The next stage of our journey brought us to Vietnam, a country I was really looking forward to seeing. The border crossing was very easy and we sailed through in about an hour or so. The one thing I do remember from the border that brought me a bit of amusement was due to the fact that we were on the public bus the whole way through the border. When this happens the people who work on the bus help all the passengers through the border by gathering the passports and all that kinda thing. At this border when we were stamped out of Cambodia we were getting back on the bus to drive through the short no man’s land to the Vietnam side of the border. As we got back on the bus a guy who worked on the bus was collecting all the passports. This guy was dressed in ¾ length trousers and had a big massive straw sombrero type hat on his head. Every single person who got on the bus did that thing where you could literally see their thought process as they looked at the guy still holding onto their passport, they look at him with an odd look and then glance at the pile of passports he already has and then reluctantly hand over the passport...then run onto the bus and ask their friends or the bus in general if they had also handed over their passports to the dodgy looking dude at the door!! I went through this whole process myself but once I was on the bus and looking out the window I found it quite funny to watch everyone else do the exact same thing!!! Anyway once we were through the border they started playing Avatar on the TV screen which I was quite excited about as I hadn’t seen it since I went to see it in the cinema...but unfortunately I fell asleep!! When I woke up I looked around and discovered we were in Ho Chi Minh City!! Straight away it reminded me of Seoul in Korea and I got a good feeling about it straight away. Once the bus made it through the traffic and the endless barrage of mopeds we headed to our hotel. Once the rooms were sorted it was time to go and try find some food. Luckily enough there was a restaurant and bar 2 doors up from the hotel and due to hunger and tiredness we decided to do the easy thing and go there. This place we found was called Godmothers and became our home outside of the hotel for the few nights we were in HCMC. The first night we were there the food was gorgeous and with our meal we got a drink...this led to a second drink...which led to free shots from the bar...which led to ANOTHER drink...and you can imagine that this vicious circle continued until we were 5 free shots in...which got stronger every time!! The staff also brought us out a complimentary fruit plate which was just yummy! Then we copped onto the Connect 4 boards on the bar so we all started playing that. At this stage more of our group had joined the 7 of us who had headed out for dinner and we ended up with quite a fun night on our hands!! I’d like to say we stayed out until the wee hours of the morning, however having headed out at about 6.30 for food we were all home and tucked up in bed by about 10.30!!!
We obviously still had some sense about us when we got home from the bar though as we all managed to book a day trip for the following morning!! The day trip was to the Mekong Delta and involved an hour bus ride first before getting on the boat. I was slightly green on the bus journey but made it without incident...much to the relief of Rosie who was sitting beside me!!! The day trip was really good, we got in a boat which brought us out past Dragon Island and Turtle Island and we kept making our way towards Unicorn Island. When we got here we got off the boat and went to see bee hives and taste honey tea. After that there was a walk through the island which was really nice. We walked to a canal through the island and it was so picturesque. Most people when they picture Vietnam think of the palm tree lined canals with the little boats and tiny Vietnamese women in them with the cone hats on their head...at least I know that’s a picture I had in my head of Vietnam...and this tiny little canal in the middle of the island made that stereotypical picture come to life! It was amazing; there were loads of little boats with 2 people in each of them waiting to take us all down the canal to see more of the island. I really enjoyed that part of it...even if it did involve another minute boat!! After that we went back on the big boat to go to the next island where we saw how they made coconut candy. I’m not a huge fan of coconut but tried it anyway and was pleasantly surprised when it didn’t taste of coconut at all!! It proved to be quite tasty and slightly addictive!!! Then it was back on the boat to go for lunch which was a rather uninspired affair with stodgy rice and suspicious looking chicken!! After that we were back on the main river for a look around before going back to an island for a tropical fruit tasting and some traditional Vietnamese music...which was...em interesting!!! The instruments one dude was playing were fascinating to look at but the sound from one or two of them were slightly piercing so I can’t say that I found it particularly relaxing!!! Then it was back on the boat to head back to the mainland. There was another hour bus journey to endure and then we went to Godmothers for some food (avoiding alcohol completely except for the shot they gave us!!) before going to bed for an early night!
