I explore the island today.
I get up much later than I've been doing for the last couple of weeks - about 9am. I rent a motorbike for the day, leaving my drivers license as security. There's a little confrontation when it comes to how much petrol I get (what I was told and what I was given appear to show mild discrepancy) but it adds up to about a pound so for the easy life I let it slide.
I haven't been on the bike for too long when I realise it is a clapped-out Chinese piece of shit. Still, I'm committed now, for better or worse. [SPOILER: It turns out worse]. The gears are hard to change, the speedo and fuel guage don't work, and the mirrors won't adjust. I manage to put a crack in one trying to move it into a position where I can actually see the road behind me. I decide to worry about that later.
I find the harbour and rent a kayak for a few hours. I paddle around the Halong Bay, stopping off at first a populated beach, and later a completely deserted one. I need to take frequent breaks -I haven't kayaked for years, and I'm moving reasonably respectable distances. Once on the empty beach I do what I think any sane person would do in such a situation - strip down to my boxers (well, my clothes are drenched in sea and sweat), write I WAS HERE in huge letters in the sand, then stand a rock and scream as loud as I can, just to see how loud that is (I was satisfied, especially as the curved rock formation behind me added an echo).
Paddling back to harbour and picking my bike up, I start motoring North. I stop at a cave which used to house a hospital during the war. There are three storeys inside, meeting rooms, wards and even a cinema room and a swimming pool. Continuing North I stop for lunch. The Pho (noodle soup) is fantastic, and as I'm in a fairly remote spot, I'm hopeful it won't cost the earth. Not a chance - they see Touristy McTourist come a mile off and double the price. I have no choice as I've already eaten. Bastards.
At the most northern point some onlookers are quick to point out my bike's flat front tyre. I have no idea how long that had been there. They ask for a few dollars to fix it - not seeing an alternative I stump up. To their credit the onlookers do, I think, about the best job they can. They nip off to the village and are back with a repair kit nice and quckly. However, the flat tyre is caused by a hole between the valve and the body of the inner tube, which is too complicated for a quick fix. Compounding matters is the fact I have no money left.
A bit of back-and-forth results in me paying for a lift back to the town where the ATM is, before hopping into the rent shop to moan at the bike's owner. I am envisioning all kinds of problems here - him blaming me, refusing to return my license and so on. I feel I have two cards up my sleeve. The first is the guy who gave me a lift back, who can explain in Vietnamese what the problem is. I kept him sweet by paying over the odds for the journey. The second is that I have the bike keys on me as a hostage, if necessary.
Luckily it doesn't come to that. I get back my license and even a token refund. It's a shame - up until the tyre business, and despite the general shoddyness of the bike itself, it was still very fun to take the mountainous roads over the island. Still, I've had enough of this place now, so buy my onward ticket and head out for my last island night. I talk to a Vietnamese woman who is here with her two kids. Her young boy misbehaves constantly. My immunities to the so-called "charms" of children receive their booster shot.
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