To get from Da lat to Ho Chi Minh you can either take a 9 hour bus (it probably takes longer, let’s be honest) or you can fly. Fortunately we were able to find a very cheap flight again so decided for that option. We woke at 5am, were collected by Tim and Annie in their taxi, and off we went to the airport about 30 km from the city. The sunrise was beautiful on the way, but what wasn’t beautiful was the noise the taxi was making. Something was going on with his wheel and it was making a horrible noise. Luckily, we made it to the airport unscathed and on time. Our flight took 35 minutes and after an obvious trainee pilot landing (I’ve never braked like it before) we were in Ho Chi Minh.

My first thought was ‘here we go again’. On first glance the traffic and chaos was just the same as Hanoi, maybe even worse. It took quite a long time to make it a small distance through the busy traffic, but we were happy to have uber available to us again. We checked into our hotel, which was a small guesthouse run by a lovely woman, and was given the most extensive and detailed colour coded map we have received during our travels.

Our first stop in Ho Chi Minh was to McDonalds. Simon was disappointed when he realised that it was still too early for normal food so he had to settle for breakfast. Me, I was very happy as I love a sausage egg mcmuffin and a hash brown. Our next job was to get Simon some passport photos for our crossing into Cambodia. This was pretty painless and they told us to come back later to collect them.

After a refreshing shower we decided to do some exploring. The heat and humidity here is pretty unbearable though and soon we were pretty sweaty. We walked to collect the photos, then over to our first stop, Notre Dame. You’re probably reading this thinking I’ve gone crazy. Becky, you’re not in Paris… but yes, they have a cathedral called Notre Dame. It was pretty impressive from the outside, but unfortunately we couldn’t go in at the time that we were there. Catholicism was brought to Vietnam by French Missionaries and is more prominent in the South of Vietnam.

Next, we had a look around the Post Office. The Post Office is known for its very typical French architecture and was really interesting to look around. They still had the old style booths there, which now contain ATMS and lots of interesting maps on the walls. It was very large for a post office and we think it was probably dual purpose as a bank as well. We walked around the side souvenir shops as well here.

After a refreshing iced tea stop at Dunkin donuts (it’s very Americanised here) we walked to the War Remnants Museum. We had to decided to visit this today as we were heading to the Cu Chi tunnels the next day and wanted to get some information beforehand. The entrance price was very cheap, around 50p. The museum was full of photos from the battlefield and also of the suffers from the chemical, Agent Orange. Some hard hitting displays included some stillborn babies preserved, who had severe birth defects, and a display on the torture techniques used on prisoners of war (tiger cages). I came away from this museum feeling like I’d learnt a lot. In comparison to the Ha Lao Prison Museum in Hanoi it was far less biased, but still very negative towards the American involvement of the war. The museum only showed American weaponry and military hardware. Even though the Viet cong used Chinese and Soviet Union weaponry during the war, these were not displayed.

The new information I did learn was that America primarily supported France and their colonisation of Vietnam because they didn’t want to lose access to the resources in Vietnam, including the metal Tungsten. Then the war became about a need for America to stop the communist domino affect. They were worried that if Vietnam was allowed to have a communist government that other countries in the area would soon follow. My opinion, as is the same as many others, is that the war should never have happened. This photo below summarises how much man power, weaponry and money was invested into this war compared to WW2 and the Korean War. It really does put it into perspective. There was too much loss on both sides and ultimately, nothing was achieved from it except destruction and heart break.

The museum had been emotionally tiring so we went back to the hotel to relax for a while before heading out for dinner and to meet up with some friends to play an escape room. For those of you who don’t know in an escape room, you get locked in and then you have a certain amount of time to escape by figuring out clues and puzzles. We took a taxi over to district 7 and the Crescent mall where the escape room was based. When we got there though, our American friends told us that the room had recently closed down. Oh dear! The mall was interesting though having lots of British shops such as M&S and Oasis. We took a taxi back and called it a night after being a little disappointed.

The next morning we got some baked goods at a local bakery called ABC bakery. It was so good to finally have some pastries that tasted the way they should. This set us up nicely for our half day Cu Chi tunnels tour. We expected to leave at around 8am and be back for 1pm, but didn’t make it back till nearly 3pm! I would say that’s far more than half a day. Our tour guide was called Mr Binh and he was half Vietnamese,  half Filipino, but during the war he joined the US Navy and fought for them. He was a very interesting character who told us a lot of his opinion of the current state of the country and also what happened during the war. At one point he asked us why he was stupid. Obviously nobody knew how to respond, but he told us he was stupid because he lives in a communist country.

We drove through the countryside hearing his stories about the war and about his family. We eventually made it to a factory where people who have been affected by the chemical, Agent Orange, are able to work and create arts and crafts for tourists to buy. We bought a piece of art for our wall.

Mr Binh told us more about the Americans being worried about the domino affect of communism and that the Gurillas from the North started to attack Saigon in protest. During one of these attacks his Fiancee got killed and that’s what lead him to flee to the US, where his Father was working, to join the Navy. As he spoke Vietnamese he was soon offered a position in intelligence. We eventually made it to Cu Chi tunnels and it was packed! There were tourists everywhere! We both hid in a sniper hole (my hips only just fit) and saw some of the traps that were used against the Americans by the Viet cong. Some of them were pretty horrific and involved getting legs trapped and spikes to the face.