The following day was explore HCMC day!! Once we were all up and ready we headed out for a little tour of the city. We started off down at the Notre Dame Cathedral, which isn’t a patch on the one in Paris but was still a nice building. Just across from that was the French style GPO. I really liked this building and when I went in I felt like I had walked into the Dublin GPO!!! It had all the wooden counters and steel bars just like Dublin, and I also noticed that it even had the little wooden phone booths that are in Dublin...although granted there was an ATM in one and computer terminals in some of them!! We went to grab a bit of lunch then before heading down to look at the Reunification Palace. Myself, Rosie and Kev decided to go in while some of the others went on down to the War Remnants Museum. The guide book said that the Palace had been untouched since the 70s and was like a time warp....I was not disappointed! As soon as we walked in we noticed the clashing colours and rooms decorated in the exact same shade of awful yellow or green from the carpet and curtains to the chair covers and wall paper! It was slight overload in some rooms!! My favourite room though is the room I have affectionately dubbed the Austin Powers room as it would not be out of place in one of the movies. It came complete with circular leather sycadelic coloured couch, ridiculous lamps and light shade and tacky wooden personal bar in the corner! And I’ll just remind you here that this was the PRESIDENTIAL palace...where the president actually lived and met with other royal and political people!!! The palace comes complete with a movie room, heliport and on the 4th floor a dance hall and casino. A war bunker was also built and completed in 1966. The bomb shelter was built by President Ngo Dinh Diem after the palace was bombed by his own troops in an attempt to kill him. While the new palace was ordered to be built in 1962 by the president he never got to see the competed article in 1966 as he was killed in 1963 by his own troops. The bunker itself was very impressive with a number of tunnels and a large concentration of different telecommunication rooms. All these are also preserved perfectly since the 70s so we again got to see the old style phones and the big communication machines that they used throughout the war. The palace has been known by a number of different names over the years from Independence Palace in 1975 when communist tanks crashed through the gates, and Norodorm Palace, when it was used by the French Governor-general of Cochinchina in 1868. When we finished exploring the time warp we headed down to the War Remnants Museum. This was an experience not unlike the S-21 prison in Cambodia. It consisted mostly of photographs from the war which showed the affects of chemical warfare used by the US such as Naplam. When Naplam was dropped it would literally wipe out everything in its path. Whole forests and jungle areas were wiped out within minutes. Crops and livestock were destroyed and it affects the people in a horrendous way. The Naplam would burn through the skin and not only would it disfigure the person; they were then contaminated by it and now pass the contamination onto their children. Even today children are being born with disabilities and disfigurements as a result of the chemical warfare. Some of the pictures were very hard to look at and it was heart breaking to see that it still affects people today, but the very last room we came to was a display of how people who have been affected by it are still leading a normal life. People who have been born in the last 20 years or so are now working as teachers, there was one guy who was born with no arms who taught himself how to be a carpenter with his feet and he now carves the most exquisite beds and furniture. Another person again without feet, is an artist and there is a girl who has her own classroom in a local school where she goes to teach the children in the school how to read. Although there was a lot of information to take in at the museum and a lot of it was quite disturbing it was nice to finish on a happy story as such and to know that although people are still being affected by it they are not letting it ruin their lives or letting it stop them doing what they want to do. The museum also had an outdoor display about the tiger cages that prisoners were kept in. These cages were about the size of a coffin and rather than being wooden they were made of barbed wire. Up to 7 prisoners used to be in one cage and left there for hours or even days at a time. We also saw the guillotine used by the French which was lasted used in about 1968.
That evening we all went out for dinner and by pure coincidence found a place that was showing a friendly between England and Wales (rugby!). That night there was also a friendly between Scotland and Ireland so all 4 teams were represented so there was a bit of craic going on....and it didn’t help that Ireland lost to bloody Scotland...Rhona was a very happy lady for the rest of the night! When the matches were over we all went back to...yes you guessed it, Godmothers!!! And another great night followed, which was rounded off by a great catch up with Triona on Skype...with a good internet connection!!! Next day was an extremely chilled day for everyone with hangovers being an issue for some people! But that evening some of us mustered up the energy to head to the Sheraton Hotel for cocktails at dusk overlooking the city from the 23rd floor. It was really nice and the city looked amazing at night with all the lights. We knew straight away we were in a posh place as even though it was 2 for 1 cocktails (which was just as well as the cocktails cost about 6euro...we’re used to paying maybe about 2 or 3 euro these days for cocktails!!!) they only brought out one cocktail to us all. We all sat looking a little confused but as we were in a posh place decided not to act like penny pinching backpackers and we didn’t say anything. Then as Rosie finished up her cocktail the waiter whipped over with her second one ready to go! It was then we realised that the place was so fancy that rather than giving you two cocktails at once and have one get warm or sitting there too long they just watched the drink and when it looked like you were ready for the next one it appeared by magic!!! Like I said...it was a posh place...not something we have been used to for these last few months!!! When the sun had set and we got some lovely pictures we then headed to a local Vietnamese restaurant. On the walk there we passed by the Opera House which was a gorgeous building all lit up. In the restaurant everybody else’s food was lovely, but I seemed to pick the dud of the menu and ended up with what can only be described as a rubber fish cake! We all did get quite excited though about the fact that there was brown rice on the menu and after the first initial “Oh, its 3,000 more than white rice”, we copped on and reminded ourselves that this was the equivalent of 10cent and we could probably afford to splash out!!! When we were all finished it was time to go back to the hotel and pack up and get ready to leave Ho Chi Minh City. I really liked it there and if HCMC is a sign of what else was to come in Vietnam we were all guaranteed to have a great 2 weeks!!
