Minsk Trip

My friend Al and I went on a motorcycle trip to the north a few weeks ago. We were on the road for four days. He had the week off from work and wanted to rent a couple of Minsk motorcycles and get out of town. We planned a route that would take us into the mountains and close to the Chinese border. We picked up the bikes on Wednesday morning and headed out of Hanoi. The traffic was miserable and it took a while before we found the highway we were supposed to be on, but after that, it was smooth sailing to the north.

Here's Al before the trip:


We drove for a better part of the day, making a few stops along the way for beer and cigarettes. By the time we reached Lang Son, we were ready to eat and relax for the evening. We booked a room at a hotel and explored the city.

Lang Son is a simple city with beautiful little mountains surrounding it. The mountains are small but steep and some of them have stairways built into their sides. We climbed a couple of them to get a view of the city.


Al doing the "Top-of-the-World" pose:



Don't these mountains look like a pair of breasts?


The similarity is uncanny!


In the morning we headed north again. This time to a town called Cao Bang. Along the way we took a wrong turn and ended up at the Chinese border.



We found the road again and continued north.


We took a small detour to drive over a few mountain passes and found ourselves on one of the worst roads of the trip. It was under construction and muddy from being soaked by rains from the past few days. We drove in the deep ruts made by trucks but still got stuck several times. The bikes slid around and were hard to control. Luckily the Minsk is made for this kind of terrain and runs well in low gear. We were able to pass the mountain and reconnect with the main road on the other side. It took a lot longer than we had expected.






We came to a river crossing that offered a ferry for trucks and a shitty little bridge for motorbikes. We took the bridge.


It was starting to rain and get dark. We drove as fast as we could to try and beat the darkness but ended up rolling into Cao Bang after sunset. We found a hotel and headed to the local bar. The bar was great. It was a cocktail lounge and real find for any part of Vietnam let alone a weird little town that far north. We drank a few cocktails and then bought a pack of playing cards and headed back to the hotel. We stayed up pretty late drinking and playing cards and then passed out. We had planned to leave early the next morning for another mountain pass road on our way south to Bac Can, but we didn’t wake up until after 9:00 and our hangovers kept us off the road until 11:00.




We drove up a main road to find the mountain pass road. It was a long detour and we knew it was going to take a while. However, when we finally reached the road, it was flooded worse that the other muddy road and impassable. We had been on a wet and foggy road all the way up to this road and knew that this detour was going to be bad. We were literally in the clouds and the ground must have been soaked for weeks. We knew we didn’t have enough time so we had to make a decision; should we keep going west, past this mountain dirt road and reconnect with the main road to Bac Can much later, or do we turn back and count our losses. We knew that if we turned back it would save time, and so we did. We had wasted the best daylight we were going to have and drove 120km out of our way. In Tinh Tuc we turned around and headed back to Cao Bang.



The road to Bac Can was a good one. It was smooth and easy to drive. The view was spectacular too. However, we had run out of time again and arrived in Bac Can in the dark. At this point, we had been driving all day with hardly any stops. We were cold, tired, and hungry. We found a hotel and went for food. It was a well-earned meal and we started to feel like we were coming back to life.




In the morning we actually managed to get up early and head out before 9:00. This made all the difference in the world. We took another detour through another mountain pass road, and although it was just as narrow and unkempt as the muddy roads, it was covered with rocks and easier on the bikes. Nevertheless, it was just as slippery. The bikes performed beautifully and the ride was exciting. The bikes pitched from side to side, bounced up and down and jumped over rocks and ditches. Controlling the sliding and skids was tricky at times but I felt like a dirtbike racer on a well-designed obstacle course.



We reached the town of Thai Nguyen a lot earlier than we expected and realized that we’d be in Hanoi by 5:00. We took our time getting back and stopped for coffee. But this road was a main highway and very busy with traffic heading back to Hanoi, so we just kept up a good pace and let the kilometers pass.


Getting back into Hanoi was no fun. The trip was over and the traffic was totally uninviting. But it was good to be home. We were covered with mud, soaked to the bone, and tired. It made me realize how great it was to be out of town, but just as good to be home.

A ride like this is a great way to clear your head and take in nature. It’s challenging at times and the only thing you can think about is the bike and the terrain, trying to get through a difficult area, to a simple destination. And at other times it’s fast and easy, leaving you to your thoughts.

Here's a map of the trip:
I think if you click on it you can see the details.

Goin' South

Drew came to visit for a few weeks and we had a great time. He was here for New Years and then we all traveled south together. We went to Ho Chi Minh City (Old Saigon) and then to a couple of small towns in the Mekong Delta.

Saigon is bigger and more cosmopolitan that Hanoi. And that’s about it. I guess it’s easier to live there and the nightlife, including live music, is more active, but it’s so large and sprawling that it makes Hanoi seem like a quaint little city. We did have a couple of great meals and barhopped one night, but it’s hard to get an impression of such a big city in such a short time.

In Can Tho we hired a boat to take us a floating market where we ate pineapple and checked out some old canals. Our longboat was captained by a really nice man and his wife. They also had a little puppy on board named Dollar. We all laughed when he told us the puppy’s name.











We headed to Rach Gia where we were going to spend a night and then head to Phu Quoc Island. Rach Gia was very uneventful and we were more eager to leave than explore the town.

