SAPA:

Is a beautiful mountain village in the north-west of the country, not too far away from the Chinese Border. The train was even louder then the previous trains!
At 1600 meters Sapa is surrounded by terraced rice paddies and the highest mountain of Vietnam, Fansipan with approximately 3100 meters, is not too far. The region is inhabited by various hill tribes, mainly the Red Dao (wearing red pillow-like hats) and the Black H’mong (in their black-dyed outfits).
The tricky thing about Sapa is the weather. Especially in Jan and Feb it can be very foggy, cloudy and very cold. Unfortunately this was the case when we arrived there. On our first day we got a few hours of clearer sky and even some sun, so that we could catch a glimpse of the stunning beauty of the green mountains and the rice paddies. However, in the late afternoon the fog came in and just like in San Francisco you suddenly can’t see further than a few meters anymore. Plus it gets very very cold and drizzly. We wore everything we had but could not really get really warm for the next two days. We had gotten a room with an amazing view, which was not really of any use, but at least it had a little fireplace and Nathan had to make a campfire. Though the weather was not what we hoped it would be (we were told that it was sunny just the days before we arrived) we had a very good time.
What makes Sapa most interesting are the hill tribe people. You see them everywhere in the village, mainly trying to sell things (self made blankets, bags, jewelry, clothes etc.). Just like a lot of other Vietnamese vendors we met they are pretty pushy- they learned to use tourism for them. We did not get tired of watching.
However, they don’t like to be photographed unless you buy something from them or offer them money.
We hiked around the area (to Nathan’s great pleasure there were tons of Vietnamese Potbelly pigs), got to see some great landscape in spite of the fog, and spent a lot of time at the colorful market.
We also took our very last motor bike trip to Ta Phien, a very small Dao/H’mong village completely untouched by tourism (meaning: no hotels but still the destination for a lot of day trips). Here we were invited to several Red Dao people’s houses, mostly with the intention of selling us things. It was very nice though. The hill tribe people are very poor. One of the houses we visited was basically a dark wooden shack without a window, dirt floor with a fire hole, a few kiddy size wood benches and a few dishes. The lady living there had three snotty toddlers running around and a few pigs in a stall in front of the house. Her English was very basic but she was very kind and offered us food she had prepared over the little fire. She was so thankful when we bought a few things.
We were invited inside another house, as we must have looked almost frozen. The guys gave us some really strong home made Schnapps and had a good time watching us drink it and turn red in the face. We have very fond memories of Ta Phien and its’ very kind people.
One thing we realized about the hill tribe people, or at times about “normal” Vietnamese: the women seem to work and sell things, whereas the men are often hanging out, drinking and smoking!