If I even began to tell you about Day 1 of this trip alone you would fall over from the stress of it all! I had fully intended to hibernate at our apartment in Shekou for my 4 days off between trips, but my second day there another tour leader popped up and subsequently introduced me to the Irish bar in the neighborhood! Hibernating was thrown out the window, particularly after I woke up on our couch the next morning, really confused as to how I got there, hehehe. This went on both nights, we had a fantastic time together, and became friends where we hadn't really known eachother before then. Both roll into Hong Kong to start our trips, a little sleep deprived, but could've been worse. The trip I was doing was the CRV... <insert DUN-DUN-DUUUUN music here>. Yes the CRV of Sapa hiking infamy, that I hate. Six of my passengers were coming from a 3 week trip from Beijing, and two more joined us in Hong Kong. As it turned out, the six from Beijing did not like their tour leader and in comparison they were thrilled with me! (I'm not complaining... although I did try to discourage them from trashing her).
**WARNING: The following contains a liberal use of explicatives, given my stress level at the time.**
Day 1.... where to begin.... we were supposed to catch a flight to Guiyang early in the day, but that had already been cancelled several days previously and I'd resceduled us on the afternoon flight. Told the pax to meet at 11:30, show up at 11:30... only 7 pax. Joe's missing. Nobody's seen Joe since last night when he went to party in Hong Kong with a girl from the first trip. Call around, call around, leave a detailed message of where we'll be and how to get there, but right as we're about to take off Joe pops up! He'd been out clubbing til 6am and overslept. Unfortunatly he doesnt know where his party-buddy has gone so everyone's righlty concerned. Call around a little bit more, but eventually I tell my group, "The other leader will take care of her and if anyone is coming with me to Vietnam we need to leave RIGHT NOW!" I'd given us plenty of time before all this hassle, but now we're pushing it. We jump on the metro, have to transfer halfway, where I put us on the metro going the wrong way! (To my credit, I'd not been to this terminal before) Shit. Realize immediately, get off the next stop, turn around, and head off toward the ferry, which is already a tight schedule to make it to our flight. We arrive at the ferry terminal about 20 min before it's supposed to leave. I go to by tickets.. the total is $1800 Hong Kong dollars, I have $1600. Shit. Whip out the Intrepid Visa, bang out the tickets, run through customs and onto the ferry. Whew! In the spirit of positivity I tell the group, "You may not realize but we've got off to a great start today! You've learned to HAUL ASS when you need to, listen to instruction, and stay calm; well done!"
Wait, there's more. We get to the airport at 2:30 for our 4:00 flight. I would've checked in then but I still had to change money and pay for our tickets. Rush rush rush, get all that sorted, only to find at 3:00 that because our original flight was rescheduled we're now leaving from the International terminal, not the Domestic where we're standing. Shit! What do we do? HAUL ASS!! Sounding familiar? Yeah. Mad rush to the check in counter, the poor little girls at the desk go wild trying to get all our bags loaded up and us onto the plane on time, RUN to the boarding gate and squeek onto the plane. Good lord! Again I encourage the group, crack some jokes, make a monster out of my airplane food... (see photo), all the while in the back of my head freaking out that our bags won't arrive. It won't matter how many disasters we avoid, if those bags dont show up they will be pissed and they will blame me. So I stress for 2 hours, we get to Guiyang, wait by the luggage carasel, and much to my relief the bags come down the conveyor belt just like good little bags should, and we are happily on our way! ........ are you stressed yet for me?! And what's worse is on a smaller scale things like that kept happening for the next two days! It was really funny at one point after a crazy bus/boat transfer nearly gone wrong, one of my passengers, Joanne, bless her heart, leans over to me and asks, "Do you ever get stressed on these trips?" :-O !! I love her. Means I was doing something right ;-)
Despite the sheer and utter m-a-d-n-e-s-s of the first few days, overall we had a really reall good time on this trip. These passengers were hilarious, great senses of humor, crazy, and totally fun. At one point we were on the 10 hour bus to Hekou (which became a 12 HOUR and 15 MINUTE BUS!), about half the group had started taking malaria pills that morning so they were even loopier than usual. They got into this thing about the Chinese habit of hacking and spitting and they decided that if there were a Miss China contest the winner would be sweet and prim and would use spitting as her talent! Maybe you had to be there but it was hilarious!
Then there was the hiking. I feel compelled to remind everyone of my hatred of hiking... The Kaili hike went better than expected, mostly because there was a really slow girl at the back that I just had to keep company. Of course she almost passed out at one point going up a big hill, but my response was "We can always get you airlifted out in a helicopter and imagine what great photos you'll get! Better than anyone's!" She appreciated that. The Sapa hike also went better than expected, probably because we took an easier trail because our regular one was flooded out. This one was still quite slippery from the rain and mud though and if anyone will recall my previous issues with b-a-l-a-n-c-e, well they came into play again. Before long I had acquired two sweet little H'mong girls who literally held my hand all the way down the mountain for 3 hours! And one had a baby on her back! Consider me humbled, but it was essential. The following day the group wanted to go to the waterfall two hours away. I fooled myself into thinking I was okay on my own -- I should've known better. The trail was still ridiculously slippery and muddy, I'd already nearly fallen once, when we came upon an inocuous looking bit of the trail. It wasn't a trecherous downhill or a slippery uphill, it was just a skinny bit of the trail between two rice paddies, but somehow my left foot went out from under me and I began to pitch into the paddy 4 ft below me! I went down on my knees and tried to grab onto the grass of the hillside eventually managing to slow down and cling to the side, but my head was lower than my feet and I think I was officially headfirst in a rice paddy!! Good thing all my pax were ahead of me so pretty much no one saw. The guy closest to me says all he heard was, "shit, shit! SHIT!" pause... "I'm alright!" which he found hilarious, hehehe! They pulled me out, covered in mud, and for the next hour+ the local guide, Ding, held me by the hand and guided me to the waterfall, during which time I nearly fell about four more times. W-O-W. you better all be laughing your A$$es off right now! and happy that I share my humiliation with you, hehe. Am I the only one who feels like they can't function like a normal human being in certain situations? Just me? I thought so.
With all the near disasters this trip could've gone horribly wrong, but these pax had great attitudes and we truly had a lot of fun throughout it. I've got some great random pax quotes:
1. To check for fake money in China you scratch the picture of Mao to look for texture, when Misty saw this she commented that it must be "scratch and sniff money"!
2. On a really bumpy bus ride Michelle leaned over to me and whispered that "maybe Intrepid should warn passengers to bring a sports bra for these buses"!
3. "shit, Shit! SHIT!" ..."I'm alright!" :-D hehe, they thought it was funny.
I am SOOO excited right now because I've got a couple days off and tomorrow I'm meeting Maureen in Hong Kong!! Catch you all later! :-)
Currently Reading: The Rice Mother
Current Injury: BESIDES falling into the rice paddy, I also have a burn on my right calf from a motorbike exhaust pipe, yowie
