Spending the Day in Ninh Bình
Hanoi is a great city. It’s always bustling and loud and crazy, but after awhile I feel like I need to get out of the city and go somewhere else for the weekend, or even just a day. There are trees in Hanoi, and parks, but they can never escape the pollution, and I miss the smell of fresh grass and real air after a few weeks.
So today, my friends and I decided to do a little day trip to Ninh Bình, a province about two hours north of Hanoi in the Red River Delta region. So far during my trip, I’ve only travelled to the North of Vietnam, and haven’t experienced the south yet, although I’ll be doing that next weekend. But I love the North, with the rolling hills and mountains and rivers running through them. This will be my first time in Ninh Bình, and I’m really excited to see it.
Hanoi, where I live, and North Vietnam, has four seasons, and right now it’s “winter”, as the Vietnamese like to call it. To me this is autumn, and some days even summer. Some days it can go as low as 13 degrees, which doesn’t seem like it would be cold, and it’s not really, except when you’re driving a motorbike. Then, I’m wearing a full on winter parka, mitts, and a scarf. But today, the weather is perfect. It’s about 20 degrees and cloudy.
On the drive up to Ninh Binh, we stop at a little shop on the side of the road. They sell paintings, purses, and other little souvenirs that are all handmade by ethnic minority groups in Vietnam. They are all really beautiful. The paintings are usually of traditional village life, and the textiles are always so vibrant.
Our first stop of the day is Bai Dinh Pagoda, which is the largest Pagoda in Vietnam. I like visiting Buddhist temples, and even though I’m not Buddhist, I always feel a sense of peace and calmness when I’m inside. What was special about this Pagoda was that it housed the largest Buddha statue in Southeast Asia, which is pretty impressive if you ask me. Kinda cool to be able to say that I’ve seen that. I believe it also houses the largest Lady Buddha statue in Southeast Asia as well. This Pagoda was especially pretty because it was nestled in the mountains, and you could see the river in the distance. Although most of the population in Vietnam doesn’t have a religion because they worship their ancestors instead, there is still a large number of people that are Buddhist, and Buddhist temples are everywhere, in Hanoi as well.
After the Pagoda, we stopped at a restaurant for lunch. And even better, it was a buffet. I ordered a mango smoothie to drink (I’m pretty sure Vietnam has the best fruit smoothies in the world, especially mango), and chose the large sized plate (there were two sizes) and filled it up twice.
I don’t know whose idea this was, but right after we inhaled our buffet lunch, we were to go biking. This was my favourite part of the day though. I’ve been biking a few times while I’ve travelled in Northern Vietnam, and it’s always one of my favourite things to do. There’s nothing more peaceful than cruising through the small little villages with the mountains and rivers surrounding us. You can hear the birds chirping and crickets cricketing, and it’s such a change from the craziness that is Hanoi. I’m always present in these moments, and can’t keep the smile off of my face. I always want to spend more time biking and exploring to really take everything in, but after about an hour of biking, we moved on to our next adventure of the day, which was taking a little rowboat down the river.
There was a little lady who was rowing our boat, who actually happened to be a beast, but we still felt bad for letting her do all the rowing, so we joined in as well. We made it into a race with the boat next to us, mostly because we wanted to make it to the cave first, so we didn’t have to see another boat in front of us. When we made it to the cave, I was in awe. I’d never seen anything like it. This cave was long and thin and narrow, and the rock formations were hanging so low above us that we pretty much had to hit the deck to avoid hitting our heads. This cave is completely natural, with the only human addition being a few rickety lights hanging above us. There were also 20 million bats flying all around us.
When we emerged from the cave, I was once again blown away by the sheer beauty of Vietnam. Everything is so green and lush and magical. On our rowing trip, we also stopped at Kong Island, which was the film set for Kong: Skull Island, which I thought was pretty cool, even though I’ve never seen the movie and don’t really have any interest to.
After our rowing trip, we were going to be heading home.
Overall, Ninh Binh was gorgeous just like every other Northern province I’ve visited in Vietnam. I’m excited to travel to South Vietnam in the next few months, where I’ll be visiting Nha Trang, Ho Chi Minh City, and Phu Quoc. I’ve heard that the North is completely different than the South, so it will be interesting to see the contrasts.