The following morning we were off to Mui Ne, a beach resort on the east of Vietnam. I was standing at the bus stop and some of the other guys started to walk up...and then I thought my eyes played a trick as I saw Greg following up the crowd!! I ran up to give him a hug and say welcome back and nearly got myself killed in the process as I stopped to hug him in the entrance to the bus station. Greg’s mum Wendy was with him. They had arrived in HCMC the previous evening and had surprised everyone with their arrival! Wendy had always planned to come out for the SEA leg of the journey but when we lost the truck and Greg it was all up in the air but luckily it all worked out in the end and they are with us for a few weeks. We then all hopped onto the bus and got a surprise when we discovered that it was a sleeper bus. A sleeper bus is...well you can probably imagine...it’s a bus you get if you’re making a long journey. It’s not like a normal coach bus; it has two levels of what I can only describe as bunk beds! They are somewhat comfortable...but only if you are a little person less than about 5’10!! Any bigger than that and it’s a case of not being able to straighten the legs at all!!! So we all piled in, learned quickly how to climb onto the top level and get out of the way of everyone else ASAP and we were on the way! When we arrived in Mui Ne I fell in love with it straight away. We were staying in a resort that had its only little private beach out the back...it was about 20 steps out my bedroom door...as Mam and Dad can both testify to as when I was talking to them on Skype I took the laptop for a little walk outside to show them the little bit of paradise that I had found!!!! Once we were all settled into our rooms me and Joe went for a walk up the beach to explore a little bit. When we turned around to go back home we saw that a massive storm was moving in over the bay. I can’t really describe it except to say that there was a perfectly circular cloud coming in which was really dark close to the land and went different shades of grey as it went more towards the sky. The best way to get an idea of what the heck I am talking about is to have a look at the pictures on Facebook! When we got back to the resort, everyone else was out on the beach looking at the storm too. The wind really started to pick up and sand was being blown against our legs...which kinda hurt a little! Then it started to drizzle at which stage we all took our cue to leave and went into the restaurant to watch the rest of the storm unfold. The rain poured down and it was amazing to watch the cloud move over the bay and then for everything to go back to normal like nothing had happened! Day 2 in Mui Ne was spent doing absolutely nothing! I went to the beach, went for a little walk in the town and didn’t find anything too interesting, then went back to the beach, then out for dinner and then to bed!!! So that day really did feel like a holiday!! On day 3 in Mui Ne some of us went for a trip to the sand dunes. The first ones we went to were the white sand dunes where we could get sheets on plastic to slide down the dunes. A couple of the lads got them and we all went up to watch them. We had great fun up there with everyone giving it a go but by far the star of the day was Bui! I will try my best to describe his amazing dive but I have a video that I will email to people so you can all truly appreciate his acrobatics!!! When we first started up there some of the local kids were pushing the lads off till they got the hang of it. Then once they got a bit of confidence they started pushing themselves off by putting one knee on the board and using their other leg to push off with. Bui went to give this a go but when he pushed off he managed to propel himself in such a way that he planted his face into the sand and his body flipped over in spectacular style!!It wasn’t so much a back flip as a neck flip! We all saw it and of course our first reaction was to laugh, then we checked if he was ok and then we laughed again!! He just lay on the ground for a few seconds before coming back up to us and showing us a face full of sand!! We left soon after this as we were pretty sure no one could top Bui’s moment. That evening after dinner I went to sit out on the beach for awhile. As I sat watching the waves I was mesmerised with how the sea would go perfectly calm and then the waves would just appear up out of nowhere. As I watched them I started noticing that every now and then the white tip of the wave would be a luminous green colour. At first I thought it was just my eyes going funny as I had been watching the waves for so long but it kept on happening. Rosie came out then and I tried to point it out to her but it was gone before I could explain what I was seeing but she saw my face and said straight away, “yeah the waves light up”!!. So I was pleased to learn that I wasn’t going mental. Apparently it is phosphorus or something along those lines in the water that causes it to happen. I don’t really know what it was and to be totally honest I don’t really care, I was just glad to have seen something like that and found it absolutely spellbinding!
