International Sampoon's vacation 2007

Nimh Bimh in shit. SHIT. Small dirty city with absloutely no interest. No interest at all. Except for Tam Coc and Hoa Lu, the two surrounding towns offering the most gorgeous sweeping paddy fields and bizzare lime stone rock formations, many pagodas and many temples.

The next day we hired a moto to explore the outer areas. First we asked if anybody ever gets lost.

"NO, Never!, NEVER!" he laughed

With our new found confidence and our crap map we were lost just after the first 100 meters. I was the elected driver as I was the small bit a farm girl and all....but with Sam on the back and with gravity taking hold, I simply could not hold the thing up at the lights!
Sam took over the reins and did a stella job driving though the stinking over-populated traffic combined with the clear lack of road rules, helmets and indicators.
He sped through the streets with on the wrong side of the road (well, for us Aussies it is) with his cranky girlfriend screaming orders from all sides! The traffic was freakishly amazing. We managed two laps of the city in peak hour knowing our soul aim was to exit and find the peacefull backroads. We almost died. No exaggeration! We almost did! A crazy pink bus emitting an illegal amount of toxic waste was frantically swerving in and out of the traffic trying to kill us. After sucking in the clouds of black smog left in its trail, the air finally lifted and we found ourselves being comfronted with on-coming traffic.(AAAAHHHH)The bus swerved 3 or 4 more times I think, I dont know now, it all seems like blur , but it was definately trying to kill us.
We now consider our lives much more precious as most people do once they have a brush with death. Three days later and I am still in shock and am experiencing reoccuring dreams of my helmetless head being squashed under a crazed truck drivers wheel at the intersection where the policeman in the peach uniform was seriously pointing at Sam for running red lights and for god know what else! I mean, who is going to take him seriouly when he is wearing a pastle pink uniform? I mean really.

Tam Coc was absolutely beautiful. They called it the Halong Bay on land with giant bolders rising out of the paddy fields. At first I was dissopointed we had to drive all the way along the highway to find it instead of going the senic route, but later a lady kindly pointed us in the right direction though the dirt tracks and under the caves to find Hoa Lu. The main attractions in Hoa Lu are the Pagodas and the temples. We drove out following all the signs and ended up on a desolate dirt track in the middle of nowhere. Oh well, we checked out the goats and the women with shaved heads and then finally found our way to the temple. The temples where the same as every other temple we have seen so far. At this point we decided temples arnt for us. No more temples.
We found a little cove where the locals paddle you along the river inbetween all the paddys and under the caves. It was very beautiful except you can expect to run into hordes of other tourists that do a day trips from Hanoi. They row you about 6 to 7 kilometers under 3 massive caves, the largest one being 137 meters long where the tempature can drop 5 degrees! On the way back they try to flog you their embroidery and postcards then then ask for tips. All in all it was a great day.