Weather forecast: Mostly cloudy, hot and humid. Temperature 26c / 79f to 35c / 95f

Handicraft villages day tour visiting three villages which each specialise in making one product. Quang Phu Cau village incense: Chuong village conical hats: Ha Thai village lacquer.

We had a wonderful day out visiting the three villages. The first one we went to was Ha Thai village where they specialise in making lacquer products. We visited the workshop of an artist who produces lacquer paintings that sell internationally for high prices. We were shown the process which he goes through to produce his work and were given a chance to produce our own lacquer artwork. To see the reults look at the photos in our Vietnam Flickr albium which you get to by clicking on the Flickr logo on the left hand side of the front page of the blog.

We then visited Chuong Village. Most of the villagers work in the fields. But to earn extra money maney of the women make conical hats. We watched while a 71 year old lady sat on the floor and built a hat. We were then given our own hats to paint. See our Flickr pictures for the result. We were also given a very nice lunch by one of the villagers.

Our last visit was to Quang Phu Cau village which specialises in making incence sticks. Incence plays a big part in Vietnamese lives so the demand for incence sticks is very high. We were shown how they are produced and how they piut out in large bundles to dry. This is an amazing site, see the pictures in Flickr.