Next morning we had to leave our little paradise to head to Nha Trang. We were on a sleeper bus again and it was slightly awkward as there seemed to be very little storage space on the bus for our bags for some reason. So all the bags got piled on the front of the bus and then shoved down the aisles once we were all in our bunks. As the journey progressed we discovered the reason for the lack of space....the storage of the bus had been stuffed full of deliveries that we were dropping off along the way. There were boxes and packages appearing left right and centre...and then we arrived at a little garage...and they proceeded to pull 7 bike chassis out of the bus! So the reason for no storage then became blatantly clear! We arrived in Nha Trang once all our deliveries were made and sorted out the hotel rooms...and got a lovely surprise when we discovered that the hotel had a lift so we didn’t have to trek up a few flights of stairs with our bags on our backs (little things people remember!!!). That evening we got Nha Trang off to a similar start to HCMC with a quiet dinner affair turning into something of a boisterous night out...and once again we loved it! Luckily there was no boat trip scheduled for the following day so after a relaxing brunch myself and Joe went off to explore Nha Trang...and explore we did...we “explored” so much we managed to walk ourselves off the map that the hotel had provided us with and after walking for 2 hours looking for a left turn we eventually gave up and started looking out for a taxi. It turned out we had walked to the edge of town and had basically walked around the ring road of the town.
Our third day in Nha Trang was by far my favourite as it was the day we arranged to go snorkelling. I’ve never been snorkelling before and was slightly nervous about the whole thing. I knew I would have a life jacket on so I wasn’t worried about the drowning...I was worried I wouldn’t get the hang of breathing under water. At the first snorkelling stop the water was so clear and looked gorgeous. I flippered up and popped on my mask and life jacket and stood at the back of the boat....and just looked!!! After a few minutes I plucked up the courage and got myself into the water. The first thing I did was stick my head in the water and consciously told myself to breath. After the first few attempts I started to get the hang of it so I kicked off and went in the direction our guide pointed us in....and I fell in love with the sea! I have seen plenty of movies and documentaries where people go diving and snorkelling but I had my breath taken away when I reached the coral and it was exactly like I had seen on the TV. The water was so clear that I could see everything and the colours of the fish were absolutely amazing. I just didn’t want to get out; I wanted to keep looking for more and more fish!! After a half hour or so we moved on from the first stop and went to our second stop. This one was my favourite out of the 3 stops as it was only our group there and I found a cluster of little electric blue and deep purple fish. When I spotted those ones I just floated above them and watched them for ages. I also saw a huge blue starfish at this stop and I found Nemo too!!! When we got back on the boat after our 45 minutes there the seating area of the boat had been transformed into a buffet area!! They had set up so much food including a fish dish which was yummy, chicken, noodles, squid, rice, morning glory (type of veg!) and spring rolls! It was all delicious and between the 20 of us we devoured it! It was then time to head to our third snorkel stop which was different to the other two as it wasn’t in a cove or small bay but pretty much out in the open water in a current. The guide came with us on this one and we all followed him while he pointed out different fish and dived down to point them out to us. The third stop was my least favourite for the simple reason that I got stung by a stupid jellyfish!! At the first stop there had been lots of little jellyfish that was like a pin prick if it got us. At this stop a felt something across my stomach and then it started to sting so a used my hand to swipe it away and felt tentacle thingys around my fingers and a stronger sting on my stomach. So a splashed around and flapped my hand a bit to free myself from the tentacles, once I did that a looked around but actually couldn’t see a jellyfish anywhere near me!! I started to think I had imagined it but then as a started to swim off again I could feel the sting on my stomach and fingers so a had to stop for a few seconds to try squeeze the pain out of myself!!! When a got back onto the boat after our exploration (and spotting a blow fish!!) I had a huge sting mark on my stomach and all on my fingers...so at least I know I didn’t imagine it, and thankfully the pain had stopped by then. We also had a tropical fruit party waiting for us when we got back on the boat so we all tucked into dragon fruit, pineapple, bananas and a couple of other tasty refreshing fruits! So my first experience of snorkelling got me a jellyfish sting but that won’t put me off. I absolutely loved it!! After being so nervous at the first stop, at the second one I was the first person at the back of the boat kitted out and ready to jump in!!! I loved seeing all the fish and even something like seeing the coral swaying in the current I found mesmerising! I can’t wait to get to Oz and to be able to do it again!!
