After a few months in Japan, I had agreed to meet a friend and his partner for around 3 weeks in Vietnam, another new country for me. He knows it well and had planned out the entire itinerary, which didn't disappoint.

Rather than post about each place as I've traditionally done, I'm splitting Vietnam to focus more on the photos, being those of the places, and the people. Starting with the places, below is a brief summary of the trip that took in parts of northern and central Vietnam:

• Ninh Binh - a few hours (by car) south of Hanoi, Ninh Binh was a scenic area filled with karst landscapes, rice fields, and ancient sites. Our homestay was in a serene setting amongst the mountains and adjacent rice fields. Highlights here included:

  • a flat bottom boat trip along one of the rivers that traverses a UNESCO recognised landscape. This boat trip included passing through a 1km cave tunnel under a mountain and visting various temple complexes.

  • the Hoa Lu complex, which was the ancient capital of Vietnam in the 10th and 11th centuries and contains some nice ruins and temples.

  • climbing the rather uneven 500 steps of Dragon Mountain (as the locals call it) to take in the sweeping views, err together with quite a few others.

  • exploring the countryside by bike and scooter.

  
  

• Pu Luong - about 3hrs by car from Ninh Binh, this was a very picturesque area comprising multi-layered mountain backdrops and green rice fields dotted with small settlements including many ethnic (Thai and Muong) villages. The town and our accommodation were set high up in the mountains, which made for great views from the balcony. En route here we also visited the Endangered Primate Rescue Centre which is doing an excellent job taking caring of many langurs, gibbons and loris monkeys - the gibbon call sounds were incredible.

  
  

  Photographic highlights at Pu Luong revolved around the ethnic villages but in particular also Kho Muong Cave, which is found at the end of an unsuspecting trail behind Kho Muong Village. This 250 million year old limestone cave is of gigantic proportions with enormous stalactite/mite formations; I've been to quite a few caves but this was BIG. The scooter ride there and our 'off piste' route back, which took in a ridge top dirt forestry road, was also one that shall not easily be forgotten!

  
  

• Hoi An - a well known destination, Hoi An included a variety of things that together make for a great place, hence its popularity. These include the old centre and its colourful shop houses, the variety of food, the rivers, rice paddies, and beaches. There's also some oddities here for those into urban exploration with many abandoned large resort complexes that suffered and never recovered from the effects of a typhoon.

  
  

  Overall, Hoi An was a relaxing place and also the starting point for a multi-day scooter journey that took us through mountains, extreme heat, a bizarre theme park hotel with palatial sized rooms, skinny dipping in a roadside waterfall, and some eye opening environmental destruction, to the city of Hue. This ride shall also not be easily forgotten!

  
  

• Hue - another ancient city and former capital of the country, Hue has a lot to see, in particular the Royal Palace of the imperial city and its ancient ruins and buildings. There wasn't enough time to do the place justice. From Hue, we did the final leg of the scooter ride in torrential rain, strong wind and some pretty dangerous riding conditions. Rather than do the famous Hai Van Pass, which we could see was enveloped in a damn evil what looking cloud, we (and our bikes separately) took the longest tunnel in Asia beneath it, appearing in a completely clear and sunny Hoi An.

So to the 'place' photos....