the cyclo I was starting to feel bad because the road was very long just for less than a 1$. The market is spectacular, for most of the stuff from there I have no idea what they are. I roamed the market and shot spectacular footage, interesting stuff. Lots of tourist also in the market, being part of the city tour. The city tour was added in the recent years by the agencies but is rushed and incomplete so I decided to skip it. After I finished the market, I roamed the streets around it and I started to visit , first a church, Catholicism being extremely strong in South Vietnam, and latter all the pagodas one after another ending at the Cholon mosque. Some of the pagodas were hard to find so I went back and forth repeatedly to locate them. I took a motorbike to bring me to the center but this was lost in translation, if it existed something like this, and I ended up in Pham Ngu Lao, where is the hotel. Because I arrived there, I took a short pause for a beautifully decorated French ice cream, lots of fancy places like this being in Pham Ngu Lao catering mainly for foreigners, and I started to read the guide and noticed that I missed two more pagodas close to Cholom that are very important. So, I hired a motorbike for 40000 RT and I went there. It is hard to describe the traffic in Saigon, a city with 8 million people and 3 million motorbikes that roam like flies the boulevards, streets and soys. The traffic is super chaotic, there are lights but most of the times motorbikes and cyclos run them. The only similarity would be a Brownian motion looking of lots of flies in a jar. To cross the street is an adventure and is a technique that you have to master; the flow of motorbikes is continuous and if you would wait for a lull maybe you may get one at 3am. So you start walking relaxed and slow in the middle of this mayhem and as long as you don’t make abrupt moves or want to be somehow creative, like stopping, the traffic will flow around you. If you choose to run, you get creamed. Period! The same rules apply when you are on a motorbike and you want to get into traffic on the other side of the street. No matter how heavy the traffic is you start getting out and crossing. The horns will blow out, there will be some screeches but you will be safe, hopefully, on the other side. Otherwise, forget about going out! There are very few cars in comparison with motorbikes, first because is impossible to park, and the motorbikes are parked in paid parking everywhere in town, and second you move slower in a car because you cannot get ahead. So, a lot of people prefer to buy motorbikes, that are more like mopeds than Harleys. The price is low, you can get one locally made with $300-400, but when you ride it you take your life in your hands , somebody told me that only in the last 10 days 200 people died in traffic in Saigon. In any case, the guy I hired brought me back safe from Cholon’s Gai Lam pagoda, a feat for which he tried in the last moment to add another 10000 dongs to the bill, the bonus that I was alive and I even shot video in traffic from the motorbike. After a short stint at Kim’s cafe to make arrangements for the Mekong trip I left in the center of town to go to Rex Hotel, that was the defacto command center for the Americans in the War. It has and had a terrace on top that is very neat. Now the Rex is just one of the hotels but still one of the glitziest. The center of Saigon is in a boom and the landscape changes when you come from Cholon , that looks like a regular Asian town, or even from Pham Ngu Lao that is the backpacker area. Suddenly , when you come to the city center, restaurants are sporting prices 3-4 times higher that in the backpacker area, clubs abound, chicks roam the streets asking if you want massage and pimps come directly to you to ask if you want a lady. It is not exactly sleazy but definitely is a little unpleasant. When money talks , bullshit walks and this is valid in the Workers’ paradise that is Vietnam, that like the Communist China is a brutal capitalist society from where USA looks like a social state. I ate in a Korean BBQ restaurant, the ubiquitously bibimbap that was great and comes with tons of additions here, plus the local Saigon beer, and after I gave another tour shooting a little video, avoiding the girls and the pimps, I went back to the backpackers ghetto where the atmosphere was quite different. Obviously , the girls are looking for money and you cannot carry too much in a backpack, so in the backpackers area you are not hassled. After that again, the internet stint that was painfully slow last night and unusable in the entire area, a call home and a good sleep, and I was able to wake up at 4:00am. 2 more hours and I get in the right time.

I could not sleep. It is impossible to get to sleep when you go to bed at 10-11 am by your biological time. I got in the room at Tuan An Guest house around 10pm and after a shower I got in bed. It was relaxing to lay down after so many hours in the plane but I could not sleep, just relax, so at 6:00 am I was up and leaving the place with my luggage because I did not like it. It was not very clean and very expensive for nothing. I moved across the street at Ngoc Diem Hotel in a room at the fourth floor with fan for $9 or AC for $13, with nice bathroom and fridge loaded with drinks and snacks. It is clean and very nice with some kind of view no matter that I did not take advantage of it.
At 7:00am I was at Kim Cafe and I booked the tour for the tunnels, had a breakfast with eggs and good crispy French bread and chocolate croissant, well there were the French here, and I bummed on the streets and called home till 8:30 when the bus was coming.

