Cat Cat and the tribal people.....

                                    Awoke 7,00am and enjoyed Skype time with the family until the frustration of dropped lines called an end. Consumed my supermarket purchased repast and after some obligatory housekeeping chores, exited onto the streets of Sapa to locate the "Ben Xe"---yes, Vietnamese for bus

station. I am sure that Ben Xe will ring my ears many times over the next few weeks. Wanted to settle schedule & ticket price etc for the next leg of the journey, which is the stretch across the north of Vietnam  before turning south. The next 'large" town is Dien Bien Phu, fully 12 hours in a minibus, across whole mountain ranges---ie on very twisty roads, I settled for splitting the journey into an 8 hours leg as far as Muong Lay. Muong can't be a very big place as it does not even register in the hotel search sites---we shall see.
                 Onward bus travel taken care of & time to get up close & personal with the tribal people in the region. Was told that there is a

tribal village a few kilometres down in the valley that rejoices in the name of Cat Cat, After grabbing a quick lunch, hopped on the back of the ubiquitous motor scooter taxi and was shortly deposited in Cat Cat. A $3 toll paid and I had freedom to stroll and photograph the village pathways and alley ways strung out on the hillside. The tribal people survive on tourism it seems almost 100% and are skilled in extracting money almost for the air that tourist have to breath. It was fun and quaint but had the strong sensation that what I was seeing was rather stylised and theatre, it did however afford vantage points for seeing some magnificent views of the  valleys. The rice harvest is just coming in from the contoured fields and I saw worker groups flailing the rice plant to separate the rice from the chaff. Hard work, but probably bearable in the cooler temperature that prevail at these higher altitudes.
              A plaque in Sapa today that explained that the town enjoys four climates each day----foggy mornings, warm, sunny mid-days, rain in the late afternoon and chilly nights.