The next day we were leaving Nha Trang, however our bus wasn’t till 6 in the evening so a group of us headed off to the mud baths. We all really enjoyed it. When we got there we had to shower first in hot mineral showers and then a dude turned on a big massive tap in a big massive bath and mud started spilling into it! So we all jumped in (about 10 of us!!) and had a mud bath. We stayed in there for about 15 minutes and then it was time to get out shower again and then get into another big massive baths, this time with crystal clear hot mineral water. This was after going through the hydroshower that spurted water at us at high speed and pressure...and those of the group who had some sunburn from the snorkelling the day before did not enjoy this part of it!!! After chilling out in the second bath tub in the sun (this whole experience was outdoors!!) we headed to the hot mineral swimming pool. We were expecting it to be warmish and all just jumped in...Which proved to be quite a shock for our sunburn when it started stinging the bejaysus out of us for the first few seconds after the water hit us!! When we were all swimming pooled out we went and got ourselves ready to head back to the hotel and to wait for our bus.
Our journey that night was also on a night bus and what an experience it was! Once again it was a sleeper but except this time we were actually expected to get a proper sleep on it as it was an overnight bus! When we first got on the bus driver immediately didn’t like me and some of the others in the group as there was a cave type thing down at the back of the bus where there were 5 seats in a row with a low roof and another 5 places above that. It was hot and dark in there so when the dude signalled for me to go into it I just looked at him and said no way. After a few minutes of continuing gesturing on his part and head shaking on my part I just picked a seat, sat in it and looked at him. He either didn’t mind or had lost the will to argue with me without being able to use words so he left me alone....and starting gesturing to someone else to go into the cave!! Eventually we were all seated and the cave was full and we got on the road. We discovered on this trip that the Vietnamese have no concept of personal space!! I had picked one of the upper bunks which proved to be a God send as even though all the seats were taken on the bus the driver kept stopping to pick people up and they put little mattresses down on the aisles for these people to lie on. Now the aisles were probably about 2 foot wide and of you were on one of the bottom bunks one of these extra people would have been literally lying right beside you! There was an Irish girl who got the unfortunate seat of the bottom bunk in the middle aisle, so when one dude popped down on one side of her she just turned on her side to try and ignore the fact that he was so close...however not long after there was another stop and another dude was plonked down on the other side of her. I felt really sorry for her and if that wasn’t bad enough another guy got on the bus and lay down beside the first dude so she had two squashed in on one side of her and another one on the other side. I could tell she wasn’t very happy with the situation and I can’t honestly say I wouldn’t have been either! Of course the other problem that stemmed from this bus cramming was the fact that getting to the toilet on the bus was somewhat of an obstacle course. When it gets dark the driver turns off all the lights, there are people and bags lying everywhere, the driving is somewhat erratic and people are trying their best to keep their balance and not fall on top of someone as they venture for a pee!! I didn’t sleep very well on the bus and the one time I finally started to drift off properly the driver decided was the perfect time for a break and he stopped at a roadside restaurant!! I managed to doze every now and then but it was not what I would call a comfortable night’s sleep!! One thing I do remember from this particular journey was that my IPod fell off my bunk down onto the dude who was asleep in the aisle. When I stuck my head over the side to get it back I was very surprised to see that he hadn’t woken up when it dropped on his shoulder. The people in the bunks on the bottom were also asleep which left me with a bit of a dilemma as to how I was going to get my IPod back!! In the end I had to climb off my bunk and balance myself on the bars/armrests that stop people from rolling out of the bottom bunks. So I had one foot on a balancing beam on either side of this tiny Vietnamese dude and had to bend over without falling on any of the 3 people within my landing zone to get the IPod back! If this guy had of woken up at the moment he would have woken up to a white girl straddling him reaching down towards his face!! How I didn’t burst out laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation and wake up the whole but I will never know!!! Anyway in the end I got my IPod back without waking up anyone and I was able to go back to my happy little world of music!! Although I didn’t get to sleep much on the bus I did get to track the full moon the whole way across the sky that night and got to see an amazing sunrise too!
