Dollars to Dong-Bahts

Plant Exploration in Northern Vietnam and Northern Thailand
8/9/2005-9/2/2005

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Friday 8/12/2005

We departed our treehouse villa at 7am and resumed our journey to the west. As we drove, the early morning light rain turned into a downpour. Our driver seemed incredulous when we asked him to stop at an interesting looking site, despite the downpour of rain. Our first stop for the day was a rich-looking forested rock outcrop on the south side of the highway. Donning our rainsuits, we headed out among the trees and stalagmite-looking limestone rock outcrops. It didn't take more than 5 minutes to find my first amorphophallus, the green stemmed A. coaetaneus, followed by light and dark green patterned A. tonkinensis growing nearby.

Nearby were fascinating begonias, including a lovely rhizomatous species with bright red, new leaves. Wade found our first Solomon's seal, a lovely 2.5' tall disporopsis that was growing scattered among the rocks. After a couple of hours of botanizing, we were off again. The first few minutes back in the van were spent peeling off rainsuits and land leeches. These delightful little critters resemble small black slugs and lurk on plants in the forest just waiting for a victim to pass by. They climb aboard and anesthetize you first before beginning to suck your blood. Once they finish, they do have the decency to fall off on their own. There's no pain involved, just the shock of suddenly finding your shirt, sock, or underwear soaked with your own blood and this little creature sometimes still attached to your body. We would become very familiar with leeches over the next two weeks.

After passing the town of Moc Chau, we stopped again, this time at a steep forested bank at 2700', which was adorned with dramatic limestone outcrops. The woody flora here was amazing, consisting of large leaf michelias, litseas, and much more covering the 70 degree sloped bank. The clay hillside was so slick that the only way to climb was to literally pull yourself up the bank by the nearest tree or shrub and hope it didn't give way. As I continued to climb, I found two new amorphophallus. The first resembled A. napalensis, which is not in this area and the second was a dwarf that resembled A. verticillatus. The plant from this site that really stunned me was a 2' wide giant ophiopogon clump with 1" wide leaves.

Our next stop yielded even more species of amorphophallus. One looked like Amorphophallus corrugatus, while another looked like A. yunnanensis. A third resembled A. coaetaneus, but produced leaf bulbils. We concluded that this was most likely A. yuloensis.

We decided to stop for the evening in the town of Son La, but not before botanizing several of the rock outcrops throughout the center of the town to find more of the same amorphophallus species that we had found earlier in the day, plus the ubiquitous lowland Amorphophallus paeonifolius.

We had a little time left before the sunset and we instructed our driver to head north of town. We turned down a dirt road that ended in a rocky hillside. As we parked at the end of the dirt road, Alan was the only one who chose to exit in order to botanize near the van. Once he got out of site, we decided it was best to follow and exited the van, where we were greeted by 2 young Vietnamese boys who wanted to follow these strangers and imitate everything we said. For most of the time, the conversation consisted of 'Hello' and 'My Name is.' When we reached Alan, he was botanizing under a huge clumping bamboo. The kids quickly struck up a conversation with Alan as he came down the slick hill. As he got lower, he slipped and grabbed a tree with a squirrel nest, which frightened Alan as much as it did the squirrels. He let out a loud 'Oh Shit', which was immediately echoed by the two young boys with perfect diction. We didn't know whether to spank them or laugh, but opted for the latter.

While all the commotion was happening with the kids, we noticed that the ground was covered with superb patches of Remusatia pumila (dwarf elephant ear relative) with stunning black and silver marked leaves. Even the boys wanted to help, so they began gathering handfuls of the plants. They were so excited that it was hard to convince them to stop. They followed us back to the van, where Alan rewarded them with a chocolate bar while trying to explain that they needed to share. The part of the message about sharing didn't resonate as we drove away while they fought over the chocolate.

We drove through the town of Son La to find our hotel for the evening. We constantly reminded our driver that we wanted a 3-star hotel for the evening. It became obvious that we still hadn't solved our communication problem. The rooms at the hotel he chose were functional enough except for the lack of air conditioning and beds that made sleeping on the treehouse floor the night before seem soft. The hotel served us dinner, where we discovered that fried chicken means very different things in Vietnam and the US...both the word fried and the quality of a chicken. We were awakened around 4am by the crowing roosters, which as it turned out, was actually a low-end early warning system of an impending electrical blackout that was to follow. At least the day was starting off cloudy and not rainy...we'll see how long before the rains begins.

