the long road to Vietnam

The 10 hours bus ride from Kunming to Hekou turn into 15.5 hours of stops due to landslides or waiting for bulldozer to clear a path around a tilled/stuck truck. The bus itself is like a regular bus except there are no seats and is fitted with twenty some beds (top and down) and with people's packages packed into every inches of remaining spaces!

It was a unique experience, that one should do once and never repeat it again!

Coming down from 6600 feet to almost sea level, we can feel the humidity as soon as we're at the border.

There were couple other foreingers on the bus, we exited China and walked cross the border into Vietnam together. The exit of China was slow and painful. It took us probly over half hour to get over and then on Vietnam side another 20 plus minutes. We all happy to leave China behind. The border official has problem with spelling of Germany and also had problem with Ireland where he insist it is Finland. I guess they don't hanve much English training.

After we exchanged some Vietnamese Dong, we all become multi-millionaire instantly!
1 US$ = 15902 Dongs. Then we had lunch at a local place and promptly being cheated with 3 dollars nasty looking chicken.

The Irishman and I parted company with the German guy (he is heading to Hanoi) and we boarded a bus for Sapa in hills (4800 feet), our first real stop in Vietnam.