Been a long time, i know, but busy busy busy...

we leave in the morning for indonesia, a fact that astonishes us both in how quickly the time is racing buy. for god's sake, it cant be christmas already. its still so warm.

i believe when we last left off, seth had left and we were awaiting the arrival of kevin and nicole... and there's sooo much to catch up on.
day 1: after a late night arrival, kevin, ashley and i set out to explore the madness of hanoi. the congestion of motorbikes is almost indescribable, certainly unparalleled in anything i've ever seen. kevin acclimates quickly after witnessing a scooter mashup.
day 2: while ashley ran errands, kevin and myself headed to unseen parts of the city. the original plan had us pedaling around on bikes, but after 24 hours of vietnamese traffic, kevin, in a very un-kevin moment, decided bikes might be too trecherous. instead we walked to an area on the map that advertised a circus, which turned out to just be a park. before entering the park we stumbled onto a gang of roustabouts staging a midday cockfighting match which ended when the chickens spilled out of the designated fight zone, and onto kevins feet. to enter the park we had to pay a woman 16,000 dong. after giving her a 20,000 note, she gave us our change in breathmints, and when we protested she began screaming at us. best trip to the circus ever.
day 3 (enter nicole): first day with the whole group, and nicole is put through the gauntlet of asia's city streets. tried to see the ho chi minh mausoleum, but found that it was closed. instead toured the ho chi minh museum and learned, literally, nothing. it's a visually stunning museum, with loads of beautiful exhibits, and next to no information, just like the house on the rock. that night we wrapped thing up by attending a water puppet show, a traditional north vietnamese passtime. nicole and ashley "absolutely loved" it. i enjoyed myself, but would hesitate to use the word love. it was a puppet show, in the water, in vietnamese. it was about as good as i expected, but you can read all about ashley's and nicole's thoughts in the next entry of this blog.
day 4: we book back to back trips out of town, the first to sapa, and the next to halong bay. before boarding the overnight train to sapa, we saw some sights, played some cards, and drank some beer. this was a pattern we would follow religiously throughout the rest of the trip.
day 5: sapa... i think we'll let kevin tackle this one, should he choose to write a blog entry. i will say this: it's a beautiful part of the world with spectacular culture that is far too cold for me to fully embrace on my five month vacation to the tropics. i have worn sandals every day for the past three months, and the need to put on socks in sapa killed a small part of me.
day 6 & 7: take it away kevin.
day 8: get back to hanoi at 5am to find a city still sleeping. with our bus to halong bay not leaving for 3 hours, and nary an open coffee shop to be found, we dumped ourselves lakeside in a city park and watched hanoi's geriatrics stretch their legs. once again, for full details, see the aforementioned entry by nicole and ashley.
the bus got us to the bay at noon, or so. we boarded a boat that took us to our actual boat, where we would be spending our first night. the boat itself was great, a traditional vietnamese junk, outfitted with all the necesstities of a pleasure cruise, it's gem being the rooftop sundeck. we started with a phenomenal lunch of fresh fish, crab, and prawns, then sunned ourselves for a spell before setting out for a one hour kayak tour though green waters. when we reboarded the boat, we took turns diving off its ledges into the water for a swim. then came dinner, and then came drinks. we stayed up on the deck for a good part of the night talking with the other passengers on board before everyone turned in, ashley and i deciding to sleep up top, under the stars. god knows how long we slept before ashley awoke in a freezing panic, trying with difficulty to drag me inside to our cabin. i was sleeping like a baby.
day 9: we start the day with a trip to "amazing cave." one might think that a name like "amazing cave" leaves only room for disappointment, but it actually lived up to its name. i could spend a moment here trying to describe what amazing cave was like, but instead, just think of a normal cave, and then imagine it being bigger and more amazing. there we are. after the cave we were dropped off at a private island, and this has to be said: as i was disembarking, or whatever the correct maritime word is, i thanked our captain, and patted him on the shoulder. he responded by patting me liberally on the ass. and after a few pats, he firmly cupped my left butt cheek, and positively manhandled my buns as i stepped off the boat. i was left shocked and, honestly, amused.
our private island was nice. kevin fished, we read, we kayaked. we tried to play beach volleyball, but when we smoothed over a mound of sand on the court, learned that the mound had been deliberately and strategically placed to prevent sewage from seeping up on the sand. with a geyser of shit-smelling waste fast growing on our court, we abandoned the game before it began.
dinner that night was the only meal of the halong bay tour that didn't knock my socks off. the main culprit came on the first course of the night: sea mantis. i had never heard of sea mantis before, but it looked like they had taken a normal praying mantis and ripped its hind legs off, thus making it a believable seafood. we each tried it, and i think kevin even finished his, but the dinner never really recovered.
day 10: as the rest of our boat mates packed up to return to hanoi, we took a boat over to cat ba island for a day and night of self planned activities. following the success of our previous moped adventures on cat ba with seth, we each rented our own motorbikes and tore across the island, making intermittent stops along the way. our first stop was a short but steep hike up a goat trail (with real live goats and everything), followed by lunch at the rock wall where we had climbed a week earlier. then we scootered over to cat ba national park and did a trek through jungle, seeing huge strangler figs, a couple of monkeys, and the biggest squirrel i've ever seen. when the sun went down, we rode back into town and had another delicious vietnamese meal before turning in.
day 11: the daydream of halong bay sadly came to a close after a final gorgeous boatride into the harbor. that night, on the advice of an aussie we met on the boat, we found a local watering hole where they'll serve you beer in a dirty glass for about 20 cents apiece. when the aussie showed up to join us, we tested the strictness of the country's drinking age by sending his thirteen year old daughter up for a round. the bartender handed her the beers without a thought.
day 12 (today): the three trottiers made our last rounds through hanoi while ashley took care of some more administrative duties. shopping, card playing, and 20 cent beers seemed as fitting a way to end our time in asia as anything. after one last, fantastic meal we saw kevin and nicole head to the airport, on their way to tokoyo. ashley and i, saddened by the loss, headed to a night market to commemorate our last night in vietnam. after strolling along a quarter mile of crappy knock-off designer clothes, and shoddy trinkets, we found a stall that sold paint-your-own-plates, which is exactly what it sounds like. we chose a romantic themed plate, and sitting on miniature plastic chairs with the locals, added color to the cartoon angels, flirting in the clouds.