a walk in the park
yesterday woke to the sounds of birds. and nothing else. maybe the putterings of the national park staffer in the house next door, or leaves rustling. a bug crawling. however, there were no honking horns, no recorded sounds, no cacophony of people and motors. i spent the night at cuc phuong national park, about an hour and a half from ninh binh, where i've spent the last few days. ninh binh is nothing to write home about (except in passing on one's blog), but the surrounding landscape is beautiful and lacks too many tourists. and the national park: bliss.
not only was the drive there utterly loverly - my driver was a sweet 25-year-old who pointed out pineapple fields, and honked while driving only when necessary, what a concept - but picturesque. the low-key highway, bordered on both sides by these stunning karst rock formations topped with green growing things, soon disappeared when we turned onto a dirt road at a big roadside market, and then we went from dusty small town to fields and villages. over the sound of our own motor was the occasional passing motorbike or bicycle, and i just sat on the back of the bike remembering the things i really really love about vietnam and don't get enough of. people who don't see too many tourists. little kids goggling and smiling. goats standing on steep, rocky slopes. and stunning landscape all around.
we drove up through fog and cold, and after a visit to this amazing endangered primate rescue center, we drove into the center of the park. cuc phuong is the oldest national park in vietnam, dedicated personally by ho chi minh with some homily about preservation of the forest being important because it's a treasure of vietnam that will preserve productivity. (not to diss uncle ho, gods forbid.) now i was the one staring agog at this quiet, peaceful, green oasis that actually does exist in vietnam with no circus atmosphere attached. we arrived at this cold-water, basic guesthouse in the middle of the park, and after i'd gotten some vegetarian meals pre-ordered, i practically skipped down the first trail i could find, so dizzy and high had i gotten from this clean, plant-respirated air. my god, there were butterflies! FLYING AROUND! not attached with pushpins to a framed cotton backing!
i hiked for 3 & 1/2 hours and got the sweat flowing and the blood pumping. they were decent hikes, with lots of climbs and dropoffs next to the path; and the loop trail led to a thousand-year-old tree. it was such a wonderful novelty to hear nothing but the sound of my own breath and footfall, of water droplets landing on damp leaf litter, of syncopated and varied bird calls. and sometime during these hours, the fog lifted from over the trees and the sun shone through. i have not seen the sun in a couple of weeks, my friends, and it was like a drug. i was like a girl scout who'd gobbled a few too many thin mints, such was my joy. after looping loopily back to the guesthouse area, i lay down on the cement steps of a nearby ghost-town meeting hall and dried out. soaking up sun like a lizard.
and the next day i actually ran for half an hour, something i have not done for many moons. and to have clean air in my face, not another soul on the park road, just running, almost made me fall down in happiness. or uncoordination. (actually, walking down that same road the night before, with only my mini-maglite and a sparse few fireflies, i almost did fall down in the no-electricity, jungly dark. that was a long, 1/2 kilometer walk. i thought a lot about ghosts.)
so i didn't want to leave, but having lain in the sun for a couple of hours, and dosed my bloodstream with fresh oxygen, and made my body nice and sore, it was OK because it'll last me the short while before i have to leave the country. my fresh-faced driver came back to pick me up, and the transition to the city - which is a small, mellow one to start with - was gradual. from the national park, he took us a different way, through more karst mountains with fields of sugarcane at their bases. trowels and hoes making metallic clinks hitting damp dirt clods, wooden cow bell, the creak of a bicycle. leaves of rustling gum trees, chickens clucking, the low growls and gentle thrashings of puppies wrestling in the dirt.
and then from villages to town, from town to highway, from highway to city. but the noise fatigue i was suffering has been eased, and my blood rejuvenated.
not only was the drive there utterly loverly - my driver was a sweet 25-year-old who pointed out pineapple fields, and honked while driving only when necessary, what a concept - but picturesque. the low-key highway, bordered on both sides by these stunning karst rock formations topped with green growing things, soon disappeared when we turned onto a dirt road at a big roadside market, and then we went from dusty small town to fields and villages. over the sound of our own motor was the occasional passing motorbike or bicycle, and i just sat on the back of the bike remembering the things i really really love about vietnam and don't get enough of. people who don't see too many tourists. little kids goggling and smiling. goats standing on steep, rocky slopes. and stunning landscape all around.
we drove up through fog and cold, and after a visit to this amazing endangered primate rescue center, we drove into the center of the park. cuc phuong is the oldest national park in vietnam, dedicated personally by ho chi minh with some homily about preservation of the forest being important because it's a treasure of vietnam that will preserve productivity. (not to diss uncle ho, gods forbid.) now i was the one staring agog at this quiet, peaceful, green oasis that actually does exist in vietnam with no circus atmosphere attached. we arrived at this cold-water, basic guesthouse in the middle of the park, and after i'd gotten some vegetarian meals pre-ordered, i practically skipped down the first trail i could find, so dizzy and high had i gotten from this clean, plant-respirated air. my god, there were butterflies! FLYING AROUND! not attached with pushpins to a framed cotton backing!
i hiked for 3 & 1/2 hours and got the sweat flowing and the blood pumping. they were decent hikes, with lots of climbs and dropoffs next to the path; and the loop trail led to a thousand-year-old tree. it was such a wonderful novelty to hear nothing but the sound of my own breath and footfall, of water droplets landing on damp leaf litter, of syncopated and varied bird calls. and sometime during these hours, the fog lifted from over the trees and the sun shone through. i have not seen the sun in a couple of weeks, my friends, and it was like a drug. i was like a girl scout who'd gobbled a few too many thin mints, such was my joy. after looping loopily back to the guesthouse area, i lay down on the cement steps of a nearby ghost-town meeting hall and dried out. soaking up sun like a lizard.
and the next day i actually ran for half an hour, something i have not done for many moons. and to have clean air in my face, not another soul on the park road, just running, almost made me fall down in happiness. or uncoordination. (actually, walking down that same road the night before, with only my mini-maglite and a sparse few fireflies, i almost did fall down in the no-electricity, jungly dark. that was a long, 1/2 kilometer walk. i thought a lot about ghosts.)
so i didn't want to leave, but having lain in the sun for a couple of hours, and dosed my bloodstream with fresh oxygen, and made my body nice and sore, it was OK because it'll last me the short while before i have to leave the country. my fresh-faced driver came back to pick me up, and the transition to the city - which is a small, mellow one to start with - was gradual. from the national park, he took us a different way, through more karst mountains with fields of sugarcane at their bases. trowels and hoes making metallic clinks hitting damp dirt clods, wooden cow bell, the creak of a bicycle. leaves of rustling gum trees, chickens clucking, the low growls and gentle thrashings of puppies wrestling in the dirt.
and then from villages to town, from town to highway, from highway to city. but the noise fatigue i was suffering has been eased, and my blood rejuvenated.
posted by a wandering eye at 7:23 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home