Philippines and Hanoi

After 28 hours I finally arrive in Baler (the philippines), I take a tuctuc to the bungalows and I finally see my sister again!! Woehoeeee, wauw it's so nice to see her. After half an hour Rik comes back from his surf session and we go for breakfast. The weather is pretty shitty to be honest, but I really don't care. It's so nice to see Ivy & Rik again. We just hang out the whole day, have a drink, walk a bit and have another drink. Enough to talk about! It's strange and so normal at the same time. We're at the other side of the world, see each other for the first time in months, and within a day it feels completely normal.
In the evening we join a Russian/Philippiny Karaoke party at the bungalows and, even though I'm really tired, the party goes on till late with enough alcohol and laughter.
The next day we rent a scooter and cruise a bit around. The weather is much better and we find a beautiful bay to go back to the day after.
As a Vegetarian I do have a hard time to find good local food. Meat is the most important part of the meal so I have to do it with so rice and a simple vegetable. Luckily Rik is not so much from the local dishes, so we go for nice and safe western food. Then its already the last day, we go to the bay. The weather is beautiful, we hang out at beach and walk around. For me it all doesn't matter what we do, I just feel humbled to see my sis and her friend here at the other side of the world.
We go back to Manilla where we have a last meal, hang out at the swimming pool and then it's time to say goodbye.
What a great few days! I'm so happy that I went for this little side trip.

And now off to Vietnam

I arrive in Hanoi, find a hostel for the night and the day after I go to Downtown backpacker hostel, where we all staye together. Almost the whole group from Bali decided to come to Vietnam to do the motorbike tour from Hanoi to Saigon. It's really nice to see everybody again! First Shanghai then Bali and now Hanoi!! How crazy that everybody is travelling at the same time.
The hostel is a bit to crazy for me!! A real party hostel, noisy till 4 in the morning and from 5.30 people are waking up to go to Sapa or Halong Bai. So not much of a good sleep. Alan and I choose to go to another hostel a bit outside of the old quarter. We meet up with a few friends we met in Bali and in the evening we go to the centre to drink beer. Drinking beer, wodka and eating are the main activities to do. Every evening again, a beer for 0.20 euro a big bottle of wodka for 4 euro.. these days are not the best for my liver, haha. But we have great fun. Laughing balloons is the thing to do, they are much stronger then in Holland.. so it is common that someone drops of his chair or becomes crazy.. I can't handle it as well and start moving uncontrolled with my body, happily Bart told me don't do it again and after a few minutes of defensive behaviour I regocnised he was right. This stuff can't be good for anybody.. but probably so much alcohol every day is also not very healthy!!
All of us bought a bike, a Honda Win, or some Chinese, Korean variation on that. For just 200 dollar I had a ride through Vietnam, let's see how many breakdowns I'll  have.
The 5th of Feb we leave Hanoi, Alan and I want to go up north, first to the mountains and then follow the Chinese border to the coast in the direction of Halong Bai. The rest of the group to didn't fancy the thought of going towards the cold and probably cloudy mountains and went directly to Halong Bai.
Alan taught me how to switch gear and we're ready to go!!!

I never expected myself to drive on a scooter, but I learned that in Bali. Now it's time to learn how to drive on a motorbike, and to make it more complicated I go immediately into the mountains.

Next week my experiences on the bike so far