Traveling is great, but there's no place like home

 

Our morning started at 4:15 to take a taxi to the airport. Fallon didn't even have enough money for a cup of coffee, but we had already bought our banh my sandwiches for the morning the night before, so our needs were mostly met. Everything in the Hanoi airport went smoothly for my flight to Tokyo and Fallon's flight to Bangkok did as well.

Finally back together again (only missing one) with lots of veggies from the garden for dinner

VietNam Airlines at the Hanoi Airport

Saying goodbye to Fallon at the airport

Once in Tokyo, I had several hours to kill until my flight to Chicago. I give the Tokyo Airport 5 stars. The food was reasonably priced and delicious, they recycle and compost, it was quiet, peaceful, and clean, and the toilets were amazing! The toilets had lots of high tech buttons: one makes noise as you go to the bathroom, one washes you with a single stream of water, one uses a spray method for cleaning with water, and one is a dryer. Of course, I tried all of the buttons.

So many exciting buttons for the Tokyo Airport toilets and I tried every one.

Lots of food options in the Tokyo Airport: here are Ramen and Udon

Udon noodles and tempura (less than $8) in the airport - now that's what I'm talking about!

James picked me us at 10:30pm just outside of Boston (he's the only one in our family who is a night owl)

After almost 30 hours of traveling, I was able to get the best ride of my trip with James back to Meriden. What a wonderful feeling to walk into my home! Everyone else was asleep, but the dogs sure were excited to see me. Even though I got home close to 1:00am, a sunrise hike up the Ledges was calling me, so Luca and I zipped up in the most perfect 55 degree weather.

Sunrise hike with the pup

The garden has grown so much!

Somebody felt left out of the hug

Sunrise with Maya

I am beyond grateful that the Universe has permitted me the family, resources, lifestyle, and health to allow me to travel. This is a gift that I do not take for granted. Traveling in VietNam and the Pacific Northwest was memorable, exciting, educational, and breath-taking. Yet, it is partly because of travel, that I know there is no place that I would rather live than where and with whom I do. Who knows where or if there will be another trip, so stay tuned. In the meantime, as time marches on, I will be content living in the best place on earth.

Blind Red Dao Masseuse, Hike in Cat Ba National Park, Hospital Cave, $.09 left

Raining again today, but we're used to it, however it did mean no sunsets or sunrises while we were on the island. Before heading back to Hanoi at 12:30, we went for a hike in Cat Ba National Park, then checked out Hospital Cave and went for a stroll on a deserted beach.

Mother Nature put the kibosh on our sunrise hike, so we headed out to Cat Ba National Park for a hike up to a peak. Hiking in 1000% humidity is rough (even though Fallon says that is mathematically impossible). The hike was not very long, but we a sweaty mess by the time we got to the top. People had told us it was a hike through the jungle and they were right. I went first to make sure there weren't any snakes - Fallon really doesn't like snakes. We talked about how challenging it must have been to fight a war in thick and hot jungle. There was viewing platform on the top where there was a 360 degree view.

A motorbike loaded up with flimsy plastic bags.

Next, we went to Hospital Cave. It served both as a secret bomb-proof hospital during the VietNam War and as a safe house for Viet Cong leaders. Built between 1963 and 1965, this incredibly well-constructed three-story feat of engineering was in constant use until 1975. It spans 17 rooms, including and old theatre, a huge natural cavern, its own swimming pool, an operating room, sleeping quarters, a mess hall, and more.  

A bomb-proof door at the entrance

Ammo room

Recovery room

Meeting room

Large meeting room and cinema

Sleeping quarters

Exit to the cave

Some of the fortification in the cave

Huge venomous spider

Huge venomous spider

We had a few extra minutes, so we stopped by a beach to take a stroll. It was still raining a lot, so not many people were on the beach. Plus, it was still morning.

Questioning ourselves about being on the beach while it was pouring rain.

Back to our hotel we went to pack up for our trip back to Hanoi and then to the airport in the morning. But first, we had booked some appointments at Dao Care.

Hai Phong is a huge shipping port

Our hotel in Hanoi

Some more delicious veggie food

It is pretty common to see people riding with their dogs

Colorful food for sale on the street in Hanoi

For our final thing in VietNam, we booked appointments at Dao's Care. Fallon booked an Dao herbal bath and I booked a Dao massage. It is a social enterprise that offers Red Dao (ethnic minority in VietNam) herbal baths using their secret recipes and therapeutic massages by visually impaired therapists. 

Fallon said that her bath was like soaking a wooden tub filled with tea. She thought it was great. The secret recipe of the 18 different healing herbs is only passed down through the Red Dao women. My massage was incredible. My masseuse was blind and did not speak English, so one would think that communication would be difficult, but it felt totally normal. She was super tune to the parts of my body that needed a little extra and I didn't even have to say anything. She climbed right onto the table with me and I felt super comfortable with everything that she did.

At Dao's Care

They gave me an outfit to put on for before and after my massage.

Fallon and I had planned out our Vietnamese Dong (the currency) so that we would not have much left at the end of our trip. Everyone uses cash here because there is an extra 3% charge to use a credit card, if a place even has a credit card option. After paying for our hotel, taxi to the airport, and Dao's Care treatments, we had almost nothing left. On our walk home, we passed some delicious donuts, so of course, we bought them which brought my total amount of Vietnamese dong down to less than $.08. This left us crossing our fingers that we would not need anything the next morning before getting on my flight home. I would say that we eeked as much as we could out of our trip, right down to the last few dongs.

Delicious donuts

Fallon had a weight limit on her bag, so she wore her suit on the plane and filled all of the pockets.

Saying goodbye at the airport. I was flying East to get home

 and Fallon was flying West. VietNam really is on the opposite side of the world from NH.

VietNam Airlines