Category: Travel

The V-Dubbers

Today was a mixture of complaining about our various aching body parts, and groaning in pleasure at the views we were treated to as we trundled past. After a leisurely breakfast of bacon butties we packed up the van.

It had been a very successful first couple nights in the van. Some of my fears had been dispelled; there was no leaking from the roof, it didn’t rock in the night with the wind to wake me or make me feel sea sick, and it was definitely warm enough. Also, most of the day was spent with the windows and doors open which means, so far, we haven’t had any condensation or damp issues. This was something I had taken great care to avoid so I am very happy its worked.

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Ben Nevis Knees

OMG my knees, my terrible knees!

When we got back to base camp, they both ached fairly evenly. It was quite surprising seeing as one of them had been through 2 major surgeries in the last 3 years and the other was completely unmolested.

Our route up Ben Nevis could never have been the “normal” one, we are proud graduates of the SUMC! We had brought all our climbing gear along and scoped out a good looking climb. Well within our climbing ability technically, but stamina-ly, far beyond us it turned out. Not because we attempted and failed it, we did not even attempt. The weather looked soggy in the morning and from our experience on welsh rock, we could reasonably expect the climb to be “seepy”. Not an enduring quality on a 450m long climb and by the end of the day, knew we had made the right choice.

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Escape to the Highlands

“Chuck it all in the van”

“What… the kitchen sink too?”

“Yes”

…. is how the conversation should have gone.

No sooner had we left Banbury than I remembered my shiney stainless steel fruit bowl that I had planned to use as a washing up bowl was still wrapped neatly in my garage. Maybe it was the quantity of stuff in the van already, or my eagerness to set off, or just the inevitability of travel, that you always forget something essential… like washing up sponges. Maybe my forgetfulness is limited to washing up apparatus?

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Field Testing

Each year a bunch of friends and I all make the effort to meet up on mass and go climbing. We always stay in the cheapest and closest campsite to wherever we need to be. Sometimes this is as close as across the road, making the walk-in so short we can watch climbers from our circle of tents. When we were students, it was always tents because that’s what we had so that’s what we used, but now we want a bit extra comfort so vans are starting to enter the group.

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Motorbike Turbulence

So I got home safely, it was likely to happen… however the plane driver operator pilot did his best to make me doubt it.

You know, I’m not sure turbulence is a real thing. It feels like the whole plane had just landed on cobbles but you are thousands of feet up and passing through air, not known to behave like victorian rock roads. I think the pilot just gets bored and announces to the cabin that there is some “turbulence” approaching. As if they just looked out the window and saw a herd of cattle.. “Oh look, some cattle at 35,000ft…” casual. And then the pilot and his piloty mates exercise the biggest con in aviation.  I bet there is no such thing as turbulence, I bet the pilot just wobbles the steering wheel direction adjuster flying stick until he gets a few people to shriek or until he thinks the air hostesses will coo over him and stroke his arms saying “you’re such a skilled pilot to have controlled the plane in such terrible turbulence!” Maybe my imagination has wandered off on its own…

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Homeward bound and gagged

Hanoi to Russia to Home 1.5

The day to leave had come. Bag was packed. Bike remained unsold. Mike was in bed (like any sane person would be at 6am) Bed checked and double checked for hidden items. Checked out. Egg Bahn Mi in my face. Coffee in hand. Taxi waiting.

The weather echoed my mood; Heavy overhead with persistent drizzle. If only I didn’t have to leave… the “real world” we had been talking about, in flying comma, beckoned and there could be no ignoring it now. I mean, I could ignore it, and I would be fine, but I would be seriously shooting my career in the foot. I like my job and I enjoy my career but in this moment I felt like nothing more than throwing the towel in and disappearing into the east asian distance. Just thinking about the possibility made me pause getting in the taxi.

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Vegging out, vegging in

Hanoi chill out

I am glad I checked my flight details today. I had misread the time of departure as 1600 where it was actually 0955 tomorrow. The downside was that I had already spent the whole day relaxing and vegging out writing up the last 3 days of blogs. It was evening when the panic started to rise and I had to frantically pack and sort all my stuff out before the pub quiz. I had thought that with my flight at 1600 I could leisurely wake and do my packing and last bits of shopping before swanning over to the airport after lunch. It was not to be and I found myself running around collecting washing, trying to sell the bike, getting dinner, playing the pub quiz, buying a carry on bag, doing the pub quiz challenges and arranging a taxi in the morning with some of the islanders.

One of the things on my to do list had been drop off a Geocache somewhere in Vietnam. (See www.geocaching.com for literally the coolest nerdy thing to do for free) I had found a Trackable in one of the caches in England and decided to give it a boost around the globe. It had been in my bag for the whole trip, occasionally surfacing in my mind. I know it’s a silly 1st world problem to have but I have just been so busy doing cool stuff that I’ve not gotten around to it. Even today, where it was mostly spent administrating my life and catching up on blogging I was too busy to find time. I hang my head in shame that I have not completed my Geocaching mission.

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Wobbling Wounded

Ha Long to Hanoi

The aftermath of the night before was evident this morning. The pleasant morning gong managed to rouse about 20% of the island. I was up, not one to miss a meal. I had the choice of enjoying the company of the angry omelette man or semi-conscious sandy islanders. None more sandy than Mike who had crashed out on the beach and made himself a sand pillow. Somehow in the middle of the night he had dragged himself, and half the beach it seemed, back into his bed.

Time is deceptive on the island. Because you have been partying all day and the only light is sunlight or that powered by generator, once everyone has given up and passed out, its not actually that late. It gets dark at about 8pm and after 4 hours of dancing like a loon I was knackered!

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Coral Cove Calamities

Ha Long Bay Castaway Island Cruise

Morning was greeted to the sound of a furiously beaten gong… just what an island of hungover people need to hear. After breakfast had been dispatched we got on the beer pong, well why not eh? (oh, I’ve picked up some Canadian slag, eh!) I knew that drinking and being drunk on the cruise would be a bad idea for me so I didn’t bother after that first round of beer pong. I was rubbish as it turned out anyway. Leemee (I don’t know how to spell his name other than phonetically) and I teamed up last night and we didn’t get to finish a game against Big Bear and Mike so that had to be settled. I must have lost the mad skills that I spent 2 summers in France developing.

The pleasure boat arrived and the music started. We loaded up with food and beer and set sail. It was amazing phut phut phutting around the bay. All the rocks were spectacular and I longed to climb them. I made do by mentally new routing the hell out of all the crack systems and bubbly pocketed limestone. I reckon I can Mental Climb™ to at least E3 now. New PB. I vow to come back here and actually climb something when (not if) I get the chance. I am glad there were games and dancing to be done. Drifting along seeing the rocks and the floating villages is amazing. There are a lot citation required of islands in the archipelago and while they are all amazing and don’t lose their appeal they all start to look the same. I felt fine while we were within the protection of the bays but we had to cross a less protected stretch of water and it got a bit choppy. Soon I was feeling the effects of the heaving boat and heaving myself but managed to keep my breakfast – much to Mike and the GoPro’s disappointment.

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