The Bro Trip

Our plans for today was to explore the national park of Cat Ba. And so we did! Started out early morning with breakfast at our favourite table right at the beach. Btw, vietnamese coffe is awesome! Lots of flavour, black and strong! No better way to wake up!


The view from our breakfast table. Can't complain.

So, we headed into town and hired a motorbike and drove to the national park through the winding paths and beautiful coastal line Cat Ba has to offer. When we got there, we parked our bike and began the longest trek we've had so far! Our journey started on wide, paved roads, but would soon turn into narrow, steep trails through the jungle that really closed in on us the further in we came. It's really amazing just standing still in the middle of a jungle listening to what it has to say. Birds, bugs, wind, leaves falling, mysterious noises in nearby bushes made by mysterious creatures... Cool!


Marcus found his home deep in the jungle, among all the other monkeys.


Christopher, the trek master!

After about 3 hours of trekking we reached what seemed to be a dead end for us. The path had been eaten by the jungle, and since we only had shorts and t-shirts, we decided to go back, or we had been eaten as well. So, we fought our way back through the jungle, and finally came back to where we started. Since we still had time to go places, since we rented the bike all day, we took a detour and visited Hospital cave. This cave was built in 1965 and was used as a hospital (really?), treating northvietnamese and chinese patients injured by american soldiers in the Vietnam War. In the cave, they had built a hospital in three floors, were they treated the injured. It also worked as a strategy center for the vietnamese military. The cave was basically built by square concrete rooms, that had different uses.


Beautiful nature in the national park. This is where we decided to turn back. Jungle!!


This little bat was hanging of a leaf right above our heads on our way back
on the trek! Just had to bother him with some pictures, tourist style!



View from the entrance of Hospital Cave. Typical vietnamese countryside.

After Hospital Cave we decided to go back to our bungalow for some food and a shower. Writing this blog update from a computer at our "regular" internet cafe. After this we're having dinner! Gonna hit yet another place from the Lonley Planet bibel! Btw, we heard the first snow fell today in Sweden. We just wanna say that we're sorry for you. We really are. Anyway, tomorrow is a brand new day! We'll probably hit the beach after breakfast and not move for the entire day. It's a hard knock life! :)

/M&C