We left in the morning on a Luxury Tour Bus for a 2hr trip to Nihn Bihn. I had no idea what we were going to be doing. Shari has so much planned and i get 'lost' as she is telling us. Nihn Bihn has a lot of World Heritage Sites and is known for it's limestone mountains, rivers, grottos, and of course rice fields. It was also the primary shooting site for Kong: Skull Island – the famous Hollywood movie (which i did not see).
Our Tour Guide was Tim, energetic and knowledgeable, spoke English, but with an accent of course. So i only was able to capture bits of what he was saying about 'the history' of the Kings and Temples. There was one 'pit stop' to 'P' and lots of souvenirs to buy.
We arrived for our first activity, a wooden boat ride. Sounded good enough; i had no idea how much fun we would have. To get to the boats, there were many hallways lined with festive lanterns.
There were hundreds of people and our group had trouble staying together. Possible waiting time could have been 3hrs, but somehow we got through in about 1hr. Lots of people in life jackets carefully getting into boats.
We have not had great weather since we arrived in VietNam... mostly cloudy and cool. But for today's activities, the overcast and cool temps were welcome. And off we went with our 'paddler woman'.
I was expecting a short boat ride and then back on the bus again. How wrong i was, we were in the boats for over 2hrs and having lots of fun.
Slowly going down the river, with beautiful views ... and then. We went through several cave tunnels, one as long as 1000 feet, they were lighted and had many stalactites.
The clearance through the Cave tunnel was a bit narrow in places causing even me to duck. During the rainy season, this part of the trip would not be possible because the water would be too high to get through.
Passing Temples along the way. We came to one Temple and our 'paddler' motioned for us to 'get out'. It wasn't where we 'got in', but we got out. I think she needed to take a well-deserved break, because we then saw her motioning for us to go 'over there', where we got in the boat again.
It was very relaxing and way more fun than any of us had imagined. We had some quick photo opportunities before we got back on the bus. The lanterns were beautiful!
Next stop was a Buffet Lunch, lots of good food. A buffet is a good way to try things out, and leave them if you don't like it.
Then we got fitted on our bicycles, and off we went down the road ... in the beginning with cars; but eventually along rice fields.
Ending at a Temple
Then back on the bus for our next activity. We did some research on this one. It's called the Lying Dragon Mountain. There are 500 steps to the top to see the Dragon. And we discussed if we wanted to climb. At first I said no, then yes. But as the bus approached the entrance, i could see, right before my eyes, what the 500 steps looked like. It was daunting.
Our Guide, Tim gave us a way out saying we would get 2 drink tickets if we didn’t want to do the climb. My friend, roommate, Sylvia, said that she was taking the drink tickets. Honestly, it was very enticing. But I decided I would at least start the climb. As we left the bus and walked towards the entrance, Sylvia decided to try it too. She also has knee issues. So we started. There were steps, stone steps, and lots and lots of people. Chinese New Year celebrants.
Sylvia started counting the steps, when she got to 180, we rested, and she said she was going to go back down. I asked her if she didn’t think she could go just 20 more steps and make it to 200. She said ok. We ended up going all the way up, 500 steps!
There were several 'rest stops' along the way, and we took advantage of them.
Shari and Butch were ahead of us, but we eventually met them at the top.... Triumphant !
When we got to the top, the views were amazing and beautiful.
We could see the river with people on those wooden boats.
At the top, there was yet again another climb to the VERY top, where the actual dragon was. We felt ‘tricked’. This climb was not with steps, but just random rocks, very narrow, and now a very steep drop off to the right. The rocks were limestone, but also had shiny black rock, I would call it obsidian, but I don’t really know. However, what I do know, is that it was worn, very smooth and very slippery under his foot. We waited in line to go way to the top for 10 minutes and the line was not moving. There wasn’t much room up there and people were taking their time with ‘photo shoots’. We eventually decided that we were proud of ourselves for getting this far, and it wasn’t really necessary to see that damn dragon. So we took some photos of what we could see. The Lying Dragon !
During the climb up, we realize that going down was going to be way worse on our knees, than going up. Sticking to the sides, and using the walls as balance getting back down, wasn’t as bad as we thought it was going to be. However, we were both limping back to the bus . Feeling very proud and righteous. ook advantage of the 'sides' to steady us, and it wasn't too bad. If you notice, even that young girl was struggling.
We found another Dragon and got a photo with him there.
Back in the bus, 2hrs and back at Trang Trang Boutique Hotel.
We had most of the day back in Hanoi, before we caught a 10pm 'Sleeper Bus' to SaPa, for our next adventure.
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