Wednesday 12th February 2020
With my eyes blurred from sleepiness and my lungs filled with the clean medical scent of my surgeon’s mask, we set off through the town and on into the lingering mist. Thai guided the little Honda past potholes and traffic jams, round puddles and between great timber trucks with practiced ease. Clinging to the back of the bike with my feet, I thrust my hands deep into my pockets and decided I should have worn trousers.
My ankles were soon sore from rattling against the bike over ever bump. When we stopped by the side of the road to eat our breakfast Bánh bao, I stretched my legs and removed my mask briefly to inhale deep lungsful of air. To our left we could see a vast expanse of rice paddies laid out in a patchwork formation. Amidst the hazy morning mist, we could see ghostly figures drifting slowly through these paddies. Some bent over double, inspecting something indiscernible in the soil, others pushed bulky contraptions on wheels which spluttered along emitting a mechanical grunting which flew unimpeded across the rice paddies to join the sounds of the other engines on the road. As yet another lorry roared past, flinging dust and grit into my eyes, I finished my dumpling and hopped dutifully back on the bike as Thai pulled away from the verge.
We wound through the road network of Bắc Giang, heading roughly south. As the wind whipped past my bare knees, slowly freezing them, I shivered and coughed into my mask. But before long the sun bravely forced itself through a chink in the clouds to shed golden rays on the hills to our left.
The road began to gently wind upwards. It curved back and forth on itself with the laziness of a river, and soon the mist began to turn into clouds, and I was once again flying through the sky on a motorbike. In Hà Giang, while I was riding, I was forced to constantly switch between admiring the scenery and keeping a sharp eye out for the next bump, crack or pothole to avoid. Now, a passenger, I made the most of my position on the back of my bike to crane my neck all around at the views.
Soon we arrived in Tây Yên Tử and, leaving our bike in the carpark, we walked up towards the passing stalls selling tourist merchandise and disinterested Vietnamese men sitting silently smoking by the roadside. Having seen several green busses labelled Bắc Giang <> Tây Yên Tử and having noted how large the carpark was, I was surprised to find the great castle with its flags and high walls to be largely deserted. Several tourists posed in front of the impressive building, but this was far from the crowds I had experienced previously at similar destinations. Thai and I decided that people were staying at home due to the coronavirus.
We wandered slowly past beautiful flowerbeds and gardens behind the castle, with soft music and Buddhist chanting issuing from hidden speakers amidst the flowers. We ascended a short hill before arriving at the cable-car station. Here I turned to see the beautiful blue hills of Bắc Giang fringing the sky in front of me. In the distance the hills turned into navy shadows, covered in a soft veil of mist. In the valley below me I could see the various restaurants that cater to tourists, and to the left I saw the tell-tale line of vegetation indicating a stream or river winding through the rice paddies.
Thai insisted on paying my 200k ticket to the peak, and we were soon shuffling into a small red cubicle with a family of four. We sat in silence for a minute, peering at each other anxiously over our masks, before our car clipped back onto the cable and we were sent gracefully soaring up the mountainside. Directly below us, in front, behind and all around was dense jungle. Dripping wet and uninviting in the chill air, the jungle looked almost alien with the way the damp trunks twisted around one another. Soon the bottom of the valley disappeared, and we were swallowed whole by the cloud.
We laughed with shock as upon stepping out of the cable car we were struck in the face by a gust of icy wind. The tiles of the cable-car station were sopping wet with moisture, and the attendant’s dark eyes were barely visible from beneath their full body waterproofs and surgical mask. We continued into the cloud and were soon picking our way up and down rough-hewn rocky steps past pagodas and clumps of bamboo towards the peak. Every time I paused eagerly looking around for the view, my hopes were dashed as all that greeted me was more cloud.
Nevertheless, we pressed on, and soon found ourselves at the foot of a vast golden Buddha. So dense was the cloud that even the Buddha’s face was blurry and hidden in the greyness of the sky. Not wanting to get cold we hurried up the stairs which became steeper and steeper until they were cut into almost sheer vertical rocks. The wetness made the rocks slippery, and it was with relief that we finally saw the little pagoda on the very peak of the mountain. Here there were a couple of stalls selling trinkets and snacks. Before I was suckered into buying a beaded bracelet, I was pulled away by Thai who took me to where a fence shielded us from a steep drop into nothingness. Looking down and then up and then down again, I saw that the grey of the sky was indiscernible from that of the clouds that lay below us.