Our next stop was to the firing range. It has been on my bucket list for a while to shoot a gun, but I never expected my first shot would be from an AK47. We bought 30 rounds, 10 for the AK47, 10 for the M16 and 10 for the M60. I only wanted to have a go on the AK47, shooting about 6 rounds in the end. Simon shot all the others and thoroughly enjoyed himself. His favourite was the AK47! I was expecting much more of a kick back, but actually it was fine. I definitely would like to have another go, maybe in the US at a shooting range. What I couldn’t believe was how loud the guns were! I have a new respect for people who are surrounded by gunshot noises all the time. It is unbearably loud even with ear mufflers.

After the firing range we went down into the tunnels. The tunnels have been widened for tourism, but are still very very tight. We didn’t get stuck luckily and travelled through about 25m of the tunnels used by the Viet cong. The Americas used dogs to sniff out the tunnels and find where they were hiding. I can’t imagine being trapped in the tunnels waiting for people to find you. Not fun!

With that our time at Cu Chi was over. We started the journey back which was about 90 minutes and made plans for that evening to try another escape rooms game and to go up the Bitexco tower. We found a place near to all of our accommodations for the escape room and booked it for later on that evening. Firstly, we headed up the tower to the 52nd floor to have a drink. If you just want to go to the viewing platform, you have to pay about $10. If you go to the bar, it’s free and you end up spending maybe $3-5 on a drink instead. Bargain.

For the escape room the American girls went first and us second. The whole experience was great, but I won’t tell you much about it incase you choose to do it in the future. Our game was called prison break and needless to say, we didn’t escape in time. It was hard! We found out after that the Americans got further than the Brits. Good game guys! We had some food later and called it a day.

(Buddha likes coke)

The next day was our last full day in Ho Chi Minh. We got up late, ate a fry up, Simon got a hair cut, we arranged pick up for our Mekong tour and didn’t do a lot else until the evening. We met up with Rachel, Anne, Annie and Tim to say goodbye. We had a lovely dinner and then went to Hard Rock where we had a bit of a disaster. Simon went to buy his collector glass and they told him that they didn’t have any available to buy. Uh oh!!!! We did however go up on the stage with the band and have a good dance. We walked back through the night market and said goodbye to all our new friends. It had been lovely getting to know them all and we really hope we get to see them again in the future.

We were picked up at 7.30 am for our bus to Da lat. We like to travel early in the day to maximise our time in each place we visit. I usually sleep a bit more on the bus, with the help of my travel sickness tablets. I have to admit we were concerned when the bus showed up. Not massively concerned, just a small normal amount. The bus was small and cramped. Simon couldn’t even get his knees behind the seat in front and there were more people than seats in the minibus. Luckily, after a few more collections we transferred to a much nicer and cooler bus.

The drive was around 3 hours, taking us through beautiful mountain scenery. We stopped half way for a rest stop which was pretty in itself. After our rest stop we drove through a cloud. Very very bizarre to lose vision so much. Luckily, our driver had proven himself as capable and responsible in terms of speed so we weren’t worried. We saw a lot of areas along the road where the barrier had gone to stop people going off the cliff and there were quite a lot of landslides. We knew this road and the road from Da lat to Ho Chi Minh were notorious for accidents, but we felt safe the whole time.

We arrived and checked into our bargain accommodation. £8 a night for a private double, which actually had 2 double beds and a really good bathroom. It also included breakfast, so all in all the room was a bargain and really really good. It was called Da lat 24h guest house for anyone who may visit. We ate some lunch in the hotels restaurant, which was cheap and good too before we headed out to explore.

We started walking towards the old Da lat railway station as we wanted to catch the 2pm train up to Ling Phuoc Pagoda. We soon realised we weren’t going to walk there in time so jumped in a cab. We made it in plenty of time, but were told we couldn’t buy tickets for the 2pm. It wasn’t clear why and other people were confused too. We were pretty annoyed we rushed over for nothing, but decided if we had time we would come back for the 4pm.

We walked along Xuan Huong lake, on the way back into the city, which was pretty and relaxing. Da lat is much cooler as it is mountainous so it wasn’t anywhere near as strenuous to walk around in the afternoon here. We walked past the ‘chicken’ cathedral, named by the locals for the rooster wind vain on the top of the steeple. We were expecting more than that as the woman at reception at our hotel kept going on about the chicken cathedral far more than a little metal chicken deserved. Oh well…

We arrived at The Crazy House soon after the disappointing chicken cathedral. The crazy house is a building designed by a Vietnamese architect called Dang Viet Nga. She was the daughter of one of the Presidents on Vietnam and studied in Moscow for a few years. The building is designed as multiple treehouses with many unusual paths connecting them all. There is a nature theme here and the more you look, the more animal influences you see. I have to admit, we were both pretty disappointed by the crazy house. The house was far from finished, building work was going on everywhere so a lot of the site was unsafe. There were loose wires, rubble and rubbish piles everywhere. For a place that gets so much hype… we were bored within about 10 minutes. Sorry crazy house… you didn’t do it for us.

After the crazy house we managed to make it back to the railway station in time to get the 4pm ride up to the Ling Phuoc Pagoda. The ride itself was only 20 minutes, but it was lovely to see all the greenhouses in the countryside on the way. We walked around the pagoda for a while, but I didn’t bring a top that covered my shoulders so we couldn’t go inside. Before heading back down on the train we stopped at a locals cafe for a Vietnamese condensed milk coffee, which is always served with unlimited green tea. Yummy! We sat like locals on the side of the road and enjoyed the atmosphere of children coming home from school and people enjoying the last few hours of light.  We were pretty tired that night so ate in the hotel again and got an early night. The next day was going to be very exciting so we needed to get some good sleep.