When we arrived in Hoi An at 7.30am we got to the hotel to discover that not all the rooms were ready. So some very lucky people got to go to bed straight away...I unfortunately was not one of those lucky people so had to dump my bag in someone else’s room and find something to entertain myself with for a few hours while I waited for people to check out. In the end I decided to walk down to the beach to have a look as I had heard it was about a twenty minute walk, so I figured a walk would probably do me good after sitting and lying down for the whole night on a stuffy bus! Well a 30 minute walk didn’t even get me close to it! I walked for about an hour or so (no watch on so I don’t actually know!!) and still didn’t make it to the beach. I had also had a flip flop casualty in Nha Trang so I was wearing my dolly shoes with no socks on which started to really hurt my feet. After a few attempts at saying “Ok, I’ll go to this next corner and if I can’t see the beach I’ll turn back”, I eventually did give up and turn back. Of course at this stage my poor little toesies were in agony and they only way I could actually walk was to take the shoes off and do it barefoot!! When I got to the hotel I discovered that I had been gone for nearly 3 hours!! But in those 3 hours someone had checked out so there was a bed awaiting me!! I ran to the room, had a shower and hopped into bed for a few hours of uninterrupted kip!!! The walk to the beach was probably about as exciting as day 1 in Hoi An got as after my nap I just pottered around the hotel and then got take away from a restaurant that evening and ate it in bed watching a movie!!!
The next day was Triona’s birthday!!!! So I got for breakfast and then hung around for a couple of hours to give her a call on Skype. Unfortunately the internet started to be really crap and it was all very jumpy so I didn’t get to talk to her for long. I still laughed though at the few seconds of silence after I greeted her at 7 her time in the morning with “Happy Birthday”. I could picture the thought process she was going through until she finally replied “Orla....is that you??” It was priceless!! After my sisterly duty was done we headed into town for a walk and some lunch. It was on this walk that I had a startling revelation! We got to a sculpture tribute type thing to a guy who had helped get Hoi An its World Heritage Status. Part of the display was a large globe with Vietnam highlighted on it. So I had a look and started to walk around the globe to find little old Ireland...and was stunned to see that I had pretty much walked around it 180 degrees before I found the little island I call home! I had a flood of different thoughts ranging from “holy crap, I’m far away”, to “how did I get this far in only 4 months” and “how did I get this far without flying!!” It was great to see just how far we had actually come but also really, I’m not sure sad is the word but I can’t think of the right word, to realise how far away from home I was!!! Anyway after that little revelation we continued to wander around what is a really quaint village. Hoi An went virtually untouched throughout the war and everything is as it has always been. The old houses are amazing and although most of them are shops now they are still in the old style houses with the original architecture and decoration. The following day I had gone on a bit of a tourist walk by myself. I went to a couple of different places including an old family church, called the Tran Family Chapel which was built in 1802. It was built for Tran Tu, a member of the family who became ambassador to China. I also went to the ceramics museum (the best thing about it was seeing the old house it was in and seeing the exhibition about the restoration of the house itself), a couple of temples and a traditional family home. The house I went to is called Tan Ly House and is lived in by the 7th generation of the family and everything is exactly the same as it. The house was beautiful and had been designed with such a lot of detailed. There was poetry on the columns but rather than being written it was inlayed mother of pearl, and the writing was designed to be birds in different states of flight rather than just normal writing. I know all that sounds rather confusing but trust me when I saw it was beautiful! The house is quite close to the river bank and so in the rainy season when the flood waters rise the family use ropes and pulleys to haul all the furniture from the ground floor to the upper levels of the house. The main thing I remember about the house was that they mark on a section of wall how far the flood waters rise every year and in 2007 and 2009 the waters reached about 8 feet. I couldn’t believe it when I saw it and was impressed to see how well the house had survived over the years considering the weather it has to contend with!
