Hello hello, welcome back to another travel update. As promised, this time a bit faster than last time. We are now in Thailand, but have traveled through Vietnam last month, and I haven’t written anything about that yet… here it comes!
Last time we ended in Singapore and flew to Vietnam, to Ho Chi Minh (formerly Saigon) to be precise. We left on time for Singapore airport, which is known as the most beautiful airport there is. Botanical gardens, waterfalls and a train going through the airport there, we were looking forward to it. Unfortunately we ended up disappointed because we flew from Terminal 3, which is slightly less spectacular… that was a bummer! Anyway, in the end the goal was to get to Vietnam and we succeeded. I still had some bad memories about it, because 2 years ago I was refused on a flight to Vietnam due to an error on my visa. Fortunately everything went well this time 😊
I had already been to Vietnam, but we didn’t go there for no reason… We had agreed to travel together with Nikki & Tobi! Nikki is a friend of ours who we met in Thailand 2 years ago. Since then we have always kept in touch and we have also visited each other several times in the Netherlands. Tobi is a friend of Nikki and I had already met him in the Netherlands, so that was super nice! 😊
In Ho Chi Minh we decided to visit the Cu Chi tunnels. These are tunnels that the Vietnamese used in the war with the US. They are tiny and you had to duck through them. There are several entrances to these tunnels, all of which are hidden, so the Vietnamese could quickly appear and disappear everywhere. In addition, there were many other war techniques that they used. That was quite ‘fun’ to see, because you didn’t immediately see the terrible consequences. That was different when we went to the war museum. There were several exhibitions about the war, and they left little to the imagination. It’s a good thing we went there, but we came out very quietly. Fortunately, there were plenty of fun things to do in Ho Chi Minh to distract us from this, for example we went to several food markets and did some shopping. In Vietnam they have the Bahn Mi, which is a French baguette filled with coriander, carrot, cucumber and a form of protein of your choice. I ate a lot of that 2 years ago, so I had to have a shirt of that too.
After Ho Chi Minh we went to Mui Ne and then to Da Lat. Mui Ne is a fishing village on the beach and we could relax here. They also have famous dunes here and we have been there too. From the coast you can see all the fishing boats and that is a beautiful view. Da Lat is located at a higher altitude and is therefore not so hot, which is nice. Here we went to waterfalls and visited Mongoland, this park was created in honor of Mongolia, but the main reason we went was the slide. They had a ‘dry’ slide here in all kinds of colors that you could get off with a rubber tube, and that was fun. I found the food in Da Lat to be a bit disappointing, except for one particular soup, which was delicious. It was also Samantha’s birthday when we were here and of course we took a moment to celebrate that. We booked a hotel where you could see the stars from your bed and had a nice dinner, an Italian restaurant of course 😉.
Then it was time for our first real night bus. This means of transport is very famous in Vietnam. You leave in the evening and arrive at your destination the next morning. To say that it is really comfortable is another matter, but in any case it is a nice experience. We left from Da Lat to Hoi An and that is a beautiful destination. Hoi An is known for two things, the lanterns and the tailors. In Hoi An you can have clothes made to measure for a very cheap price. A lot of people buy suits or dresses here, for example. I already had enough dresses with me, so I didn’t need them anymore 😉. In addition, Hoi An also has a very beautiful center located on the water. We also went on the famous coconut boats and rented scooters to go to a large cave with several temples.
From Hoi An you can easily reach Da Nang and here you can go to the beach. They have a big dragon bridge here and on weekends it spits fire. I remembered that from the last time and so we planned it so that we would be there on the weekend.
After Da Nang, the capital Ha Noi was on the program. We took the night bus again and arrived in the morning. Just enough time to arrange tickets for that evening’s football match: Vietnam vs. Indonesia. As most people know by now, I really enjoy going to football matches. So when I go to a new country, I always try to see if there is a match we can go to. And then I saw that Vietnam would play a World Cup qualifying match in Ha Noi at the end of March. Then I thought we could be there… And quite coincidentally we arrived on the day of the competition 😉. We went to the stadium in the morning to get tickets and were the only foreigners to receive preferential treatment. The sellers called us all the way to the front, so we didn’t even have to stand in line! In the evening we went back for this highlight and that was a lot of fun. I always really enjoy the atmosphere surrounding a match, and in other countries it is even more fun. There were also some Dutch people playing for Indonesia, so that was fun too. Unfortunately for Vietnam, the match did not go so well, and they lost 0-4. But that didn’t spoil the fun because when Indonesia scored the 4th in the last minute, all Vietnamese cheered!
