Day 1 of my Hanoi trip, Pixie and I were off to Perfume Pagoda (Huong Tich-in Vietnamese @ Ha Tay province). After a simple breakfast of bread, some tomatoes, some hard 'baked' beans we were herded into a van that took us on a 2-hour van (Ford Transit) ride to the jetty for another hour ride on a boat and another 10 minutes of cable car ride before reaching the foothill of the Perfume Pagoda.
Pic on the left is one of the many that u may see along the way to any sightseeing places out of Hanoi City. It's amazing how they place their cemetaries in between land that they cultivate for food and economic purposes. I do wonder why they do not have a special zone/area for cemetaries since land is abundant there.
Fancy some frog wine or snake wine? The mere sight of both containers were enough to make me gag! It seems that Vietnamese enjoy exotic food, in particular wines. I've even seen some scorpion wine in some shops that sell these wines.
At the jetty where we had to endure an hour long journey up Yen River/Stream to the foothill of the Perfume Pagoda (Huong Tich - in Vietnamese). The boat that we had to take, as u can see in above pic, was made out of steel plates welded together with little wooden stools to fit 2 people's behind in cramp condition! The view on the way to the foothill were picturesque, as natural as it can be (i guess) for the the time being.
We managed to cover the following places within the alloted time of 11am-1:30pm:-
- Uphill trek on uneven path (path under construction) from the jetty/wharf to the Cable Car station. (Note: Had poor breakfast, already hungry and pushed myself to move on)
- Took Cable Car 10 minutes cable car ride uphill (point to note, it took 3 Swiss-1M2F approximately 20minutes to complete the climb while the rest of us-11 opted for cable car)
- Walked from Cable Car station to the mouth of Perfume Pagoda (cave)
- Walked down the steps to the cave and deeper inside, there were about 5 altars (could be more...too dark!) with different deities
-Time to leave, walked up the steps back to the Cable Car station and waited til there were at least 30 people on both ends. Otherwise, the station master will stop the cable cars to save resources!!! (gosh, what else would they think of next??!)
By the time we reached the bottom Cable Car station, all agreed to have lunch 1st before visiting another temple, Thien Tru (Heavenly Kitchen) Pagoda. Then it was time to head back to the van and back to Hanoi.
In a nutshell, it's a recommended place to visit on a cooling month instead of summer as the humidity and heat affected me. Bring along a bottle of water (you can buy a 1.5l bottle for VND10K @ foothill and it gets more expensive as you ascend to the Huong Tich), an umbrella and/or buy a Vietnamese hat to keep the sun from your face, put on sunblock and if you are a 'puteri lilin' (Candle Princess) bring along windbreaker and wear long pants.
Also, please be fit as you are required to ascend and descend many steps.
If I recall correctly, since I was in Hanoi in Jul the air conditioning in the Ford Transit which transported us felt as thought it was not working. I was perspiring the whole journey there and what more to say on the way back...
I think we reached back to HPH approximately 6plus and Trixy came to take Pixie and I out for dinner again. Shall write more next time...
No comments:
Post a Comment