6:00am we woke up for the Bac Ha market… Far too early for any kind of market cultural or otherwise if you ask me but we had made it all the way there and we weren’t about to sleep through it just to get back on the bone shaker bus without at least buying something useless.
A few Vietnamese coffee’s good and strong later and we were ready for anything! By this time the market had started to get rolling and loads of hill tribe people were strolling past the window with their wicker back baskets full of all sorts of stuff so we just followed them up the hill, into the main square where tourist tour buses had already started to turn up and down into the market. It was pretty spectacular how the sleepy little town had suddenly filled with life and colour overnight and even though at this point it had barely began there were ponies running about the shop and livestock being ferried in on the back of mopeds including the odd basket of dogs… We wandered past the tourist stalls which of course Georgie looked at every item on every one then took a turn into the fray, where the real market was beginning to get lively. It was a complete assault on the senses almost too much, the smell of sun dried fish and pigs squealing, the colourful hill tribe women all gossiping and the mopeds squeezing through the crowds, the overwhelming smell of rice wine and tobacco smoke from the men sitting having a toot on their bongs. It was pretty intense so we ducked out to a coffee shop on the main square for some refreshment and watched it unfold from a safer distance but it didn’t last long because Georgie had her heart set on some authentic hill tribe clobber and for that we had to go deep…
And deep we went, with no regard for the heat or the confusion we made our way to some stalls where Georgie was nothing short of accosted into a full hill tribe outfit and sold not one but two handbags, by this time it was getting more manic by the second and filling with tourists and locals alike to the point that there was barely enough room to stand still and take in what was going on around us. Georgie got her hill tribe clothes all sorted while I stood and watched a bunch of men poking and feeling up a couple of pigs before giving a nod and having them stuffed into sacks and lashed to their mopeds… Amazing.
We went for more refreshments and then had to head back to our hotel because we had alot of ground to cover if we wanted to get back to Hanoi to meet our bank card in time, we stuffed the new clothes in our bags which turned Georgie’s bag from massive to unbelievable then headed out for the short but gruelling hike up the hill to the main square to try and find a seat on a local bus. We were sent the wrong way a few times which to be honest almost had us keeling over then by chance we found a bus that didn’t look too bad, of course after it had driven around the town for an hour until it was actually full to bursting point and we were all squeezed in like sardines it didn’t seem quite as appealing but to be honest even if we had wanted to get out there wasn’t a prayer. About 10minutes into the journey one of the locals was obviously feeling a little rough (probably too much market hooch) and threw up which gave a new dimension to an already unbearable bus ride… It slowly thinned out as people got to their stops but it was as bad and hot as the ride there and even though the market had been pretty damn good as far as markets go it all started to seem not worth the trouble of getting there, maybe had we have been passing through or even spending a few days there then yes, it would have been magic but the way we did it it was just a killer and by the time we rolled into Lao Cai to try and wrestle some train tickets off the oaf at the office we were well and truly beat. What’s more we had a 5 hour wait for the train so we just hung out at a really nice Vietnamese cafe where Georgie played with the little baby that lived there and I purchased some mucky playing cards and played a fine game of solitaire… and I actually mean solitaire the card game.
We finally got some sense from the ticket man and tickets for the train at 5pm but still the train wasn’t due to board until 8pm so we just hung about some more until then, and as soon as we could we boarded the sleeper train and were out like lights…

Bac Ha market madness was originally published by HappytimeBlog - Backpacking around the world - Backpacking travel blog

After all the adventure and exploration of the past few days we decided to take a day off, sleep in till whenever we fancy and decide on what to do next and when to move on etc… We figured that we are quickly running out of time to try and fit in everything we want but we hadn’t quite finished with northern Vietnam and all its hilly wonders, amazing rural life and stunning views so we decided to head north east to Bac Ha the next day for the Bac Ha Sunday hill tribe market, the biggest market in the area… Now I think I’ve suffered my fair share of south east Asian markets recently but this one promised not only tat and trinkets but also a good helping of culture, and based on that presumption we packed up and booked a bus for the next morning. We didn’t really do anything else with our day except eat but it was a good day none the less. Our bus arrived at 7:30 so we were up and packed and of course had time to squeeze a super sweet super strong Vietnamese coffee down our necks before hopping aboard our mini bus and hitting the road for Lao Cai the main transport hub to the far north where we wandered to a restaurant and waited for a while for a local bus, while a small child from the shop next door stood about 6 feet away and stared at me for the entire time, the lad bareley blinked! I think it was probably the nose ring…This is where the fun began, we had been told it was about a 2 hour trip and I had deduced from the map that the roads weren’t going to be the best roads we have ever been on, what’s more it was local bus for less than $3 or private tour bus for $40 so in the interest of budgeting we went with the non air-con local bus… 4 of the most gruelling, hot and cramped hours later we arrived at Bac Ha, the ride was less like a bus ride and more like a really bad Thai massage by the world strongest man in a sauna! At times the bus actually drove along a train track, and at others along roads that couldn’t be any worse if they had recently been bombed but we were there and a short stomp found us nicely in a coll clean hotel room. It had taken us 8 hardcore hours to get there and we were exhausted but determined not to let that stop us we rented a moped for a few hours and went for an explore. Bac Ha is a small town set in similar if not as spectacular surroundings as Sapa, but it has a lot more of a rural feel to it even in the town centre there was the occasional pony and trap plodding by and lots of the houses where of wattle and daub type construction with wooden frames and cracked mud walls. Time was getting on and the light was fading so we didn’t go too far, just far enough to get a feel for the place and see the beautiful surrounding country side then back to town for a… Hot chocolate, its not as cool in Bac Ha as it was in Sapa but come the evening its just cool enough. We didn’t much further than that because we were both hot, tired and smelly also we wanted to be up early for the market in the morning…

The death bus to Bac Ha was originally published by HappytimeBlog - Backpacking around the world - Backpacking travel blog