We were picked up by our canyoning tour company, Highlands sport travel nice and early. We had been given multiple recommendations during our travels for this company so didn’t hesitate to book with them, even though they were a little more expensive. Safety is so important when doing an activity like this and we had read a few stories about deaths in the Da lat canyoning area over the last few years, including 3 Brits just a year before. Luckily, Annie and Tim had been able to book onto the tour too and after meeting the other 2 amazing couples on our tour we were ready and rearing to go.

We knew that this was going to push or limits a little bit and I made sure to not do too much research beforehand as to not worry myself unnecessarily. I knew we would be abseiling down waterfalls, jumping off cliffs, sliding down waterfalls, zipling and eating lunch and that’s it. We got geared up and had a safety briefing where were taught the basics on abseiling. I had only done something similar once in Mexico and Simon a few times as well. Soon though we were heading off to our first abseil. Simon decided to always volunteer first so I was always second… boo!! Maybe it was better to just get on with it. The first abseil went well and before we knew it, it was over! The sound of the nearby waterfall just added to the excitement an we couldn’t wait to go again.

We trekked though the jungle to our next abseil, a small abseil into a zipline. It was really interesting to watch them set up the lines from seemingly nothing and whilst we waited we chatted to all the other lovely couples. We both entered with quite a splash! So much fun.

 

Next we went for a slide in a waterfall. This was pretty scary, why? Because who knew what was under all that water. We had to lie down backwards and just let ourselves be taken by the water. The second time we went down as a pair. Great fun!

Next was the big one! A 25m waterfall and this time, we were going right through the middle of it. It is a really good job I didn’t see what we would have to do before, otherwise I think I would have been pretty worried. We had to take our shoes off as the waterfall was very slippery. Worrying sign number 1. We had a gradual decline and then it got steeper pretty quickly and at the same point the water got so vicious that we couldn’t see the guide at the top anymore. We had to receive all instructions from the guide at the bottom. We kept plodding down and soon we were being told to stop and let go. The rope had run out. Before we went we were told we would have to fall backwards for the last few metres, but nothing prepared me for how high we still were. He counted me down and I just went. Free falling backwards for about 4m. We weren’t allowed to jump feet first as the water was only 1.5m deep. Unfortunately, a few people forgot or just ended up going that way anyway.  They were fine though. It was so exhilarating. Unfortunately, I didn’t see Simon do his, but the photos show that he did it all with a lot of style.

After some more trekking it was time for some cliff jumping. As it’s the dry season we were advised to not do the 11m jump. Of course Simon and one other guy did it anyway. I stuck to the 7m jump… plenty big enough for me. Simon did the 7, 9 and 11m. Crazy boy!

Finally it was lunchtime and a chance to catch our breaths. We ate some yummy baguettes, fruit and banana cake to prepare ourselves for the last abseil… the washing machine. The name filled me with dread and i was right to be filled with dread. It wasn’t a long abseil, soon we were free hanging and had to lower ourselves into the waterfall. I slipped on the first part and then faffed around trying to get my footing for a while. Soon enough though I was lowering myself into the crashing waterfall. Here is where I should have taken a big breath… I didn’t. At the bottom you just have to let go and the waterfall eventually spits you out. This took around 15 seconds though. I was gasping for air by the time I surfaced. I think I looked like a fish coming up and it took me a little while to recover. Simon loved this one and wanted to go again. Give me the big one any day.

After a trek back to the van we were done. It had been an amazing fun filled and exhilarating day. I’m so glad we pushed our limits and did it as so many people we met didn’t canyon in Da lat. Such a shame as it has been one of our favourite days so far! How many people can say they abseiled in or near to  4 waterfalls! 🙂

That night we went out for dinner and drinks with the whole canyoning crew. They were such a lovely bunch of people and we had the perfect evening to end a perfect day. We started with a drink at the crazy bar/maze bar/100 rooftops. This place has so many different names online,  but ultimately it’s a bar version of the crazy house and so much better! It is so detailed and you can absolutely get lost in there. We found the rooftop just in time for the sunset over Da lat. Magical. At dinner Simon and I had a bottle of wine for the first time since New Year. In New Zealand we reached the conclusion that the climate in parts of Vietnam must be perfect for wine and finally we had been proven right.  We enjoyed a lovely bottle of Da lat excellance.

The next day we went on another day tour to see the countryside of Da lat. Due to the cooler climate, Da lat is a hub for flower farming, coffee plantations and cricket farms. Here are the stops we made on our tour:

The train station for a quick look around.

A flower farm. This one mainly grew roses. 12 for $1.

A cricket farm. We both tried a cricket. I wasn’t massively keen even though it just tasted like fried veg. Simon ate about 20… We also drank some rice wine here.

A silk factory. This whole process is so fascinating.

A weasel coffee plantation. I was a little concerned about the animal welfare side of this, but this farm at least seemed ok. So what happens? During the October to January period, the coffee trees bear fruit. The weasels go along and eat the coffee and the berry is digested. The enzymes in the weasels stomach are meant to increase the flavour of the coffee bean, which is ultimately pooped out and collected. We weren’t too impressed with the flavour of the 2 beans we tried. They were pretty bitter and I wouldn’t say worth the extra money people were paying for it.

