We met up with this tour group called the "Easy Riders." Here is my guide Loi getting our bike ready.
Woohoo!!! Let's go! (Courtney and I)
Don't I look like a natural on the back of a motorcycle? This picture was taken while we were moving...Joe took this when he was passing us!
We started our tour with a visit to one of the famous shrines in Da Lat area. There were many dragons. Here I am under one...
and next to another...
there is some importance to the dragon. Something to do with life...wish I would have paid a better attention...
As we were leaving Da La we went on a short hike by a large water fall. The fall was called Elephant Falls. It was a dangerous hike but beautiful!
Me with one of the little falls:
I wish I could show/explain the series of rocks we climbed down just to stand at this spot....and then the series of rocks ahead just to see the falls...
But after the slippery, scary hike...we made it to Elephant Falls:
And it was beautiful...(and bright!)
Right next to the falls was a large shrine. The shrine itself was beautiful. It was famous for the Giant Laughing Buddha and for the Buddha with 100 hands and 1000 eyes. At the entrance was another dragon...
Here is one of the Buddhas. This type of Buddha is from India. The fat, laughing Buddha is from China. Both are used everywhere but have different origins. In this temple, the Indian Buddha is inside and the laughing Buddha was outside.
and here are the 100 hands and 1000 eyes...
Outside was the Giant Laughing Buddha that this shrine was also known for. There was a door to enter at his belly but it was locked!
The was a meditating Buddha outside and we felt the need to join in for a moment of peace and prayer...
After this hard hike it was time for lunch. The guys said they would order for us if we could eat everything...we were daring enough. The place was pretty gross...stray dogs, lots of flies and a very unsanitary looking kitchen...but the food was so delicious!
This is chicken with something. The chopsticks you can see are bright green...many places had the same ones. they are a lot longer and thicker than the chopsticks in Japan.
This is the whole table...
The guides were so impressed with our ability and desire to try the new foods. A lot of it was spicy...but so delicious! As we were finishing they ordered dessert for us. It was a fresh fig. It was an interesting taste and texture. The texture was like syrupy juice and then you just had to swallow the seeds quickly. Overall it tasted alright. Not sure how safe it was to eat but we all survived.
We stopped many times (mostly to save our bottoms from going numb) but also to take in many beautiful scenes. You can see all the farms in the background. Vietnam grows a wide variety of vegetables, sugar cane, coffee and so much more. Here is us enjoying a view of central Vietnam in all it's glory...
At one point we were told to take a hike (those were the exact words) and on top of the little mountain (hill) was another wonderful view...
Every so often the guys would pull over and get off to show us something else. Here we stopped at a flower farm and learned that Da Lat is famous threw out Vietnam for growing the more beautiful flowers. They are shipped daily to Ho Chi Mihn (a 6 hour bus ride!)
We also learned a lot about the coffee industry in Vietnam...there were coffee trees everywhere. Here we are getting a lesson about coffee trees:
Coffee beans on the tree:
and then they would dry it out on HUGE tarps in the front yard, back yard, on top of the house...everywhere was coffee:
More "factories" (aka...someone's house). Here was a family making brooms.
The guy just collected the brush and then rolled it all together...it was pretty amazing how tight he could roll the handle. And the finished product:
One of the most interesting things we saw was the silk factory. We were able to see all stages from the harvesting of silk worms to the making and selling of silks. Here is the first factory. At this factory the worms have already made their cacoon. The cacoons are brought here and stacked for when needed. Here are some of the cacoons:
When you broke open many of the cacoons, there were still live worms in there!
The cacoons are put into boiling water to soften. Then when a stay strand is found, it is pulled onto the spinner by this worker. You can see the silk strand being spun onto the green wheel. ( I am sure there is a name for that but I have no idea!) We learned each cacoon can produce about 80 m of a silk strand.
From here, the silk is strung onto larger wheels...(again, I am sure there is a technical name...)
Then the silk is used to make scaves and cloth. This machine was imported from Japan. They just started using machines in the last 5 years, before that, all silk was weaved by hand. If you look at the brown like paper in the top of the picture, that has holes in it. It looks a lot like braille. It is actually made from wood and it is the pattern. It clicks threw at every strand to let the machine know what do to. It made a loud clicking noise. It was very cool to watch.
We went to another "factory" where the Vietnamese version of sake (or Happy Water according to our tour guides) is made. We watched them boil, ferment and distill. It was amazing. Everything was done over a wood burning fire. We were able to try some and bought some to enjoy that night at dinner. It was strong and burned going down.
After visiting the silk factory we visited a "factory" where they breed the worms! Here are millions of worms just fattening up!
Our day is almost over. We take a short break to walk threw the town center of what we were told was one of the ethnic minority groups of Vietnam. We later figured out that they are Hmong people.
We visit another ethnic minority group and were able to tour their houses. The tour guides told us their names but said they usually just call them "long house people" as you can see from the shape of their homes. These groups are now receiving finical support from the government to build better homes. They also get to go to high school for free unlike the rest of Vietnam.
Here is the inside of the house. The center has a loft sort of area. This is where everyone sleeps. The fire is built under it. This is how everyone stays warm!
The day is coming to a close. We are tired and our butts hurt from sitting on a bike for nearly 10 hours! We took a break and had to do a little stretching!
a good night sleep and then on to day 2....
No comments:
Post a Comment