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| Lotus Field Homestay |
Moved to south of Hanoi, an area with river and
inland karst hill formation. Read that the towns are not interesting to
stay in, so chose Lotus Field Homestay in the outskirts, a quiet
location with fantastic view of karst hills.
Booked a private car for the next to tour the sites, us40, an affordable comfort.
First
visited the Bai Dinh pagoda group, found out that it is a huge area of
temples, pagodas and garden, the construction started 20 years ago. The
view from the pagoda, tallest in Asia, is wonderful. Otherwise it
is a soulless tourist attraction.
Far more interesting and worth
visiting is the ancient temples group up in the hill at the far end of
the area, probably why this development started.
Flights of steps brought you up the small forested hill with temples built inside caves and under rock, very atmospheric.
Next
to visit is Hoa Lu complex, a large area with a few old buildings. We
are not impressed with the architecture and the hordes of tourists are
unpleasant, not worth our time.
After a good lunch, went for the
Trang An boat tour. Very well organised to move tourists on to flat
rowing boats, so the wait was not long.
We picked route 1 which went through 9 caves and visited 3 temples on the hills. It is the route visiting most caves and least buildings, let us see more of the national environment. Luckily it is the one with the least tourists and we avoided the eye sores of many boats in the view.
It is a fabulous experience to get into so many shallow caves, the roofs lined with stalactites and have eroded shapes. Very often we have to dug in order not to touch the roof.
The river and hills are in pristine condition, no development nor agriculture, it is nice to see it being preserved, and be enjoyed without much environmental impact.
Should be good to do it first thing in the early morning to avoid crowds.
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