Hanoi to Haiphong

Sat 23/11/13     110km

Up early and with a forecast of rain. And me without a waterproof (seriously). Had a very large breakfast and was on the road shortly after 8AM.

Having got some reasonable maps and having asked around it looked like my best bet was to cross the Red River at Long Bien as this is foot and bike traffic only, then shadow Highway Five along roads running along the railway track. Long Bien bridge is a box girder affair constructed by the French between 1899 and 1903 as a railway bridge. Apparently it played quite a key role logistically during the American War being repeatedly bombed to little long term affect. Getting to the bridge was OK, with the traffic not being too insane and the day I've cat but not raining.

After the bridge finding my roads wasn't too difficult (offline Google Maps and GPS helped) and I cycled merrily away starting in an industrial zone which gradually became progressively more rural, albeit with artisan brick factories studding the landscape at first. As it got steadily more rural so the number of people saying "Hello!" went up... when I went past a school with the kids on parade in the playground I was half expecting a literal explosion to take place. The road gradually narrowed and then became a dirt track. Delightful though this was I diverted onto a main road at the next small town and continued on until Hai Duong. Originally this had been my "bail out" point if I was having problems as it was about half way and contains a decent selection of hotels. However, as the cycling was going well I decided to press on.

Unfortunately at this point it became apparent I was going to have to at least a brief stretch on Highway Five. Now, points in it's favour are there's a hard shoulder for scooters and bicycles, and the drivers on it are used to two wheeled traffic. Points against are there a lot of really LARGE fast trucks, sometimes the hard shoulder is blocked so one has to swing out into the main traffic and on this occasion it was starting to chuck it down. When smoke started to drift across the road from rice stubble being burnt (how they kept it going in that weather is a mystery) I just stopped the bike and laughed. Seriously? Heavy traffic, rain and now smoke?! Luckily it was a scant couple of kilometres from here I found a turning that dropped me back on country roads. Soon after the rain eased and I was happy again...

Haiphong was OK, found a hotel without any problems although it was nothing to write home about (blogs don't count). Having said that I met another cyclist who'd come down from Hanoi, albeit following the Highway all the way. Thank goodness for maps is all I'll say, didn't envy him one bit.

Today's photo is from a coffee break.