1st March
We pick up the story exactly where the last one left off, in the noisy hotel room, only where the party next door was blaring until the wee hours. The guy once he went to sleep snored so loud I thought that he was in bed next to me! Needless to say I didn’t have a good night’s sleep at all.
I was informed that it’s the biggest and best hotel in that town but that doesn’t bode well for the others! I’ve stayed in some terrible hotels and this one joins them quite high on that list.
Speaking of the hotel, something I forgot to mention in the previous blog…
We give Scott a hard time for having super soft skin. He did after all get a splinter in Hanoi from a perfectly good, well used chair. He had to one up himself when I came to his room in this hotel by brushing his foot along the mat in front of the bathroom before shouting “I got a splinter!”
It wasn’t…
It has a hair. Who gets someone else’s hair stuck in their foot by standing on it?
Anyway let’s continue from me being grumpy outside the hotel, waiting for our lift.
We drove 15 minutes back to the field office, where we had a lovely bahn mi for breakfast – something I’ve always wanted to try and then heading to the entrance of the forest where the broker for the local porters was trying to negotiate a last minute price increase. Remember her for tomorrow.
This is where the adventure began for us properly although, I’m not going to be able to describe it that well here. You’ll have to wait for the video to see exactly what it was like.
After parking the cars and it being a little quiet between the whole team (consisting of well over 20 people) we slowly started to walk towards the forest, starting with a killer hill that almost finished me and Luke off, through an acacia plantation. The locals are encouraged to grow acacia and allow it to mature for 8 to 10 years rather than the usual 5.
We walked with Hai, the director of the forest department for that area for a little while, encountering our first in-situ leach as we passed some of his rangers on bikes.
At this point he pointed something out to us. We didn’t even realise but almost instantly from the acacia plantation to the rainforest there was a significant temperature drop. A cooling feeling that sadly would not last. The temperature and humidity in the forest were both high and it’s still the winter here!
That reminds me of another thing!
While we were back in the hotel and headed for dinner (some of the best pork I’ve ever eaten by the way) we were on a quest for ice cream and it was not an easy one! Apparently they don’t sell ice cream in the winter but one of the Viet nature workers got on his bike and found us some with the help of a couple of young boys. Although he got us about 10 Ice lollies between the 4 of us.
Back in the rainforest as my brain yearned for an ice lolly we waded through our first river which was only shin deep but it is here that our funky rubber sandals showed their worth. It really was easy to walk in them over the rocks. They’re certainly no fashion statement but in the rainforest functionality trumps all.
We got to the first ranger station where I had to ask the question I had been dreading! Just 1 hour in to the trek I had to ask what we do about the toilet and was told to find a bush.
I’ve nature pooed before and it is never a pleasant experience. I’ll save you the details but you can know that I lost my wad of toilet paper between the camp and the toilet and there wasn’t time to go back for more. Panic set in and I held on for the worst minute of my life.
On return to the tent I filtered some river water which made for some quality H2O and as I write this after coming back out of the forest I can confirm that neither of the boys utilised theirs and got to feel the work it takes to produce a litre of filtered water.
We set off again and crossed river after river. Some of them as high as the top of the thighs and with an incredibly strong current.
Sadly some months ago a ranger in fact lost his life protecting the animals of this reserve when he fell in to the river with leg cramp and couldn’t be pulled to safety. The work they do is incredibly important but it is also very dangerous and I have huge respect for them after walking for just 5 hours in their shoes. They don’t complain, don’t struggle and work in the forest for as much as 1 month at a time. These men are the unsung heroes of conservation.
Lunch consisted of sticky rice cake, which was pretty difficult to eat, followed by a bread roll containing what tasted and felt like a cross between a sausage and pate. It was actually pretty delicious.
At the end of the 5 hours of hills, rivers and rocks (which were the hardest substrate to walk on, and definately the most painful) we arrived at our base camp. The rangers go undressed and jumped in the river so myself and Scott also stripped down to our pants and got in for possibly the coldest bath of our lives! Even Hai got in before making a hasty retreat back on land with Luke.
But we needed the bath because it helped to remove the 5 leeches I had on me at that point (I think Luke had about the same and Scott maybe 2 or so) but also to help with my condition.
It’s important to drink in that environment and I think that I probably didn’t have quite enough, coupled with exhaustion and lack of sleep. So I felt like I was on the verge of heat stroke. I had a banging head ache, stomach cramps and I felt really sick. But as soon as I got out of the 10 degrees centigrade water I felt so much better but still struggled with dinner that night which was mainly rice, veggies and chicken, although they serve all of their chicken on the bone which myself and Scott aren’t keen on.
By now conversation had started to improve with the team and we had a great night with them before turning in and climbing in to our hammocks which were incredibly comfortable although everyone did have a laugh about how low mine hung after I got in it and how tight it pulled in around me. I thought that was normal but apparently not.
Oh and Luke had to get the tarpaulin over his hammock fixed as he was getting rained on in his hammock
Sleep came slowly but once I got to sleep apparently mine and Luke’s snoring sounded like a motor bike race.