Elephant falls. There were some very cute puppies here too.

Linh An Pagoda and the Happy Buddha statue. He was so happy!!!!

A Lat tribal village. These people live off the land. They were so happy and smiley and we found out that the women ask the men to marry them in this tribe.

The whole countryside tour was great and we learnt loads about how the people lived and made money in the Da lat area. Da lat had been brilliant. Cool in temperature and also cool in terms of fun and exciting things to do.

From Hoi An we had to travel back to Da Nang to get the train to Nha Trang (yes, all the places sound the same). The car ride was about an hour and the train about 9 so a full on day of travelling was ahead of us. The train ride was pretty uneventful and the scenery nowhere near as beautiful as the ride from Hue to Da Nang.

We made it to Nha Trang just before 11 pm and took a taxi to our accommodation. The taxi driver was pretty funny as whenever a Russian tourist crossed the road wrong or was driving the wrong way on his bike, he pointed at his head and crossed his arms. I can only assume he was trying to say no brain. Nha Trang has a reputation as being a Russian primarily, but also Chinese resort holiday destination. Immediately we noticed this, with many signs being written in Russian as well as Vietnamese as well as the endless number of Russian tourists walking around.

The next morning we got up early, got breakfast and met up with Annie and Tim again. Today was going to be a very fun day. We were going to Vinpearl Land. Yay!!! We knee the rides wouldn’t be that thrilling as they never are in Asian theme parks, but Vinpearl Land offered a lot more than a theme park. On site there was an aquarium, shopping centre, food court and the most exciting of all, a waterpark. Vinpearl is on an island, so to get there we took the World’s longest ocean cable car. Here are some of the views on the way. We decided it would be fun to have a few pictures with characters too.

We spent the morning messing around on a few rides including: the runaway train, the drop ride and another roller coaster. Everyone else went on a spinning ride too, but i’d rather not throw up. We also played in an arcade they had where all the games were free. Amazing!

It was time for lunch and then we headed to the waterpark. We spent about 3.5 hours climbing up stairs and zooming down the rides. It was soooo much fun!!! Some of them needed rubber rings, either single or double, and others you went down on your bum. There are 2 slides that stood out to me. Firstly, a massive group one which could take 6 people and threw you around like crazy and secondly, the tsunami. The tsunami is a down and up ride, hard to explain, but i’ve put a photo down below. Very terrifying.

In the afternoon we went to the aquarium and also rode a go kart/luge style ride, called the alpine coaster, that we had to queue an hour for. It was pretty fun, but your speed was dependent on the people in front and much to Simon’s annoyance, the girl in front was very slow. The aquarium was brilliant though. Initially,  I was thinking that the tanks were too small for some of tortoises and terrapins they had, as well as some of the larger freshwater fish, but as we went through I saw that the tanks seemed to be well maintained and looked after. It was lovely to see a green turtle, white tip and black tip reef sharks and some sandtigers again. All in all, the aquarium was way better than we expected.

As we were leaving the park we stubbled across a water light show. The water and lights change in sync to the music. The whole thing was so mesmerising and beautiful.

We went for dinner that night at a restaurant called Lanterns. So so tasty. We even went back the next lunch and night. Haha! Afterwards we had heard about an underground beach bar called Havana which a few people had recommended. This was NOT a bar… it was a rave! Tim, Annie, Simon and I stood in disbelief worrying that our ears were going to explode and our organs fail due to the vibrations and noise. Simon enjoyed it the most because he’s weird like that. We had one drink and left, but wow, what an experience.

The next day we recovered from all of the excitement by visiting a mud bath. Nha Trang is known for its mud baths and we visited Thap Ba for our experience. We paid about £25 for a private 20 minute mud bath, 30 minute mineral sock (this was like sitting in a giant amazing smelling cup of tea), some hydrotherapy showers, jacuzzi and access to the pools. It was definitely money well spent. We enjoyed being overly buoyant in the mud and getting very dirty. All in all, a relaxing day.

We left early the next day for Da lat which is located about 3 hours away up in the cooler mountains. But, what did we think of Nha Trang as a whole? Yes, there are a huge amount of Russian and Chinese tourists around. Yes, the whole place feels like a resort and yes, things cost a bit more because of this. I feel like we spent our time in Nha Trang doing the only 2 activities that appealed to us and therefore I wouldn’t go back. It was fun and I’m very glad we went, but we’ve heard horror stories about the snorkelling and dive boats being over ridden with tourists and that is just not our thing. Don’t miss out Nha Trang if you go to Vietnam, but choose your activities wisely.

A few shots from a quick peak at the beach. Can anyone explain this sign? I particularly enjoyed trying to understand the defecation one. A good example of the saying ‘lost in translation’.

We had heard such amazing things about the town of Hoi An that we decided to dedicate 5 nights. Located about an hour from Da Nang, these 2 places couldn’t be anymore different. Hoi An is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and we all know how much I loved the last UNESCO town, Luang Prabang. Let’s just say… we were not disappointed.

