Travel Nirvana: Sublime Sapa

With all the travel travails that characterized my first day in Sapa, the title of this post (Nirvana? Where?) may seem at this point like a misnomer, and you may be wondering exactly when I stepped through that proverbial looking glass. But as things are wont to do when traveling, heaven followed hell, sunshine followed rain, exuberance obliterated disappointment. Today set a new gold standard for travel adventure. It might have been the Black Hmoung boy who asked to sing for me in his native dialect, but who first clarifying that it was a gift, he wanted no money. (He refused even a foil-packeted "egg cookie". Um...yum?) It might have been the spectacular mountain vistas, our stream forges, the suspended bridges, the red-clay earth, brilliant green terraced rice paddies. It might have been the water buffaloes to which I yielded path. (Tuan: "Watch please; water buffalo poop here, yes, okay.") The chicken and noodle soup that Tuan cooked at a way station along the trail? It might have been the bamboo trekking pole he carved for me or the bamboo forests through which we climbed. Perhaps it was the enormous butterflies--blues and oranges and yellows. Was it the pack-basketed villagers in distinctive native dress? The toothless woman whose smile was bigger even than her humongous earrings? Was it the local dance festival? It was all of these things, and more, a perfect storm of sights and smells and sounds and sixth-sense experiences create travel nirvana. h, now I remember--this is why I travel!

Here's what indigo dye looks like, dripped on a path: ;)


Day 2's trek and the evening's entertainment: