Lunch at one of the big tourist restaurants on the square at Bac Ha before driving back to Lao Cai where we’d take the 8:15 pm overnight train to Hanoi. Haven’t a clue what restaurant it was but if you visit Bac Ha, it won’t be difficult to find. It’s the restaurant with every Western and Asian tourist eating in. Cheap, clean and the best spinach with garlic and fried rice of the trip.
Finished with lunch, time for the rainy drive back to Lao Cai, another 2-1/2 hours with a few new and old road sights along the way. The big sight was a truck off the road on it’s side. About time we’ve seen an accident considering all the rain, mud…View image, and heavy traffic through the mountains…View image…the rice fields were a vivid green thanks to all the rain, and the car passsed many farm raised fish ponds.
The entire Lao Cai province is one of the poorest in Vietnam with an average income of $185 U.S./year, but tourism and cross-border trade with China is a growing source of income. There is absolutely nothing to see in the frontier town of Lao Cai but a bridge leading across the China border with people lining up on both sides to enter and leave the two countries. You can transit into China from here as long as you have already obtained a Chinese Visa. No such thing as “Visa Upon Arrival” in China.
Once in Lao Cai, a short excursion to the border crossing of Vietnam and China before Mr. Hi dropped us off in the Lao Cai Train Station…View image… area with nothing to do but hang out for six hours until our train left. Groups of shoe shine men stick around this area knowing the tourists will show up with very dirty boots and shoes. Eventually, almost everyone agrees to have their disgustingly filthy boots/shoes cleaned of mud and it was nice to see that the each shoe shine person took one boot to clean and passed the mate on to another man to share the profits.
Sitting, waiting, eating and watching for six long hours…