There is a phrase that goes around the long term travelling circuit, travel burnout. It’s hard to believe that travelling to a new location every few days, sightseeing all day everyday, meeting new people, walking endless km every day, waking up at odd hours to catch buses and trains and, researching and booking in spare hours can be tiring… but it is! Ok… maybe when you read it back, it does sound a little tiring. I can only describe it as ‘good and content’ tired, but tired nonetheless. We have had our own personal travel burnout crop up every few weeks in the last 2 months or so. It’s understandable really now. We have been travelling for over 5 months. Hoi An was going to be our haven. We had no plans except to sleep, eat good food, drink excellent Vietnamese coffee and get some clothes tailored. The whole 5 days were perfect. It’s very hard for me to remember exactly what we did each day in Hoi An, but the place stole our hearts. During the day the streets are lined with beautiful French colonial buildings and at night the streets are lit up with hundreds of glorious lanterns. I’ve never seen anything like it before and I doubt I ever will again.

During our time here we ate the most tasty local food we have had in Vietnam so far. Two restaurants that stood out were Morning Glory and The Mango Rooms who we visited with our lovely American friends and Tim and Annie (I told you they would be popping up a few more times). We enjoyed some of the highest quality food I have ever eaten for the price of a gastropub meal. I had the most succulent duck with chocolate sauce and Simon had a tuna steak with mango relish. Both were incredible.

We drank some beers and coffees in some of the local cafes and bars. On our first night we ended up at Dublin Gate (yes, an Irish pub), with live music and the duet were just brilliant. Live music, next to the water and all the lanterns around us. Who could possibly complain? Not me! Another night we went with Tim and Annie to Tiger Bar (we went live here), listened to some awful (I mean excellent really) music and had some amazing people watching experiences. A highlight included the most enthusiastic DJ I have ever seen… I am being sarcastic, he was like a statue, and an overly enthusiastic dancing man. He was so committed to his moves. Maybe the DJ knew he couldn’t compare so didn’t even try?

We had some clothes tailormade. Vietnam is known as a World class destination for tailoring and we had the best experience with a shop called Mr Xe in Hoi An. Simon had a 2 piece cashmere suit made, 2 shirts and a tie. I had 3 dresses and a causal shirt made. It was such a great experience to be measured up, chose your material and style and know the clothes will be perfect for you. Simon had 3 fittings for his suit and my clothes were a perfect fit after only one fitting. We can’t recommend this shop enough and even if you only get one item made, it’s really worth it for the experience. Every time we walked past the shop after our last fitting the staff waved and said hello to us. Great customer service. Our clothes will be coming to an event near you soon!

On other days we walked around the little islands of Hoi An and took photos of the beautiful buildings. One place worth noting is the Japanese Bridge. We saw a similar tiled roof bridge in Hue, but this one was even more special. We walked around the markets, trying some local dishes including Cao Lau, Banh Mi and these yummy chewy donuts.

We visited Cai Bae beach one day by bicycle. We rode through some small back lanes, watching the locals prepare and dry the Cao Lau noodles in the sun and farmers tending to their rice paddies as we passed. Simon only had to reattach the chain on his bike once and we didn’t get killed by the scooters so it was a very successful ride. We ate some lunch at a beachside cafe giving us free lounger rental, Simon went for a swim in the massive waves (he lost his mask :(), and I just relaxed.

We also, as always, played with puppies.

For once, we didn’t hit all the tourist spots, we didn’t go in any of the heritage buildings or museums in Hoi An and it was great! We didn’t need to. The place was perfect regardless. Hoi An is now up there with Chiang Mai and Luang Prabang as my top S.E Asia locations. Beautiful towns with history are definitely the way to my heart when travelling.

 

We arrived in Da Nang after a 3 hour train ride through the countryside and along some beautiful coastline. The coastline reminded us of Cornwall in so many ways, with all of its beautiful coves and white sandy beaches, just a lot more green.

Da Nang is always spoken about in travel guides and online as a hub for onward travel to Hoi An. Most people that we met stayed for a few hours or 1 night at most, but we decided to stay for 2 nights in the hope of experiencing a less touristy destination. Luckily we arrived on a Sunday so we were able to see the famous dragon bridge (made by the same architect as the eiffel tower) breathe fire at 9pm. I have to admit I really wasn’t expecting much from this and thought it would be a bit gimmicky, but we really enjoyed watching the fire being shot out of the dragon and all of the beautiful lights along the water edge. What we didn’t expect was what came after the fire. I won’t ruin it for anyone else, but after the fire breathing just bear in mind it’s not over. After this we found a Thai restaurant, which was a nice change from the Vietnamese food and got an early night.

The next day we took our time before we headed out to explore Da Nang. We were right, Da Nang has been the least touristy city during our time in Vietnam and as we wandered through the streets we didn’t see any other tourists. We were on a bit of a mission to buy a new USB stick, a memory card adaptor and a wireless charger for Simon’s phone as his USB port hasn’t been working. We made the right decision by heading more into the locals area to buy these items as they were really reasonable in price.

We jumped on a local bus later in the day and headed to the Marble Mountains. To call these mountains is a little bit ridiculous, as they are 5 mounds, of reasonable height, but by no means mountains. The 5 mountains are all named after elements; water, fire, metal, wood and earth and are made of limestone and marble. We walked up the only Marble Mountain which you can, My Son (water), and started exploring all of the hidden areas that were on offer.

Our first stop was to a cave carved into the marble. It was so beautiful and everywhere you turned there was something exciting to see. I particularly enjoyed the buddha carved into the rock and also the way the light was flowing down into the cave from the roof.

