Hanoi to Sapa……north to the highlands and “ascent” of Mt. Fanispan

November 18th

We are up bright and early for a 07:00 departure to Sapa…The road covers 315 kilometres and at Lao Cai almost touches the China border. The journey will take roughly 5.5 hours and hopefully, the driver will not be too crazy. Everything we have read points to a certain level of insanity on the part of Vietnamese drivers…. we shall see!! 

Sunny morning in Hanoi and our ride arrives on time. We booked with Amazing Uncles (you have to love these names) and are travelling with Eco Sapa Limousine. An 8-person van with 5 on-board counting us. This is the nicest van we have used to date…totally pimped out: mirrors and lights on the ceiling and sides with ultra cushy bucket seats and wifi which let me do a bit of picture culling ….the driver hands us a “goody bag” with a croissant and a bottle of water and away we go…

Excellent highway, nice views of agricultural land crisscrossed by rivers and creeks…looks quite productive and almost affluent….pics are through the van window…

The man drives SEDATELY, there are 2 pit stops en route> both very clean with nice-looking food, although we are not hungry…

After about 200 kilometers we start to rise and the terrain becomes more rugged as well the weather becomes overcast with light rain. Just before the Chinese border, we reach the turnoff for Sapa, where the road gets more serious….the next 25 kilometres are a twisty, turny, series of switchbacks …..narrow and congested ideal for passing on blind corners…our driver is good and times these moments perfectly …..by 13:00 we are in Sapa and check-in to the My Boutique Hotel & Spa. They take pity on us, as we apparently had booked a windowless room and upgrade us to a bigger/nicer room but we have to wait until it is cleaned.

Have lunch next door at the Morning View Restaurant (pretty good), get sorted out at the hotel and head out to the town-site to check things out ……

Sapa is a total mess > one gigantic construction zone: hotels, restaurants etc, plus infrastructure going in …mud, broken concrete craters  > yikes. I guess the goal is to create a mountain destination resort area but it will take some time…although some of it is taking shape…

We decided to stay close to the hotel for dinner > Little Vietnam (okay but not great) then head back as it has been a long day and tomorrow should be busy….

 

November 19th

The morning breaks foggy and drizzly, not what we were hoping for……after dithering for an hour or so we suck it up, gear up and head for the funicular/cable car station.

Mt. Fanispan is 3,143 meters high and while you can hike up, it involves hiring a guide and spending a night on the mountain. We opt for the easier option. A Vietnamese company, Sunworld has built a state-of-the-art facility here which links the Sapa townsite via funicular to the cable car site which in turn rises almost to the summit ….from there, you have the option of climbing 630 stairs via a series of shrines and statues to the summit, or, taking a second funicular to the summit…we chose to climb the last section.

Clearly this is the impetus for creating Sapa as a mountain destination (to date it has been a trekking center mostly focused on Westerners). The first step is to take the funicular:

Within about 10 minutes we arrive at the cable car station….

…and then onwards to the departure hall which has been built to process thousands of visitors, today the weather has reduced the crowds to us and a few other hardy souls…

As we depart we note that the cable car system was built in 2016 by the Doppelmayr/Garaventa Group, the premier builder of ski lifts in the world …..whew! It is also the world’s longest three-wire cable car at 6,292 meters…

….this is one serious piece of engineering….a few breaks in the clouds afford us some views….

At the top however we are unable to mind-link with the skykeepers to bring some blue sky…so off we go into a veritable whiteout (no worries we are dressed for the occasion) …. suffice to say there are no crowds here today. Nevertheless, it is quite exotic, especially with shrines en route and the intermittent sound of gongs…

The “path” is seriously steep and reminds us of when we were climbing the Great Wall of China, solid rock steps to the top, the work/cost involved must have been outrageous…

 

 

..and through the door into the Buddha, you find a relic guarded by a Vietnamese naval officer in full dress uniform (pics not permitted)…

While the weather was sub-optimal we were glad,” we had paid our monies and taken our chances”, an early dinner as tomorrow we embark on another interesting day….