It had been 3 years since I last found myself on two wheels in the mountains of Northern Vietnam, so needless to say, it was overdue time to get back. A few weeks ago, I set out on an epic week long road trip through Ha Giang And Cao Bang Provinces in the rugged North with my friend Lee Starnes. Being a quite unique year to say the least, one of the few benefits of the borders remaining closed was that we had the place almost to ourselves. Come along with me on a little journey through one of the most beautiful parts of the world…

Upon pulling out of Ha Giang City, the sweeping views begin, and never ever relented. While you’ve gotta focus on the road and not getting taken out by a truck around every turn, there’s always a side eye on the view, looking for the really good stuff. Here are a few times it worth pulling the bikes over for a few clicks.

While the views are always stunning, I’m still not a landscape photographer, and probably never will be. I always need some humanity in my frames for it to speak to me. These are a few of the friendly encounters we had with the local inhabitants along the way.

Pardon the inside joke 🙂 Heo means pig in Vietnamese, and some enterprising youthful minds have turned it into a funny English expression i.e, “What The Heo?”

Anyway, I digress. Here’s a short story:

I saw a guy with a big ass alive pig strapped to the back of his bike. I thought it may make an interesting photo, so I stopped my bike and walked over to click a shot. The next thing I know, the whole kit and caboodle went toppling over and the driver went flying off! Another guy approached just as this happened, and both he and the driver looked on in confusion about how they were going to remedy this situation. I stood by, shooting a few more frames, and thought maybe I could help somehow, but I sure wasn’t going to grab that pig! I offered to hold the motorbike and stood there for about 10 minutes trying to oblige my obligation, but that’s as far as I was going to go. Anyway, long story short, they got the pig loose and the bike upright again, and then tried to figure out how they were going to get the pig back on the bike. It didn’t look like they were gonna be able lift it themselves, and again, I sure wasn’t going to grab that pig!  About this time, another guy pulled on a bike, and I took that as my cue that they had help, and someone who probably knew alot more than me about a situation likes this, and I was going to move on!

Typically the goal of a trip to the mountains in the fall is to catch the rice harvest season, From September to October, which finds the fields at their most beautiful stage of golden yellow and the most activity as everyone is out working. Being the second week of October already, we were a bit late this year, and seemed to miss most of it we thought. But upon arriving in a small village in Cao Bang where we put up at an awesome home stay for the night, there was the most perfect patch of rice,  light and mountains literally right outside our doorstep!

Having finished the light, dinner and a few beers on the porch, we walked outside, and the sky was crystal clear and seeming with stars. Not a view you get in the city very often! So it was time to try a bit of starry night photography (with the tripod that I had been carrying all along but knew I’d rarely use!)

Stay tuned for the next post coming soon with a few more images and stories…