We climbed to the highest point next for some panoramic views over Da Nang. What surprised me the most was the amount of development in the area. Every patch of land along the coast was being turned into a hotel or villa. It became very clear that Da Nang would be very different in 10 years time.

We spent the rest of the time wandering around some more caves, visiting some pagodas and generally dying from excessive sweatiness. I’m glad we visited, but I wouldn’t say it was an absolute must do if you came to the area. On the way back the bus driver tried to over charge us. He failed to realise that we had already travelled on the bus earlier in the day so knew the cost and his passenger was an obsessive researcher who wouldn’t let herself be scammed on a public bus in any country. We refused to pay the extra and ignored him. Luckily this happened close to our stop anyway and we made a big deal of getting off the bus in protest of his rudeness. Bus conductor 0 – Us 1.

Later in the evening we met up with Annie and Tim who we had met in Halong Bay. We went out for some dinner at a lovely place called Universal Bar. Whilst waiting for our dinner we saw a rat run along the electricity cables outside. It was massive! After dinner we went for a few more drinks and just had a lovely evening looking out over the water.

The next day we were leaving for Hoi An, but decided to organise our transport for later in the day so we could enjoy My Khe beach fo a few hours. It was a gloriously warm and sunny day so we hired some loungers, soaked up the rays and read our books. Tim and Annie joined us later on and Simon went for a swim too. It was a little chilly for me.

Da Nang had been great and so much better than we expected. I would definitely visit again if we return,  but because of all the development i’m not sure it would be the same unfortunately.

 

The title will become clearer during the post!

We decided to fly from Hanoi to Hue even though we had always intended on taking the sleeper train. Why? Because it was nearly the same price and the flight only took 50 minutes compared to the 12 hour train. Yes, we had to pay for a nights accommodation which we didn’t plan for, but the double rooms we are booking are around £12 a night so not too bad at all. The flight was quick and painless, despite being a little confusing. We were traveling with an airline called VietJet airlines, which is Vietnam’s version of Ryan air or Easyjet. We had read some horror stories about the plans being cancelled last minute and the flights being ridiculously delayed, but we were boarded and on our way before schedule. What confused us was that we got onto an Estonia airlines plane. Ok, so maybe Estonia airlines owns Vietjet, but why was the plane not branded correctly. We did a double check of our tickets to make sure we weren’t headed somewhere unexpected. However, all was fine and we got to Hue safetly and quickly.

Once in Hue, we were immediately calmed by the atmosphere. Unlike Hanoi there is a lot of green rice paddies surrounding the city and some of the roads are nearly empty! What was evident pretty quickly was that it might not stay that way forever. There was a lot of fancy villa style properties, as well as large apartment and hotel buildings being built everywhere. The next day our tour guide told us that a lot of the land is being bought by the government for good money, so of course the farmers would sell. It’s a real shame that this lush greenery may not be there in the near future.

We checked into our accommodation which was unfortunately the worst to date. Not because it was dirty, not because it was small or old fashioned, not because of poor breakfast. All of this was amazing. It was the worst because it smelt very very damp. It didn’t bother Simon so much, but I could smell damp everywhere. The bending was damp, the curtains, everything. I think I figured out why though. When we left the property every day they asked us to hand our keys in and they would switch off our electricity. This would turn off the fan, the air conditioner, everything that would dry out the wet room after our showers in the morning. It was a real shame because the property and the people were great. I was so grateful during this stay to have bought some silk sleeping bag liners in Hanoi. It’s like we had sensed the future.

That night we went on an I love Hue tour. I’m going to post a link to the tour here, because it was truly amazing. https://ilovehuetour.com/

We loved our food tour in Hanoi so thought we’d step it up a bit in Hue and do this one on the back of scooters, driven by ladies who worked for the company. We were a small group, only 4 of us, and we had the most fun with our guides. Simon was driven around by the CEO of the company Ms Lien and I had a lovely girl who was studying tourism at the local university called Thu. We chatted all the time we were on the scooter and not once did either Simon or I feel unsafe, despite the crazy driving around us.

Ms Lien has worked tirelessly, at the age of 23, to create a company which is supporting the local community. It is truly inspirational. Please read more about it on the link above and visit if you are ever in Hue or some of the other cities in Vietnam (she has branched out). Her aim is to have companies all around the World. It started with I love Hue, but may end with I love the World!

Our first stop was to a locals only alleyway cafe where we tried a few different ‘cakes’. Now… these were not cakes (as in yum yum chocolate or carrot), but more snacks. The first one we had was pretty nice, it was a jelly like blob made out of rice flour, with dried shrimps and a sweet sauce. The next one was a chewy jelly with a whole shrimp in it… no thank you and the last one was much along the same lines. They guides found it funny that I kept saying ‘This is NOT a cake’. These weren’t our favourites unfortunately, but we gave them a go.

The next stop was to try another ‘cake’, but this one was absolutely delicious. You took some rice paper, put a crunchy ‘cake’ into it, snapped it, filled up the roll with lettuce, papaya and carrot and dipped it in a yummy sauce. Everybody ate all of these as they were so tasty!!!

Throughout the rest of the tour, we drove past the imperial city and took in the atmosphere at night, we ate some Hue noodle soup which was much tastier than the pho we had in Hanoi, we had some Vietnamese BBQ and finally some sweet soup. Sweet soup, or Che Hue, is a dish only found in Hue. It’s hard to tell you exactly what’s in the soup, but it came in layers with ice and you mixed it all up to make a soup. There was definitely condensed milk, banana, different beans, coconut and tapioca in the soup. I think it was OK, Simon struggled with this one. We had a lovely evening and a really great introduction to the city of Hue on this tour and would recommend it to anyone.

