Having spent a few days in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam, with its busy and loud traffic, it was time to go a little farther afield into the country. Ninh Binh is an area south of Hanoi which was an early capital city. It is in a rural area which offers some worthwhile and interesting activities. We booked a tour as doing this on our own would have been a bit challenging.
Our tour bus picked us up bright and early in the morning. The usual haze over Hanoi was apparent. Our guide for the day would later tell us that Hanoi has the second worst air quality in the world behind Delhi. That was not what we wanted to hear. (Since then I read it now has the worst!) The bus was picking up other people from their hotels so we had a number of stops to make before we headed out of town. It was a full load on this particular day. The bus trip was about an hour and a half out to Ninh Binh.
The first activity of the day was a fail for me, and I have to say I was a little embarrassed. The tour group was to take a bike ride through the countryside to reach the ancient city of Hoa Lu. Sadly I couldn’t ride the bike. I could bore you with all sorts of reasons why, but the truth is I felt awkward and uncomfortable on the bike. My attempt to ride it felt very unsafe so I decided it was not worth it. Silvette stayed back with me, and along with a few others the bus driver took us to Hoa Lu where we waited for the others to show up. A bridge over the Hoang Long River to the entrance gave us a chance to take some photos while we waited.
When everyone showed up at Hoa Lu, our tour guide, Happy, led us to a large mural which showed the history of the area. He walked us all the way down the mural giving us the highlights of early Vietnam, especially with the kings and a queen who married two different kings. While it was interesting to hear, it was also easy to forget all the information he gave us.
After the history lesson we walked into the main historical area. We visited two different sites, both of them with religious significance for Buddhists. Happy explained some of the spiritual elements of the locations and the significance of some of the symbolism. An example is the dragon which is considered a powerful force. Only a king was allowed to use the dragon as a symbol. The common man used the unicorn, except is wasn’t a western style unicorn, but one composed of different parts of animals such as a monkey and a horse.
We went inside a temple and saw a statue of a highly regarded king. In Buddhism one goes to ancestors to seek help so these ancestors are the one who provide spiritual guidance. A beloved and powerful king would be an obvious choice of someone to seek help from.
After visiting the temple Happy offered to take “family” photos, and our group was one of the few to take him up on the offer. Then we wandered back through the area to the bus which took us back to the place in Ninh Binh where the bike ride started. Here we would have lunch. The bikers took a much shorter route back. Lunch was a buffet with lots of options. One was wild mountain goat which is said to make men strong. I had some. It didn’t help.
After lunch we were ready for the more interesting part of our Ninh Binh trip, the Trang An boat tour. The boat ride was in a small boat that would hold about four people. We split up our group so I rode with Aaron and Michelle. We didn’t do the rowing, someone else did that, and in about 90% of the boats that person was a woman. Since Michelle speaks Vietnamese, she carried on a conversation with the women rowing our two boats. We got more out of it than many of the others as the rowers didn’t seem to speak much English.
The boats followed a specific route, and there were a lot of boats so it didn’t seem like it would be interesting. Nevertheless the somewhat hazy sights of the mountains and waters of Ninh Binh actually made it a beautiful trip as well as very calm and serene. Aaron and Michelle were taking all kinds of videos and photos. They kept busy throughout the trip so I just sat quietly behind them taking the occasional photo.
We went through a number of caves. The first one wasn’t very long and was pretty tall. However, some of the others were lower, long and had stalactites hanging from the ceiling. There were lights inside the cave, but the general darkness and the moving of the boat made it challenging to get good photos inside the caves.
One of the caves had colored lights inside it. I thought the lights were rather garish and unnatural. Silvette managed to get a good video of that cave. (Double click the video for full screen)
In one location there was a temple like structure in the water all by itself. It was a favorite spot for a photo.
We did make one stop where there were a number of temples together in one location. I found the fact that these rather ornate temples were in such a seemingly remote location with access by boat only to be quite impressive. Inside were statues of rather stern looking leaders with places for people to give offerings. It was all very ornate with gold all over. It was pretty impressive in some ways, but sad for me to see in other ways. We stayed on the island for a while and then got back in our boats to finish the tour.
There was one other site to see, but we didn’t stop. Part of the movie Kong: Skull Island was filmed there, and they left some of the structures after the movie shoot. It adds an interesting look to the area with the unusual shaped structures, but you have to remember they aren’t historical. As we continued on we passed what looked like a cemetery.
We were the last boats of our tour group to arrive back. On our way out we passed through a large building with interesting light fixtures. It seem like an auditorium of some sort. We never did find out what it was for, but the lights were really beautiful. Some other areas carried through with the same theme with lantern-like structures.
After we got back on our tour bus, we headed for our final destination in Ninh Binh which was a hike up a mountain. The destination was the Mua Cave and some temples as well as a dragon structure. Happy, our guide, informed us there were 500 steps up the mountain. It seemed unfortunate that this hike happened at the end of the day when we were tired. After careful consideration I decided I was not going to attempt the hike. My kids later told me it was a good decision. Apparently the hike was very crowded, and the steps were quite worn and a bit slippery. At the viewpoints the crowds were unruly making it difficult to get any good photos. I took some photos from below so you can at least see where people were hiking.
Since we didn’t do the hike, Happy took us over to a little incense place so we at least had an alternative activity. Incense is used widely for worship in temples so it is made in Vietnam. The part that is burned is created in various colors. The manufacturers take a large group of incense and and wrap rubber bands around the bottom. The tops flay out a little bit creating a mushroom like structure. The place we visited used these structures to create a colorful scene.
Happy took us there and then offered to take photos of us in various locations around the grounds. After he left, we wandered around and took more photos. The site is not particularly large so it didn’t take long for us to feel we had seen all there was to see. We had an hour of time before everyone came back down the mountain. It was definitely not the most exciting part of the trip.
With everyone back down and accounted for, we loaded up the bus for our two hour journey back to Hanoi. Once we got into Hanoi, traffic became increasingly challenging. It was Christmas Eve, and apparently people were out to celebrate. The bus was not able to get close to some of the hotels including ours. It dropped us off a few blocks from the hotel, and we had to walk back through all the traffic.
Everyone was tired. Silvette and Andrea decided that all they wanted to do was go to bed. The other four of us went out to dinner at a restaurant specializing in Vietnamese food from the south which is where Michelle is from. She was in her element explaining some of the foods that could be ordered. With our bellies full we started back to our hotel. However, the evening was not quite over. Next week I’ll share about how our day ended so be sure to come back for the rest of the story.
Credit: Silvette Lee took the photo of me in the boat with Aaron and Michelle. Other photos were taken by our tour guide, Happy or the rowers of the boats.