A major climb in a very scenic area…a 3800′ climb in about 25k, with some breathtaking views that the photos just don’t do justice to the actual experience!

We had a home visit on the way, a friend of Phong’s; in a Meo village. These people have been in VN since 1700’s, originally from south China. Communal land, farming village now. His friend is the 70 yr old patriarch. Brief history, French were colonizers of Indochina and really organized Lao, Cambodia, VN into a cohesive region. They started squeezing people for taxes eventually after establishing a cash economy vs rice/food agrarian economy. By mid 40’s, Japanese invaded area and plowed under fields for industrial production, leading to famine where 2million people died in VN. Again, china invaded 1975-85 and VN army fought them back.

Road construction in a very traditional way is occurring just uphill from our hotel and traffic is backed up a long ways, now everyone is honking in unison!

We are in Quan Ba, getting closer to China. Dinner, dice game, bed…