Not many photos as we mainly filmed.

The next morning was an early start for a full on day of exploring the history of Hue. As we only had one full day in Hue we booked a tour to take us around the highlights. We paid a little more to be in a group of 12 rather than 40 so that we could learn more from the guide. Turns out on that day there were only 4 of us, so we practically had a private tour all day. We learnt and saw some much.

Our first stop was to Thanh Toan Bridge, a tile-roofed bridge in a small village. Whilst there we walked around the local village of this market and also went into the local museum where an elderly lady showed us how rice is processed. It was really interesting and a great start to the tour.

 

Next we went to the tomb of Minh Mang. Minh Mang was the 2nd Emperor of the Nguyen dynasty. The Vietnamese people believe that he did a lot for them and was an advocate for opposing the French. His final resting place is beautiful. There is a large lake, pagodas, memorials and of course the tomb, which is hidden away so no-one can access it.

Our second tomb was of Khai Dinh the 12th Emperor of the Nguyen dynasty. This emperor had a closer link with the French government and this can be seen in the style of his tomb, which is fare more Westernised. Unfortunately Khai Dinh is not seen as favourably as Minh Mang as he worked with French government, agreeing to raise taxes on Vietnamese peasants and also sent a lot of leaders into exile.

 

We made a quick stop at Nam Giao Esplanade which is where Nguyen Emperors came to oversee sacrificial ceremonies. There wasn’t a lot to see here really.

We had lunch at a local restaurant and it was amazing. The food was incredible for the price we paid for the tour. I still can’t quite believe we had it for free.

The afternoon was spent walking around the Imperial City, which is the home of the last royal dynasty of Vietnam. We spent about 2 hours here looking at the residencies of the Queen Mother (Mother of the King), the temples on site, the site which was the Forbidden Purple Kingdom (residence of the King) and the government buildings. There was a lot of destruction to this site during the Vietnamese war. A lot of the walls and buildings still have bullet holes all over them and the Forbidden Purple Kingdom was completely destroyed. They are hoping to reconstruct all of the buildings over the next 20 years, which would be great.

This is what the palace looked like…

This is what it looks like now…

Our last stop of the day was to Thien Mu Pagoda which, in a city of over 200 pagodas, is the most famous of them all. It was a really stunning structure and we got to see some Monks going about their daily business while we were there. Whilst here I had my first encounter of my shoulder being rubbed by a Vietnamese lady. I did hear this may happen due to my hair colour, but it was the first and only time since that this has happened. Wouldn’t it be interesting to hear that she has since won the lottery? On the subject of my hair colour, I haven’t been approached too much. I think the warnings I received from people about the attention I would receive was quite out of date. The South-East Asian people are now very used to seeing blonde women and men, so it doesn’t faze them that much anymore. I am asked quite frequently though if my hair colour is real. I want to say… look at my eyebrows, but worry they wouldn’t understand… so I stick with a polite nod and a smile.

Real horse hair on the guardians of the Pagoda. 

A replica of the car driven by the famous monk that burnt himself alive in Saigon in 1963. 

We travelled back into the city on a dragon boat cruise down the Perfume River. It was pretty good fun and a bit of a novelty, but the woman and her family on board just kept trying to sell us things. Simon and I shared a beer, but as us and the other couple kept refusing her scarves, t-shirts, magnets, pictures, bags, statues etc. she started to get a little frustrated. This ruined the relaxing feel of the ride a little, as by the time she’d given up we were nearly there.

That evening we walked down into the night market to have a look around. We enjoyed a pot of tea and a coffee (on a Friday night) and took in the atmosphere along the Perfume River. We really liked Hue and was disappointed to hear that a lot of people miss it out. The amount we learnt about Vietnamese history whilst there was unbelievable and our only regret is not having one more day so we could have gone on a tour of the demilitarised zone (DMZ).

 We started our trip to Halong Bay by being collected from our hotel by our tour guide for the next few days, Binh. From day 1 he was helpful, caring and very very informative. We went to the Vega travel office where we paid the remaining balance for the trip and started to meet the people we would be enjoying this cruise with. Our group had 17 people on the first full day and then 19 on the second full day. We still don’t really understand why those 2 people weren’t with us originally, but assume it must have had something to do with the bedrooms on our first boat.

We stopped half way to Halong and had a chance to buy some snacks for the trip and obviously have a toilet stop. All the way there Binh had been telling us about Vietnamese culture and as it was Valentines Day, particularly about Vietnamese marriage custom. It was all really interesting and he kept using us as a comparison as we had been recently married. Weddings in Vietnam are huge events with up to 500 people attending. He showed us some pictures and there were a lot of guests in very casual clothes, which I found pretty odd, but the Bride and Groom were dressed up in either very traditional outfits or, more commonly these days, typical Western white wedding outfits. It didn’t used to be that guests would bring presents to a wedding, but he told us that it’s becoming more common for people to give ‘Happy Money’ to the Bride and Groom. The Bride and Groom then keep a record of exactly how much each person gave them and then give the EXACT same back at their wedding. How odd!!