We took a high speed boat to Phu Quoc early in the morning and after two and a half hours of high speed rocking back and forth, and pitching left to right, we were all pretty sick to our stomachs. People had warned us about this boat and that everyone around us would be puking their guts out, and sure enough, several of our fellow passengers were doubled over barf bags, silently praying between their knees for the ride to stop.

Phu Quoc was worth the trek, seasickness, and wait. It’s probably the most beautiful natural beach I’ve ever seen. It’s not that it was especially clean, if fact, throughout the week that we stayed there we noticed an unusual amount of trash build up on the beach. It was mostly caused by some nearby construction and the boats fishing off shore. What I mean is that it’s still relatively unmolested by developers.

We ate every night at this tiny family-run restaurant that was literally a shack on stilts on the beach. The table and chairs were buried in the sand and there were hammocks strung between the support beams. The man would take your order, go to the kitchen to cook it, then bring it to you. So simple and personable and some of the best food we’ve had in all of Vietnam.

Phu Quoc Island is so undeveloped that you really feel like you’re one of the first people to experience it. But in truth, it’s just that Vietnam is undeveloped and a place like Phu Quoc can go untouched for years and years, existing on what it already is, not what it could be.

It’s only a matter of time before the big developers get into Phu Quoc and develop the hell out of it. We were seeing the signs of it while we were there. A billboard advertising a new resort coming soon, and the obvious exhaustion on our restaurant owner’s face by the steady growth of his clientele. We arrived on a Monday and enjoyed the solitude of this little hamlet, but by the end of the week more tourists had shown up and filled every corner, drowning out the locals and demanding resort-like service.

Of course it’s important to mention at this point that I realize we were part of the problem, but I’d like to think that by acknowledging it I somehow exempt us from the damage. But then, I enjoy my creature comforts as much as the next guy.

Back to the beauty:


There was little to do on the whole Island. We rented motorbikes and tried to explore but the roads were all red dirt and choppy and after a few hours of riding we were tired and sore. We were told to go to a few different areas but could never find whatever it was we were suppose to see, and after a day and a half of this we realized the only thing to do on Phu Quoc is sit still, enjoy the food, sun, and beach. And so that’s what we did. We settled into a comfortable routine of meals, walks, and swimming.



Then Drew headed back to the states and Bina and I went to Thailand. But not before picking up Drew’s new suit from the tailors!


We landed in Bangkok and spent a few nights taking in the city. It was nice to be in a more modern city. We took advantage of the movie theaters and saw King Kong and the Chronicles of Narnia. Then we ate Dunkin Donuts. It was good to sample some of the luxuries of the west again. We also ate a Subway sandwich, which is funny because we rarely eat those back in the states. (We’re Quiznos fans.)

Before the movies play in Thailand there’s a short film of the King shaking hands, planting trees, and doing all the things that make him so loved throughout all of Thailand. It runs the length of the national anthem and everyone stands at attention until it’s over. It’s a well-respected tradition and nobody goofs off. Can you imagine if there was a short clip of Bush along with the US national anthem before every movie? People would buy extra popcorn just to throw it at the screen.

There are great markets in Bangkok and the food is amazing. Even the cheap little street kitchens have some of the most delicious Thai food you’ll ever eat.

We flew to Phuket where my friend Eddie lives and spent a couple of nights with him. We rented a motorbike and toured the area. More great food and beautiful weather. We drove up the side of a mountain where monkeys roam wild and fed them bananas. They’re used to people visiting them and bringing them food so they surrounded us as soon as we stopped our bikes and came right up to us with their hands out. They knew we had bananas and they weren’t going to wait for them.



We took a boat to Ao Nang in the Krabi province and stayed at a bungalow for a few days. The bungalows were rickety and ramshackled, but still, a great experience. We spend most of our time eating the local cuisine and hanging out on the beach. We went on an elephant trek one day and got to hang out with the elephants. They were used for logging in the region before it was outlawed so now they spend their days giving idiot tourists piggy-back rides through the jungle. Anyway, we had a great time and if they could talk I’m sure they’d say it’s better than hauling logs all day.


Bina made friends with some of the other local wild life too.

Phuket and Ao Nang were both badly hit by the 2004 tsunami. They’re pretty well recovered for the most part, but still a bit rough around the edges. From what the locals say, it cleaned out the beaches and brought more sand, but the amount of rebuilding that they had to do was incredible. And even with all the work they’ve been doing for over a year you can still see the damage.

We flew back to Bangkok for a night and then home to Hanoi. The difference was amazing. You hear all these things about how Vietnam is one of the last communist holdouts, nationalistic beyond outside influence, and you think, well, you can still buy a coke whenever you want. But even after living here for this long, going to a different country for a week snaps you back into the conveniences of modern life and the readjustment process has to start all over again, like you’ve never lived here before.

It’s now Tet and everyone has left the city. Everyone told us we should leave because the city basically shuts down. All of our friends have either gone to Thailand, Singapore or Malaysia. But we were quite excited at the idea of a dead city with nothing to do so we’ve stuck around. We bought a ton of groceries and are focusing on some projects that we wanted to work on. Our street is quiet and there’s very little traffic anywhere. It’s the nicest I’ve seen this city yet.