Next morning I made a second attempt to find my way to the beach...only this time I didn’t walk and hired an electric bike! The bike was great fun one I got the hang of it and a good idea as it was quite hot to be cycling in. We stopped on the way up the road for some lunch and then made our way down to the beach where we got some sun loungers and chilled out. On the way up the road my bike had started to lose a bit of power so I was hoping that the rest while I was on the beach would allow me to make it home before it gave up completely. The beach itself was lovely, golden sands and blue seas for as far as I could see. The weather was slightly overcast but it was still warm and the water was a lovely temperature. We had great fun with Brian and Greg cracking some horrendously bad jokes that we couldn’t help but laugh at...and of course we all people watched and commented on people’s choice of swimwear and hair styles! Then it was time to head back to the hotel to meet Rosie and Dee for some shopping, so back on my bike I got...and after a few minutes the bike properly died. And so I was forced to manually cycle home the 5k from the beach....felt like when I first started spinning all over again...except this time I was sweating as it was about 35 degrees out!! When I got back to the hotel I went straight to the shop where we had hired the bikes from, I explained what happened and she looked at the bike and said “Oh, the wire came out of the battery”. She found it very amusing and started laughing while I was not so amused!! After a short discussion they agreed to refund me some money and then I dived in for a very quick shower and change and us girls went off on our shopping expedition! Both the girls were looking for jewellery; however I was just looking for a place that would clean my bracelet. After 4 months of overlanding it had got rather grubby and wasn’t as shiny as it used to be. So I left it in at a jewellers and she told me they would see what they could do but couldn’t promise anything. After that and when the girls had bought their shiny things we went to meet Greg and Wendy for a drink and some cake! I had a mini passion fruit pavlova (Mam, add it to the recipe book...absolutely amazing!!!) and then we headed back to the hotel to get ready for a group dinner that evening. We went back to the place where we had gotten cake in the afternoon and I had a gorgeous tuna lasagne (Mam...recipe book!!!) and then it was back to the hotel to pack and get ready to move on once again!
We had an early start the next morning but the joy of public transport meant that the bus was about an hour late so we were all just milling around reception getting rather bored. Eventually our bus arrived and we were pleasantly surprised to see that it was actually a normal bus and not a sleeper bus! The bus journey itself was relatively uneventful however when we arrived in Hue the bus driver got a bit stroppy when Rachel told him that he was supposed to take us to the hostel rather than just drop us at the bus stop. He got off the bus and stood on the other side of the road but Rach told us all to stay on the bus and to make sure no one started to take our bags off. After a number of phone calls and a few irate gestures and some shouting from the bus driver he eventually dropped us to where he was supposed to. We were staying in hostels in Hue and some of us were in a 14 bed dorm. We hadn’t had a proper hostel stay since Istanbul so it was a bit of fun to all be in the same dorm...even though we only had one shower and toilet between us all!! Once we were all settled in myself, Rosie and Wendy went for a bit of a wander and walked down towards the Citadel to see where it was and how much in it was. Hue, like Hoi An, is a Unesco World Heritage Site and tourists go there, according to the Lonely Planet, to see something of old, pre-communist Vietnam. We then stopped along the river bank for a drink and a chat before heading back to the hostel to get ready for Kev’s birthday night out! I have to say I was very proud of how well we managed to coordinate the showers and a very orderly queuing system was formed. Of course all this organisation meant that we were ready a lot earlier than any of us had planned so the party started a bit earlier! Poor Kev was on a cycle of beer shot, beer shot, before we even left the hostel as the hostel has a spinning board with lots of flavoured vodkas that ranged from butterscotch or apple, to one called arse (vodka with fish sauce!!). We then left the hostel to head to the DMZ bar where we got free Long Island Ice Teas and graffitied the wall a bit in honour of Kev’s birthday. We then eventually made it to the restaurant we had booked and were pleasantly surprised as the guy in the hostel told us it had a menu of Vietnamese street food. When we got there though it was white table cloths and 3 couples having nice romantic meals...needless to say they seemed to speed up their consumption pace and left possibly a bit sooner than they had planned...there were 16 of us after all!! We had a really nice meal, the food was gorgeous and we all cleaned our plates, with some of the group tasting other dishes on the table and ordering it in the middle of the meal as the food was so tasty! When we had finished up dinner we then headed off to Why Not Bar. We had been to a Why Not Bar in Nha Trang and had a great time so we decided to test out if this one was just as much fun!! When we had been in the DMZ bar earlier in the night we had bumped into some overlanders from another company called Odyssey that we had met way back in Goreme in Turkey. So on the way back past the bar we told them where we were headed and they followed us down a while later. One of the guys, Ben, was Irish and me and Dee had a great time chatting to him without getting the piss taken out of our accents! Ben had obviously been subjected to similar slagging as someone said the word film (pronounced fil-im by us Irish people apparently!!) and he was delighted to hear someone else say it!! After a few drinks and a few games of pool there Kev decided he wanted to go to Karaoke...and so at 1.30 in the morning Kev, Joe, Dee, Ben, Bui and I walked around Hue to a karaoke bar. In all honestly it was great fun! I’ve never really done karaoke before and when we first got there it looked like we were walking into someone’s house but when we got up to the room it was all kitted out with a big comfy sofa, space to dance around and a couple of microphones. The singing got off to a great start with Kev getting 100% for his rendition of La Bamba! I gave Bippity Boppity Boo (from Cinderella!!) a go...god knows why a song like that was in a karaoke book but by far the best song of the night was Bui’s selection of Livin’ On A Prayer where we all sung at the tops of our voices. We also did a group choice of YMCA...to which there is a video, however after several attempts by different people to get it online it’s just taking forever so you might just have to miss out on the wonder that is the UKtoOz music video!! The night was rounded off with group collaboration once again of Lean on Me...And then the people kicked us out of their house and we toddled off home!! It was a night of epic proportions and Kev had one heck of a birthday night out!!