Saturday 8/13/2005

We stopped at an interesting-looking rock outcrop just north of Son La that turned out to be quite exciting. The 2517' peak contained another disporopsis, several nice patches of rohdea, remusatia, and beautifully patterned Amorphophallus yunnanensis. All were anticipated except the rohdea, which was an exciting surprise.

As we rose in elevation, we stopped again just west of Thuan Chu to find very steep cliffs that were a struggle to climb without sliding backwards. Holding on for dear life, we did manage to find a few treasures including the rare Typhonium hirsutum, several beautiful begonias, and two unidentifiable amorphophallus. The area was covered with a stunning callicarpa that we had seen in flower along our drive earlier in the day. These 10' tall x 15' wide shrubs with large felty grey-green leaves were adorned with large purple flower clusters.

Being out in the middle of nowhere always makes for interesting meal stops. We were getting pretty hungry when our driver spotted a small roadside café. The parking lot was crowded with vehicles, which is always a good sign for a restaurant...so we thought. When we went inside, we found the café filled with some 70-80 uniformed Vietnamese soldiers. Between eating, smoking, and drinking, they seemed curious about their visitors as evidenced by their increased chatter and long stares. They were actually quite friendly, even to the point of inviting us to drink with them and then trying to feel Alan's legs as he stood near their table. Obviously, their drinks had them feeling quite frisky. Each table was only a couple of feet off the ground and each 1' tall chair was something that a 4-year old child would find comfortable. Creature comforts are obviously not a big thing in Vietnam. We finally finished our meal and waved goodbye to our new friends and drove off again to the west.

We continued to gain altitude as we approached the Pha Din Pass, where the plant communities changed and became much richer. When we reached 3500', the fern species here were huge and spectacular. One Pteris-looking fern had 8' long fronds that emerged red. Another short tree fern boasted 14' long fronds. Even shorter ferns like 2' long onychiums and a variety of tongue ferns lined the roadside banks. We also began seeing the pantropical dicranopteris appearing in the fern mix. We returned to the van to find Alan grimacing in pain, as he had wandered through a patch of stinging nettle in short pants...never a good idea. Realizing that everything has a bright side, it dawned on us that there would be more plants for the rest of us if he was unable to continue for the rest of the day.

As we approached 4,500' in elevation, hedychiums replaced the alpinias and zingibers from the lower elevations. Many of the hedychiums exceeded 8' in height and some, including one with purple leaf backs, topped 9' in height. Silvery leaf begonias and amorphophallus were also at the same site.

After we passed the Pha Din Pass, the road conditions from here to Dien Bien Phu deteriorated, becoming more windy and bumpy, reminding me of a poorly built road to Hana, Hawaii. Many of the Vietnamese villages along this road belong to the minority tribes. Women wore colorful outfits, while young children played sans clothes in the vigorously running rivers in the valleys below. The tribe's people were quite curious and whenever we stopped, they gathered around and stared, such as when we made a roadside stop in Tuan Gao to rescue a piece of a red-centered pattern elephant ear.

As we descended toward Dien Bien Phu, we stopped at 2087' to examine a stunning banana species with upright flower spikes of bright reddish pink. The same stop also yielded several more different begonias, including some with bright red petioles and thick red hair on the stems. Not far away, we found another bank of amazing clones of the aroid Colocasia fallax, many with silver and black leaf patterns. We found ourselves conjuring up cultivar names before we even disembarked from the van.

As we closed in on Dien Bien Phu, about 13 km before the hotel, what little traffic there was came to a screeching halt. A landslide had closed the road ahead, but a crane was already on the job, working to remove the piles of dirt and rocks that had slid off the mountain. While we waited, a huge backlog of moped riders and several 4-wheel drive vehicles waited patiently. The backhoe operator obviously didn't finish top in his class, since when he re-opened the road, there were still knee-deep ruts remaining in the rain-soaked red clay road. Our van could only make it about 1/3 of the way across the affected section, before we had to push it backward to try again. We continued to watch as the backhoe operator tried to push one giant boulder from the landslide off the side of the cliff below, but instead he knocked down the nearby power line and nearly sent himself off the cliff. As soon as all the mopeds made their way by, we finally got up enough speed to make it by the landslide and resumed our trek to the hotel.

We requested our driver to stop at the Muong Thanh Hotel that was listed in the Lonely Planet Guide as best in town. I guess the 'best' in town is a relative thing, since this hotel would make a Motel 6 look like a 5-star hotel. The doors to the room couldn't hold a candle to a cheap aluminum storm door, but at least the bed was reasonably soft, and the hotel restaurant was actually quite nice.