Saigon is major tourist hub. I did not see so many tourists in Cambodia., but here you feel that everybody comes. Young and old, on short hauls or long time traveling guys you see all of them. The bus was full of them from all over the world: USA, Canada, England, Israel, France, Germany, Sweden to name just a few. The guide used to work for the Americans in the war as translator at a very high level, because he met several times McNamarra, during the war, and talked a lot and very sensitive about the entire conflict. He looked like he spent many years in reeducation camps after 1975, but he had a common sense and a joy of life that you can see only in few people, mainly those who pass through ordeals of this nature. Unfortunately it was not easy to understand his pronunciation. We left to visit Gaodai temple, that is the core temple for a separate religion widespread in South Vietnam, a concoction of several religions. They accept all the religions’ patriarchs on their church with equal rights, and are based on seance sessions the core believes being established in some seance sessions from the 1920s. It was established by a mystic in the second part of the 19th century. Quite interesting and colorful, the temple being super garish, with the large symbol of the eye everywhere and lots of deities that adorn the temple like on the temples in Rajasthan. We attended the mass that is impressive, the tour arriving there at the mass time, 12:00, and I shot a lot of video from the top galleries. The main spirit/soul that keep visiting them is Victor Hugo and his spirit plays an important role in the church.

From there we stop to eat, typical touristy stuff, and I met a guy from Inwwod, NY, Brandon, who workes for a German bank in NY in midtown and a girl from London, a Cambridge graduate, Sarah, who just quit a job with P&G to travel the world and now she got in Vietnam after 2.5 month in New Zealand and Australia and will continue to Laos , Cambodia, HK and Japan before going back to London. Another 2 months.

We arrived at the highlight of the tour, the Cu Chi tunnels, built by Vieth Minh south of Saigon to be able to penetrate the American front. I did not like the tour and the tunnels but I do understand both the propagandistic aspect and the obsession with the wars that preoccupied the locals relentlessly for a long time. I got in one of the tunnels but the experience is not pleasant and I have to go down on all four to fit. They built the tunnels for the smaller Viet Minh guys, and for sure Americans did not fit inside. The networks is very large but now the entire exhibit is just thatched roof holes that show how the Viet Minh where operating inside the jungle. When we got back to the bus the trip and the lack of sleep got a toll on me and I was dozing in and out of sleep the entire way, so when I got in Saigon I was barely able to walk. Also it was a very hot day 37-38C and the only thing that I was able to do is take a quick shower in my 4th floor room and get back down to eat something. After dinner I went to an internet cafe to write in the blog but the only thing I was able to do was to answer to a Claire’s email and after that super reluctantly I got back inside the room at 8:00pm because I could not stand anymore. I got in bed and got asleep instantaneously at 8:10pm , after about 50 hours of being awake.

I woke in the night around 2:00am fresh and start reading the “Sacred Willow” and waited for the day light to get in city and call home.

The good news was that I got a door seat in the plane. It is good news for a 17 hours flight that takes a toll on you. Luckily the book I got from the library was pretty good and gave me already a pretty good insight in the history of the country seen by the Vietnamese and not by their colonizers.
But still there were 17 hours, so I ate 3 times and I read also the Lonely Planet and I got in BKK at 5:50pm local time. The flight to Saigon was only 1 hour and 10 minutes and left a little delayed and when it wanted to land tried twice because first time may had some problems with the landing gear that apparently was almost disengaged but not completely. The captain apologized and we got to see twice the same view over the city. Long lines at immigration and customs. They checked everything. It is faster in the US even after 9/11. At customs they scanned all the luggages!
I got a cab ride in town for $7, more than the regular price and when I got to the hotel where I booked my room they did not have any rooms available so one of the guys took me on a motorbike to another hotel. Probably they overcharged me, $18, but no big deal. There are lots of rooms in town so it is not necessary to book in advance.
The place where all the foreigners stay, called Pham Ngu Lao, is similar with Khao San Road in BKK but larger with lots of glitzy cafes mostly catering for travelers. I got some brochures for the trips around here and I have to figure out in what order I will do them. I called in NY but nobody was home and neither in Bucharest.
Tomorrow, I may take a tour in the city or go in a day tour to see some Vieth Minh tunnels and a temple for all religions.