Vietnam Part Five: Mai Chau

We catch a taxi from the backpackers to Ha Dong bus stop, or bus station - we're not exactly sure which. The driver deposits us in the dust with a wave of the hand that Ha Dong is somewhere Over There. We head to Over There, but the people at Over There tell us that this is not Ha Dong. We walk a little further down the road, and return to Over There and from Over There we think we see a sign for Ha Dong on the opposite side of the road. We ask the people at Over There if Ha Dong is across the road. They tell us `Yes, it is Over There` (Over There now having moved to the opposite side of the road). We cross to the other side and are back at Over There. We try to read the bus schedule at this Over There, but decide to seek refuge in the bank next to Over There where a lovely lady tells us which bus to get onto. The next Cowboy Bus that lasoos along, we hop onto. This makes the conductor very angry, but at least we are moving from Over There to Ha Dong.

A few minutes pass before I break Mr N's reverie at ruffin' it, to ask 'How will we know when we have got to Ha Dong?' Frantic questioning of fellow passengers ensues. Another lovely lady comes to our rescue and informs us that the Over There we just left was Ha Dong, and this bus is leaving Over There but not going to Ha Dong, because it was already in Ha Dong. Get off bus. Walk back to beginning. Discover that the place where the taxi driver (who we had been cursing as a useless sod) was Over There. Get onto bus. Weeee and away we go to Mai Chau.

We drive for two hours in a luxury upgrade of a South African minibus taxi. There is a steering wheel and the door only makes its surprise open sporadically. Plus, we have green velvet curtains.

We are shuffled off by an enterprising taxi driver (not the bus driver, another driver of a normal car) in a dusty town. We are now Taxi Central, as cars and motorcycle taxis swarm around us, each offering a dodgier deal the one before. A helpful shopkeeper - another lovely lady ( it seems all our heroes are female) saved us from the buzzers and helped us get onto the next bus that we needed.

The next two hours we bumpity bumped up the mountain road and I made friends with the refrigerator that was being transported in the aisle. We abruptly took a pee break when the bus ran out of petrol and Mr N, Mr S and I discussed the Nature of Smoking, and addiction in general.

Mai Chau finally greets us. Hungry and tired and full bladdered, we are approached by an enthusiastic businessman who wished us to stay at his house. Distrustful and grumpy, we attended to out physical needs before agreeing to a no-strings-attached viewing.

We agreed and we speed along on the back of motorcycles, the mountains opened up to rice paddies and a wooden village and our city slicker hearts were sold. Finally, we had stepped onto a slightly less beaten track and could feel superior in our rusticness when we told our stories back home.