The North East (Day Three)

Day three, and we wake up a little groggy after our rice wine and vodka evening. The weather again is a bit overcast and grey. We head off for a long drive towards the Chinese border. The countryside landscape has now changed into dramatic pinnacles of limestone that rise majestically from the fields of farmed land. We pass through isolated villages and our guide tells us to which tribes these belong...there are over 50 tribal heritages in Vietnam but apart from the style of houses they live in it is not immediately apparent to us how to differentiate. One thing for sure is that life for a rural family is not easy and poverty is knocking on the door of most dwellings. Most peoples days are spent working the land and at our time of visit this means harvesting the rice crop; it looks like back breakingly hard work and makes me grateful for the supermarket at the end of the street at home. If I lived here I'm sure I would starve as it all looks far to strenuous for my lazy arse to endure.

Our guide tells us he has a treat for us today and after a while tells us we are going to visit a cave. If I'm honest my heart sank a little thinking that it sounded really boring. However the cave is unexpectedly good...taking a good half hour to walk through, the pathway took us through huge capacious cathedrals of monstrously proportioned stalagmites and stalactites like eerie grotesque living statues that creepily alter their appearance, nanometre by nanometre. I wouldn't want to be alone here on my own in the dark.

More driving and after an hour we arrive at today's main event. The weather has started to clear and blues skies await us as we leave the car and walk to Ban Gioc waterfall. This is really impressive, 53 metres high and spanning 300 metres, the falls are surrounded by lush jungle vegetation, with hundreds of differently coloured dragonflies and butterflies flitting around the grassy verges. It's so beautiful that it almost looks too good, as if instead of a fantastic example of mother natures creativity it's how a set designer from Hollywood would construct a scene from the Garden of Eden.

The waterfall spans the Vietnam/Chinese border, our side is pretty much deserted but the Chinese side has a good dollop of tourists embarking onto bamboo rafts that punt the camera clad sightseers up to the spewing crashing cascades. We are in dry season at the moment so even though the falls look in full flow to me we are told that in the wet season they become even more ferocious.

We spend so long at Ban Gioc that when we finally leave and get to the only restaurant for miles it is totally packed out. However the Vietnamese are forever resourceful and when it comes to eating it seems that venue is of no consequence. Next to the restaurant they are in the middle of building a two storey extension, so a table is set up for us in the middle of the ground floor and we have lunch in a building site with young lads carry bricks and buckets around us.... the food was great so who really cares and an added bonus was I didn't feel guilty about flicking me cigarette ash on the floor.

The waterfalls were brilliant, Ad got some good pictures even though he had to cling on for dear life clambering down a near sheer drop to attain the best shot (I didn't go, not with my wobbly legs) and the weather was picture postcard perfect. After another long drive back to Cao Bang, an early dinner, just a little rice wine, it's early to bed ...a good day all around.