July 14 in Sapa

Graphic nature so please be aware before reading:

Woke up around 830 not feeling very good. I was not ready for the long hike that I had ahead of me. The worst part was that I forgot my pills back at the hotel in Hanoi because I thought 4 days not a problem. Well a big problem. Went to breakfast, and ate some food, but nothing seemed to be staying in. Go in one end out the other. I was sort of debating whether to go because we also were doing a homestay that night. But I couldnt miss this oppurtunity so I met everyone at 930 in the lobby to depart for our adventure.
Started walking and about 20 minutes in, immediately felt pain in the belly and the urge to go. I asked Mah if there was a stop coming up and there was so I ran to the bathroom and of course it was a tourist stop so there was a line. Having to wait a little get to the bathroom to find that there was no TP. Asked around and my German friends gave me some tissue paper. Went back to the bathroom to relieve myself.
Came out of it not feeling any better and once again thought about going back, but luckily the Frecnh couple I was with had some pills and I took them. We started moving again, the weather was beautiful but the scenery was even more so. Trying to take it in the best I could. We stopped at a river where I relaxed some more and took some more of the french pills.
Then we got to a village where I relieved myself again and ate some lunch. I felt a little bit better, so that was good.
We kept moving to get to our homestay. Rice patties everywhere you turned. Just magnficient. After 12Km of trekking we finally arrived at our homestay, whcih looked too nice to be a homestay. I thought we would be sleeping on dirt floors taking showers outside and having asian toilets for bathrooms. Completely opposite, mattresses with mosquito netting around them, 1 shower and toilet. Also there were 12 others staying with us. So after we put our stuff down we went to the river to cool off. By this point my stomach seemed to be doing a lot better.
After the river came back to the house, took a shower and just relaxed as the sun went down. Met people from all over the world. At one time the table was speaking 5 or 6 different languages. People from Spain, Holland, Germany, Switzerland (german lang), USA, and of course the village people. It was very fun and great that English was the language that connected everyone. Had a great dinner with some Happy water. We all just hung out and talked till about 10:30 before I went to bed.

The next morning woke up at 5:30 not feeling very good again. Crazy, when will it end. After about 3 trips to the bathroom finally felt a bit better. Had breakfast took some more pills and then we were off for another 6km hike to the next village. Today scenery seemed like a totally different sapa. We went into the jungle a bit. It was very neat. Would recommend this trip to anyone. We arrive at the village for lunch and my friend phillipp and i decide to climb this 100 ft waterfall. Probably not the best idea, for it was very slippery even on the dry spots. At one point our shoes werent getting enough traction on the rocks. We kept sliding back down. So we had to take off our shoes and socks to get better traction. Thus we finally made it up the waterfall feeling relieved that we didnt die and accomplished something fairly diffiuclt. Came back down using the path that we saw others using and had some lunch. After lunch had to use the Asian toilet. Man, this sucks. Hike for about another 15 minutes hop in a van that took us back to Sapa City. Said thanks to our tour guide who was really great, took showers, and then departed for the train station.
Arrived near the train station where we gave our ticket vouchers to a man that was in a restuarant who then took them elsewhere to return 15 minutes later with our tickets. Very stange.
Got on the train arrived in Hanoi 8 hours later and now righting this blog.

Tonight I head to Hue which is a 12 hour train ride to the center of the country. Goodbye north.