I will not pretend that the clouds weren’t a disappointment. In reality, climbing so high and having built up so much anticipation on the journey to Yên Tử, it was gutting to find the mountaintop shrouded in clouds. Nevertheless, the hike was enjoyable, the nearby surroundings were beautiful, and the company was exceptional. Sitting with Thai, eating oranges and bread, I smiled at how easily we got along together despite barely being able to string together a full sentence in each other’s language. Throwing my orange peel over the precipice into the clouds, which may still be falling now, we began the descent.
Around an hour later we were back in the carpark, refreshed from the clean air on the mountain and our hike up and down from the peak. Craving lunch, we decided to head back into Bắc Giang to An Châu.
Before we left, I took one last look to where the slopes of Yên Tử mountain disappeared into the sky. In front of me lay more rice paddies, and for a moment I was transfixed by the beauty of this subsistence farming. An ageless man stumbled slowly barefoot through ankle-deep mud, throwing his weight behind a boxy and impractical looking plough with an engine that sounded on the verge of malfunction. Fifteen metres later, he skipped to his right and swung round hard on the handles, leaning back like a professional sailor as the small tractor turned and started off again in the other direction. Thoughts of great tractors with bulging tires and combine harvesters wider than the rice paddy itself seemed completely alien here.
Promising myself that I would return to see more of Quảng Ninh province, we set off along a beautiful road which followed a river for some way. Passing bamboo forests and rice paddies, little villages and hillsides charred and blackened by the timber industry, we soon arrived in An Châu where we wolfed down a bowl of Phở we headed off in the direction of Khe Gio, a hidden spot which proved to be more beautiful than I had imagined.
Navigating through narrow lanes past fields of potatoes where chickens ran freely on the road, we arrived by a river and stepped down off the bike into the peaceful stillness. Some way downstream on a massive flat boulder we could see a large family having a barbecue, but apart from this group and a couple of dogs, we were alone. We crossed the smooth-flowing river and climbed a short slope to where a leat ran some ten metres above the level of the stream. The leat was narrow and fast flowing, carrying fresh clear water to who knows where. Expecting the path to lead on next to the leat, I was surprised when I soon found myself, treading along carefully on rocking and unstable flagstones which were balanced on top of the leat. Every now and again there would be a large gap to avoid, and as we walked along, I kept a sharp eye on where I was placing my feet.
Soon we were deep inside the Vietnamese jungle, and I was once again forced to stop and pull out my camera to ensure the memory of such beautiful biodiversity would never die. Seconds later I regretted my decision, as in pulling my phone out of my pocket I somehow managed to snag a 100k note which came fluttering slowly down to slip between the narrowest of cracks between the flagstones.
I called out to Thai, excited, panicking. He rushed back to help, confused and clueless, as I ran back the way we had come, crouching down to shove my hand through a gap and grope in the darkness. Một trăm nghìn! I shouted at Thai, laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation. One hundred thousand. He immediately understood and ran past me further downstream. Peering into the darkness beneath the flagstones, I caught site of a flash of green, and ran to catch up with my money. Sticking my hand into the water I somehow grabbed the note and thrust it into the air with a shout of glee.
We continued on to the beginning of the leat where a small weir spanned the river. Here, I stopped to look around. I felt awestruck by the stillness of everything. Little breeze disturbed the leaves and vines which formed the wallpaper of the surrounding hills. The soft white noise of insects whirring away in the background merged with the bubbling of the water as it trickled over the weir. As I stood on the weir and looked out at the still water in front of me, it was impossible not to feel calmed by the beauty of nature. Here, away from Vietnam’s plastic pollution, its bustling roads, the smog of its cities and the endless construction works, here was the raw untouched nature of Vietnam.
As we walked slowly back through the jungle to the bike, I felt moved by the beauty of the place, and I was sad that I would never be able to fully express to Thai how thankful I was to him for showing me this hidden spot.
It was another three hours before we rolled up to the front door of Sun School. We had driven over a hundred kilometres and walked almost a quarter of that. Our legs were tired and aching, but as we pushed open the glass door of the school, we shared a smile of achievement that spoke more than words ever could.
Da Lat – Vietnam Blog 9