The next day myself and Joe went off to explore the Citadel. Construction on the Citadel began in 1804. The outer wall is 2 metres thick and 10km long, it also has a huge moat that is 30 metres across and about 4 metres deep (the moat is now overgrown with fantastic water lilies). At the centre of the wall facing the river is a 37 metre high flag pole...I couldn’t quite comprehend how high it was till I was standing right beside it. Although I could see it from pretty much anywhere in the city, as I walked towards the Citadel on the first day, I just thought I was really close to it because the flag was so big, but in fact I was still rather far away!! The flag pole has had an eventful life, built in 1809, extended in 1813, knocked down by a typhoon in 1904 and rebuilt in 1915...to be destroyed again in 1947. The actual one that exists today was erected in 1949. The Citadel was bombed heavily during the French and American wars and only 20 of its 148 original buildings have survived. We had only planned on being there for a short while but it was a really nice place and we sat down and took our time enjoying it. We found a little cafe to sit down with a cold drink overlooking the water lily covered moat and just soak up the atmosphere for a couple of ours. The Citadel was beautiful. A lot of the buildings were destroyed during the war but some of them have been restored so it was lovely to see the old style buildings. We then headed back to the hostel for a meeting with Rachel where she told us that the next leg of our trip over the border into Laos was going to be a scheduled 24 hour bus journey! We then had the choice of adding a further 4 hours onto that to get us to Vang Vieng or else we could make an overnight stop in Vientiane, however there was a possibility that our rooms wouldn’t be available at 7.30 in the morning, our schedules arrival time. After being the victim of such a fate in Hoi An I voted to add on the extra 4 hours and just go the whole hog and the majority won out so we have an epic 28 hour journey ahead of us!
The next day I got up and pottered around the town a little and then a group of us were going on a dragon boat trip on the river. It was really nice to relax and take in some of the scenery without having to walk around in the heat. We went to the main pagoda in Hue, called Thien Mu Pagoda. It is at the top of a hill but luckily it wasn’t too big a hill to get up to. It was quite impressive, a 21 metres high octagonal building, 8 stories high. This was also where we saw the car that a Buddhist monk drove to Vientiane in the 70s and burned himself alive in protest to how Buddhists were being treated because of their beliefs. When we were finished at the pagoda we headed back to our boat and back to the hostel to pack up. That evening then I went for a lovely meal where I got Cordon Bleu, veg and mashed potatoes!! One of the best meals I had had in a long time!! I’m really starting to miss being able to cook for myself and having normal food like chicken and potatoes...suppose it’s the Irishness coming out of me!!
And so that is pretty much the end of Vietnam, aside from the bus journey which I will tell you all about in the next blog as I think this one is just about long enough already!! I have to say I have absolutely LOVED Vietnam! I have seen many different sides to it, from the busy city of Ho Chi Minh, to beach resorts, the protected Hoi An and the great fun and nights out in Hue, everything has been just amazing. The only rude people I have encountered here were the bus drivers...but then again I guess I would be kinda moody too if I had to drive hours through the night with a bus full of sleeping people! Vietnam is definitely on my list of return places...and for those of you who want a new wardrobe my advice is to come to Vietnam for a holiday with an empty suitcase, go straight to Hoi An and get everything you could possibly need tailor made for you in am matter of hours. Kev got 4 full suits made for him in 24 hours!! They make everything from bikinis to ball gowns and everything is exquisite...and reasonably priced. So in a few years time when I head back to get myself a fab wardrobe made I will let you all know and we can all go on the biggest shopping spree holiday that you can possibly imagine!!!