Ha Noi is known for the ‘train street’, this is a very narrow street with shops through which a train passes. Of course we couldn’t miss this and saw several trains passing by. You really had to retract your legs because otherwise you would be hit and you could easily lose a leg. Fortunately, everyone still had their legs and we needed them because we had booked a food tour. Walking through the city with our local guide Mei, we went to different restaurants to try food, and that was a lot of fun! Our favorite dish was the Bun Cha, which is a kind of broth with meat and noodles to which you add your own vegetables. After Ha Noi we went to Sa Pa and this is known for its rice fields and we also did a tour through there.
After Sa Pa, Samantha, Nikki and Tobi went on the famous Ha Giang scooter tour and I went back to Ha Noi. I had already done the tour 2 years ago and had heard that it has become a lot busier since then than when I did it. I also had to try to arrange visas for Samantha and me for Laos, and in retrospect I definitely needed that time. We discovered too late that we had to apply for a visa for Laos in advance if we wanted to go by bus, which was our plan. Normally you can arrange a visa upon arrival, but this was not possible at the border crossing we were going to take.
So I went to the Laos embassy to arrange our visas for us. We had read that we needed passport photos, so we quickly took photos in front of a white wall in our room in Sa Pa. Printing these photos was already difficult, but luckily a woman helped me by editing the photos and then printing them out. So, off to the Laos embassy. The question was whether I could apply for a visa for Samantha without her being present. I did have her passport so we would see. Fortunately, this was not a problem and I was able to submit both applications. The next morning I went back and I received the passports and visas. That was very easy…
With all these papers we could book the bus to go to Laos. We had to leave on Friday because our Vietnam visas would expire on Saturday, so we had to be out of the country. Samantha was coming back from the Ha Giang tour on Friday morning, so we booked the bus for Friday. Then we found out that the bus would not arrive at the border with Laos until 3:00 in the morning, so on Saturday. That would mean we would be in Vietnam 3 hours too long.
At first we thought this wouldn’t be a problem, after all it is only 3 hours. We read online that you had to pay a fine of about €30 and that they would then let you go, that would be fine (literally 😉). To be on the safe side, I went to the Vietnamese immigration service in Ha Noi…
It was quite chaotic there, to say the least. Nothing was in English and I had no idea where to go. I just stood in line somewhere and after a while some people pointed out that I had to go somewhere else. I saw one person who was also not Asian and asked him for help. I had to draw a number and then wait until it was my turn, which seemed a bit more organized. After waiting a while it was my turn but unfortunately the immigration officer did not have good news. You can indeed pay a fine if you stay in Vietnam for a few days too long, but this is not possible if you want to leave the country by bus, only by plane. So we had 2 options: we book a flight or we can come back to immigration on Saturday, surrender our passport for a week and pay the fine. Well great.
Good to know that that day was Thursday (two days before we had to leave the country), I was alone that day, and my internet on my phone suddenly stopped working that morning. Not all very pleasant. With that news, I decided to go back to the Laos embassy, asking if the visa we had just received could also be used if we were going by plane. We had indicated that we would go by bus. “Any way you want,” said the man from the embassy, some good news that day. I hadn’t eaten anything yet so decided to go to a breakfast place with WiFi so I could let everything sink in, look up some things on my phone and try to reach Samantha. I told her the news and that was of course a shame for her to hear, but at least she was still sitting comfortably on a scooter in the most beautiful area of Vietnam haha 😉. I started looking for flights for the next day and saw that the flight to Laos was expensive, but yes, that makes sense if you want to book it 1 day in advance of course. We honestly didn’t care anymore where we would go as long as we could get out of the country and it wouldn’t be too expensive. I typed ‘from’ Hanoi, ‘to’ ‘Anywhere’ into my flight searcher and I saw that Siem Reap (Cambodia) had a very cheap flight. That’s nice, I thought. Siem Reap is relatively close to Laos so that would be perfect. I quickly looked at the visa restrictions for Cambodia and hoped that we could do a visa on arrival… ‘e-visa’ was the first heading I saw. Ah no, I thought, you often have to arrange that a few days in advance. I read a little further… I saw ‘visa on arrival’: “Yes! It is possible!”. That was quite a relief. I immediately booked those tickets and the next morning we found ourselves on a flight to Cambodia. A good end to the story! 😊
I think these types of experiences are recognizable to most travelers. It is a strange experience of stress and knowing that everything will turn out okay, as it always does. Sometimes you just have to remind yourself of that during a day like that. And I have to say, it wasn’t all that bad. People helped me several times that day and I was also able to help people myself. After that I went to the gym to get the stress out of my body and I could relax again. And in the evening there was another football match that I went to 😊
Well, now you know why the next travel update will start in Cambodia, much love!