Alix says:
We headed southwest of Hanoi 3 hours via local bus for 50,000 dong ($3) to this quaint area made up of a few little villages amidst rice fields between the looming mountains close-ish to the Laos border – our destination. We had thought about going to the famed Sapa far north of Hanoi, but chose against it after hearing about how touristy it had become and our like-minded couchsurfing host Cameron strongly urged Mai Chau for being similar in sight but much lass traveled. And that it was.

On the awesome twisty, turvey bus ride we met a traveling Swede, Alex, and his 5 year old son Adam. They were also headed to Laos via Mai Chau so we joined forces. We got into town after dark which always makes for a cluster-fuck finding your place to stay. Some dudes offered us free motorbike rides if we went to house #1. All the homestays are numbers, Cameron had told us #9, Alex was recommended #19….who knows what to do with these numbers. So we went to #1 where we were greeted by the beautiful prego wife, her husband, 8 year old daughter and about 10 local guys sitting on the first floor around a huge pot of stew surrounded by plates of meat, herbs, veggies and tofu and they invited us to join them for dinner sitting on a woven mat slamming shots of rice wine! We ate a delicious, fresh meal with them, drank tons of rice wine, talked as much as we could with the language barrier (thankfully Alex speaks some Thai, having lived there, and these are Thai minority villages), and once the local men left myself, Colin, Alex, Adam, prego wife and her daughter played some cards via headlamp since the generator had turned off. It got so fantastically dark here, crickets were a symphony outside! Colin and Alex went out to take some long exposure tripod photos and I played with Adam on the dark road marveling at huge snails and catching glow bugs.

That night we slept upstairs, the family downstairs, on mattresses with mosquito nets in one of the darkest, quietest nights out in the country I can recall since the islands of Thailand. Then we awoke promptly at 6am to mindblowing construction next door – they are building a new house. Something one fails to notice when you are dropped off in pitch blackness! I did some Tiger Balm and drank some instant coffee trying not to notice the chainsaw and looking forward to finding a new home, something we all agreed on being first priority.