National Park Tour

We left nice and early Wednesday morning for an overnight tour of Cuc Phuong National Park and Ninh Binh Province. I had booked this tour (and our Halong Bay trip) through Private Asia Tours and we were able to see some really neat stuff as there was so much packed into 2 days.

First stop was the Endangered Primate Rescue Centre.
 
 The researchers here rescue monkeys, langurs, and gibbons from the illegal wildlife trade. Many of these animals are near extinction. They are rescued and researched and hopefully make a family (many are living alone in captivity - not helping the population).
 
Then they live in the microhabitat to learn to flee from hunters and other dangers and how to forage for food on their own, before being placed back in the wild. It is an amazing program, and the kids liked seeing all the monkeys (Tasi pretty much shouted 'MONKEY' for the whole time we were there!)

After lunch outside

 
We hiked to The Cave of Prehistoric Man.
 
In the picture you can kind of make out the 3 tombs containing remains of prehistoric men dating about 7500 years ago.

 
My family enjoyed exploring and testing out the echos!

At the next stop Tasi was pretty tired so Don and Koa went on a short walk before deciding to stop and make a few dams.

 
As I said, Tas was pretty tired and in the car she got the sillies :)

Don and I enjoyed the views of the countryside as the kids napped on the drive to Ninh Binh. We checked out the local market and Tasi liked the crabs. The picture isn't good, but the stallholder put a crab in a little bag so Tas could get a better look - she like that until it moved!
 
My kids have found new ways to entertain themselves at restaurants. You didn't expect them to be well behaved ALL of the time did you!

Here is Tas at the hotel.

No she hasn't grown that much - this is the door to the room where the drivers and tour guides sleep, and I am glad I saw it with the door open so I could see that it had 2 steps down once inside. It reminded me of the half floor in that movie - maybe from Being John Malkovich.

Anyway, back to our tour and after a short drive we got on a boat to see the Tam Coc caves.
  
The four of us were on the boat, along with a father-daughter rower-guide team. A lot of other rowers were teasing ours because he had so many people - apparently 4 Vietnamese are allowed, or 2 foreigners, or 1 American!! Ha ha, poor rowers!

We saw some beautiful scenery.
 
Rowed through three caves.

And saw a laundry line in the most unexpected place.
 
After lunch we boarded another boat on the Hoang Long River. At the dock Makoa let me take a series of photos of him and this rock!
 
The kids were snuggled up with me.

So Don pretended he was on a boat on a holiday all by himself, until I was talking to him and taking his photo that is!

I thought of my dad when I saw this lady irrigating her pastures, glad this isn't the way we had to do things at our house!

And I am assuming she got here by bicycle.

The scenery was again breathtaking. We visited a fishing village and we impressed with the concrete boats.


It was a lovely trip and it was nice to explore the countryside and national parks.

Budget:
Tour: $360
Tip: $31
Extras: $30
Accommodation (Thurs) - $124
Dinner in Hanoi - $27