In my 21 September posting on staying in a factory town, I stated that we were staying in the homes of local friends of Hien's, or friends of friends. Until now. As we head down into Vietnam, we have run out of friends -- partly because Hien is Chinese although she was born and raised in Vietnam -- all of her friends are Chinese who have family or friends in China.
For our resort visit to Yangshuo, though, we stayed in a hotel for US$10 per night and I thought It was quite a nice place with a balcony. I will have a separate posting on this event with a lot of pictures attached.
Now that we are in transit, we are testing the boundaries of what a typical American might look for in lodging. Hien and I have been having this running argument over the years -- I am spoiled by business travel, and Hien loves "backpacker" travel a la Lonely Planet guides. On this trip, I am letting her have her way in the interest of seeing if I can learn anything new.
Our first test was in Nanning, China. We took a five-hour bus ride from Guilin to Nanning where we transfered to a train to the China-Vietnam border. Since the border closes at 4:30 p.m. and we did not have time to make it that day, we needed to spend the night. The Lonely Planet Guide to Southern China recommended the hotel across from the train station as the cheapest clean friendly hotel available for "backpackers", so that is where we stayed -- the Ying Bing Hotel.
The bathroom was a combination toilet, wash sink, and shower all in one. This is evidently fairly typical -- this was the situation at the last friend's place we stayed at in Guilin, and it has been this way in every place we have stayed thus far in Vietnam. Since we were to stay in Nanning only for eight hours -- enough to get a night's rest and shower in the morning -- US$9 per night for a double room was a very good deal -- comparable to a Hotel 6 room in the U.S., only larger. It was clean even though it lacked character. It even had all the usual toiletry amenities. Three or four-star hotels in the neighborhood ran around US$50 per night.
Now on to Hanoi -- I was hoping for an upgrade to something in the $20 per night range. But no -- we looked at several different places to find the cheapest -- most of the hotels in the Old Quarter of Hanoi rent rooms at $8 to $10 for the night for a rather spartan environment that is usually clean and serviceable. Bring your own soap, though.
