Day 146 – Sapa to Dien Bien Phu

Travelling to the edge of Vietnam

Today we checked out of Sapa Romance Hotel and said goodbye to the friendly Anna and her family. We have bought a bus ticket from Sapa to Dien Bien Phu, from the hotel that cost us 350,000 VND / $21.35 AUD per person. A ute came and picked us up in the morning before dropping us off less than 5 minutes away.

Here we waited for another van to arrive. Once it came, it was full of locals, and goods. There was just enough room for us. The locals were friendly but spoke no English. One of them was asking me questions about my Fitbit, but besides showing him how it worked, I couldn’t understand his questions.

The views from the roads were amazing. The entire area is full of mountains and after a while we were following a large river. Out of all the travelling we have been doing in sleeper buses, I preferred today’s van ride.

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There was a stop for lunch along the way, which was a house converted into a restaurant. It was a very local experience and the food was tasty. There were two other tourists on the bus, who kept to themselves and didn’t eat the food, but we ate the food at every stop throughout the country and didn’t regret it once.

We arrived at the Dien Bien Phu bus stop in the afternoon, and should have looked at the departure bus times for Laos, but we went straight to our hotel, Phuong Nam Hotel which was a 20 minute walk into the city with our back packs. Once we settled in, the hotel was no help with the bus times, as they just told us where the bus stop is. We then walked back down towards the bus stop and booked a bus to Laos for tomorrow.

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There are some war time monuments to see in Dien Bien Phu, but we didn’t go to any, due to my wife still recovering from the flu.