Ninh Binh

We went on an organised day trip out to Ninh Binh Province on a bus, stopping first at the Tenth Century temples at Hoa Lu (there are two – the first is the best but our guide, Phuong, didn’t tell us that until afterwards and the second was less busy, at least. He’d already spent too long talking us through the mural at the entrance to the Temple complex depicting the history of the site so we had to dash around a bit as it was.) Then we drove on to Tam Coc, where we postponed the planned bike ride through the rice fields until after lunch as it was raining but then made Phuong let us go anyway, despite his worried assertion that some tourists had fallen off their bikes yesterday! Afterwards, we joined the queues and jostled our way onto the boats that ferry people down the river in convoy – a cool flotilla of little ‘basket boats’, a couple of passengers apiece, paddled by oars that are mostly operated by foot, that pass gracefully amongst the atmospheric karst outcrops and through a series of low caves. Afterwards we went to the hill above Hang Muna, where a punishing 500-step ascent leads to a small pagoda at the summit with great views – even on a misty day like today – over the surrounding countryside, with its rice fields, rocky outcrops and distant, fog-shrouded hills. Back in Hanoi, we went for tofu and mushroom banh mi at Banh Mi 25 and then went back to Nola to sample something else off the cocktail menu and some more of that very fine coffee, respectively…