The taxi driver got us to the train station on the other side of the huge motorway sized main road from the bus station. Still crossed ok and then Julia and Pernille spent five minutes shouting at the locals while they gestured us across the bus station. Finally spotted the bus, where the locals had been pointing us to, and clambered on. It turned out to be the 5.10 bus, but all to the good! We sat five across at the back. The Vietnamese sit right across the bus on moveable aisle seats and the bus conductor is boss, ordering people into the right seats. He was all of 23 and do not imagine he wears a uniform or anything, ( though the Hanoi bus conductors do - pale grey and blue). The vietnamese also get motion sickness so bags were handed out. fortunately only one did on this bus, though i have heard horror stories from the others! I had a nice seat by the window on the left. Got the rising sun but no problem as even have curtains and there is air con on the bus. Also the Vietnamese like to watch pop music videos of local stars - who are obviously thorough primpted and preened and very buffont in some cases. I quite enjoyed it actually. Just about. Better than ghastly old British daytime TV. I watched the countryside out the window. The others all plugged in, across the back seat with their wires in their ears - imagine the scene from the locals pov!!
Out the window I finally saw some Vietnam: heading south, Industrialised suburbs of Hanoi gave way v quickly to rice paddies with huge pillared advertising billboards in the middle of them, some in poor condition. Saw people already in the fields, lanes leading off into the distance with single motorbikes on them and oxen, mid-chestnut brown in colour, with humps. Later on I saw one of these pulling a cart through the centre of Ninh Binh , gravel filled, with old man in coolie hat standing steering, swishing its tail past all the scooters and motorbikes.
Then further afield suburb villages started to flash past. These have more unique houses, similar build to hanoi but somehow either in better condition or you could just see more of them. Some very pretty, with balconies, bougainvillea and painted yellow or blue. Some of the balconies, stone or wood, are carved. Usually two story, but the larger house can have four or five floors - in the villages further out. At this point I was quite reminded of Tenerife. There was also the odd compound - walled areas, possibly pagoda temple complexes but if so, not large ones, and no actual pagoda buildings. Surrounded by banana plants and palm. A few churches clearly visible. And several large decorative cemeteries, headstones of many shapes and sizes including some familiar to us and some mini pagoda style. Wonderful scenes.
There were also some very pretty off-roads with modern banners over the entrance to the roads, like arches, with writing on them. Sector or district destinations perhaps? Struck me as quite communist, but also quite colourful. There are also many of those classic thin flag banners everywhere, that flap furiously in the breeze.
Noticed small round yellow haystacks int the villages with increasing frequency. Some were being burnt off. Many herds of small white ducks too, either penned or free range, or swimming amongst the paddies. Also as we got further from Hanoi the amount of grain spread on the roads, obviously drying, increased. Very neatly arranged so that the traffic, including huge construction trucks could breeze past. Our guide on Sunday told me later that it had just been the rice harvest already. There are two a year and the stalks are either used for winter fodder, or burned off, or used for cooking - placing the food inside and using the haystack of stalks for insulation. The roads themselves were mostly Tarmac or concrete, with a tiny bit of gravel. Even the smart Tarmac roads however have bumps, or 'ramps' as we may call them, in them. Perhaps deemed to tricky to level properly? Strange how it affects your ride in the back seat of a bus though - my bum did leave the seat on one occasion! However it was only one and given the various tales I have heard and warnings given, I'm sure I was expecting worse! The Cypriot roads I remember could easily have given these a run for their money! I have to admit I secretly quite like the pale, new stretches of concrete road, like abandoned runways, in the sun. No edging or markings on them. Just grain.
In one village they were widening the road and laying sewage pipes. Great. Except they seem to have used the same diggers and bulldozers digging out the road to have gone right through the front of some houses! And the houses still had furniture and washing hanging out. Some had their glass French windows (which seem to be common front doors as most houses have padlocked bar grids too, open onto four feet drops! Some houses were obviously going to get a nice new front pavement, but others had been mostly chewed up and were still inhabited, braced and covered in tarpaulin.
Later still we drove through Hoa Lu, a village near Ninh Binh. They extract limestone for carving here in centuries old craft tradition and this includes lumps of swiss cheese rock formations, taken as is into people's gardens as decorative pieces - saw many in situ in courtyards in the area. needless to say, a lot of the stone carving and most activity in fact takes place quite happily in the road fronted shops and shacks with the traffics thundering past. There were mountains rising in the background now, a distinct slash through the countryside, stopping abruptly, Watership Down style (only much more huge!) towards the north. Some of the side roads were now huge wide and deserted and reminded me distinctly of that famous Vietnam war photo of the naked napalmed girl running down the road crying, with her arms outstretched.
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