Haiphong was one of the stranger places that we visited. The only reason for this is that it was not set up for tourists in the slightest. There were almost no foreigners there, I think we spotted one our first day in town. We arrived in Haiphong on the fast ferry from Cat Ba. Finding the ferry was quite annoying as there was an official government ticket office that was only open for around an hour a day. Then every single hotel would try to sell you tickets, and there was a tourist company called Hadeco that set up a makeshift office on the main town square. We ended up booking with Hadeco for a mid-day boat for 150,000 dong.
Upon arrival in Haiphong we asked for some directions into town and were told it was around 10km so we grabbed a taxi. For a ridiculous 60,000 the guy took us for a 3 minute ride right to the central square. Luckily along the way I spotted a tourist information office so we back tracked, got a map and directions to the ‘hotel’ area of town. Haiphong is the 3rd largest city in Vietnam, but there is little going on as far as tourism is concerned. Most people use it as a point of transit to and from Hanoi and don’t even spend a night. Hotels are not that cheap so there is no reason to stay very long. to add to the general average-ness of our stay, I got bed bugs in our hotel.
The most exciting thing we did, apart from walking through the markets, was book a bus to Ninh Binh. We found a company called Hoang Long, which is a little bit more expensive, but more trustworthy. You can book a bus from the Tam Bac bus station. When we went into the bus station we were immediately surrounded by locals laughing at our attempts to pronounce Ninh Binh properly. The ‘nh’ makes for a soft ‘ng’ sound so they kept on say “nung bung” much to our confusion. They were also fascinated by Kim’s tattoo and ear-piercings. The first ticket lady got fed-up with our lack of Vietnamese, but the second lady managed to sort it out and got us on a sleeper bus for the 4 ½ hour journey.
Turns out the sleeper probably wasn’t all that necessary. We were placed right at the back of the bus, where there are five cots all in a row, with no space in between. As the sleeper busses have two levels the lower level at the back is really claustrophobic. You have to lie down, and there is little room for movement if the bus is full. A cheeky bastard had also stolen Kim’s seat because he didn’t want to lie in the middle cot which was about a foot shorter than the rest. I had nowhere to put my guitar so I carried it on top of me until the cheeky guy who stole Kim’s seat offered to place it next to him by the window. The bus ride was really interesting as the cheeky guy started talking to us. He was really friendly, and wanted to practice his English so we talked about all kinds of random things. He asked us to describe New Zealand, what people do there, what we do for money, what our goals in life are. It was all so simple, but still quite personal.
After a delayed 5 hour ride we arrived in Ninh Binh and were dropped off on the side of the highway with wishes of good luck from our seat-stealing friend. Ninh Binh is a large city, and oddly enough was impossible to find a map for it. We searched everywhere for one before arriving, and even googlemaps just had a big blank space next to the highway. Upon checking now there is a map on googlemaps so your journey should be a lot easier. Using our lonely planet phrase guide and a piece of paper we approached a man sitting around near the drop-off point. We pointed to the word for train station, as all the hostels in Ninh Binh are located near the train station. He then started rambling in Vietnamese, pointing us in the rough direction. So we set off across the highway, crossing without traffic lights.
As we approached the train station we went down a random side-alley believing it to be an offshoot of the main hostel street, and a good part to start looking for a bed. Out of nowhere a young man on a moped rode up and asked where we were going. We told him we were looking for a hostel, and he told us he had just the place. He took us to his hotel where we were given a book full of positive comments about Mr. Dai (as he formally introduced himself) and his hotel. Having little choice we took the room, and settled in for a nap. We woke up a little later in the afternoon, went to the train station and booked a hard sleeper down to Hue. Booking the ticket was quite easy, as the station agent spoke a decent amount of English. They also have a handy notice board out the front with English translations for all the important words. After booking our ticket we returned to the hostel and sorted out an adventure for the next day.
Note: Will continue the story next time, I am trying to keep posts at a nice length so you don’t get bored trying to cram in 2,000 words at a time. I am also trying to get back to one city at a time so there may be some overlap when I describe Ninh Binh next post.
Haiphong has a cool park running right through the city to explore. Try and catch the locals playing Jianzi in the sporting area. Beware the prices for foreigners in the fruit market.
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