We learnt on the next leg of the trip about how Halong Bay was formed by legend and also scientifically. Hanoi used to be called Thung Long, which means rising dragon and Ha Long means descending dragon.

‘The legend says that during the old time when the country was newly formed, Vietnamese had to fight against fierce invaders coming from the North through the sea. Feeling sorry for the country, The Jade Emperor sent the Mother Dragon and her children descending on earth to help ancient Vietnamese people defend the country.

While the mighty enemies were attacking the main land, The Mother Dragon and her children suddenly appeared and incinerated the enemies with their divine fire and giant emeralds. The emeralds from the dragon’s mouth were scattered around the battlefield on the sea and formed an invincible defensive wall that left enemy battleship fleet sinking. Thanks to the dragons, the Northern invaders were finally swept away and the peace finally came back the South East Asian country once again. After thousands of years, the wall of emerald turned into island and islets of different sizes and shapes.

After the battle, The Mother Dragon and her children didn’t come back to the heaven, but stayed in the mortal world and turned into human form and help people planting, cropping, raising cattle, reclaiming, and expanding the country.

To remember the help of Mother Dragon and her children, the people live there from generation to generation name the bay where the Mother Dragon descended “Ha Long or Halong” and the bay where her children descended “Bai Tu Long”, which means “Thanks to the Dragon’s children”. This legend is also a part of the general belief that Vietnamese people’s has Dragon’s origins.’ Taken from – http://www.halongbay.info/news/the-legend-of-halong-bay.html

We arrived at the marina and it wasn’t long before we were joining our boat and heading out into the beautiful scenery. We had a super tasty lunch straight away and were taken to our rooms, which were just perfect, with windows overlooking the Bay. We met some lovely people on our tour, namely Paul and his niece Lisa and Annie and Tim. Embarrassingly, these people are all British, but we all just clicked and had a great time. Annie and Tim live just down the road from us in Cornwall which is great and Paul and Lisa in Suffolk. I have no doubt that we will see all of these people again once we get home and there is a good chance we may join Paul for something very exciting in the future (watch this space).

Black kites were everywhere

Later in the afternoon we went kayaking through Bai Tu Long Bay. There are 3 bays in the area, with Halong being the most recognised, but the others are far less touristy and just as beautiful. We kayaked through lagoons and into archways and caves. Eventually we ended up at a lagoon where we saw lots of wild monkeys very very close up. 2 of them were even being super naughty while we were there. It was very relaxing and peaceful there and a really lovely introduction to Halong Bay.

After this we went to ‘surprising’ cave. Named because everyone is pretty surprised by how impressive it is. I still think our most impressive cave has been in Pai, but the way they had lit up this one made it very very beautiful. Our tour guide pointed out some interesting rock formations… see if you can spot any in these photos.

That evening we had a very tasty meal and enjoyed some drinks onboard with our new friends. A lovely way to end the evening. When we decided to go to bed though 1/2 of our group were having a lot of loud fun! Throughout the day the group had definitely become an ‘us’ and ‘them’ situation. They all knew each other already and to this day I still don’t understand why they didn’t go on a Halong party booze cruise. All they wanted to do was drink, moan and make life difficult for the tour guide. Ok, that’s not fair… not all of them did, but it got a little bit tiresome. We had to put our earplugs in that night as they were deciding to wrestle in the communal room above our bedroom and play Lana del Ray super loud on their speaker. How very depressing.

The next morning we were up nice and early for breakfast before our first stop of the day, Ti Top Island. We zoomed up 400 odd stairs to the top to get some stunning panoramic views over the Bay. Our tour guide was completely right that we needed to get up there quickly as by the time we were coming down it was PACKED! We had some spare time on Ti Top before going back to our boat and 4 of us decided to go for a brisk and refreshing swim. Once you were in it was ok, but a little shock to the system getting in.

Once back on the boat we started our transfer to Cat Ba Island, the largest island in Halong Bay. We were going to have a fun filled couple of hours exploring, starting with a bike ride to a local village. Seeing the locals going about their daily business was great and the scenery was breathtaking as we rode through the countryside. There were puppies everywhere in the village and we got to see the school, which only has 3 teachers and a head master. The younger kids are all taught together in the morning and the older kids taught together in the afternoon.

After our bike ride we started a trek through the jungle. Simon pretended to be Tarzan for a while and climbed up some vines into some caves. I decided that if I did that we would have to make a claim on our insurance and I’m not to keen to do that. We then did some rock climbing up to another amazing viewpoint. Simon and I zoomed up and down, which we were pretty proud of ourselves for. We rode back on our bikes to the boat and then enjoyed a lovely late lunch.

Spot my head…

For the rest of the afternoon we anchored near to a floating fishing village. In Halong Bay the fishing villages are banned as they cause litter and other environmental problems, but in this other bay they can still be found. We jumped in some more kayaks and spent a good hour exploring the fishing village and seeing how the locals live and work out here. We saw a woman feeding some of the fish that she was farming and also saw some men putting buckets of sand under the water to grow clams. It was really interesting, but after all the activities of the day we started to get tired and were looking forward to heading back to the boat to relax.

We made it to Cat Ba Island at about 5pm and transferred to our hotel. We had a balcony overlooking the bay and it was BEAUTIFUL. We went out for dinner along the water front and wished a little that we had longer in Cat Ba. However, I think we’d made the right decision to not spend more time there as the weather was a bit overcast and it wasn’t that warm. Next time though!

The next morning we had a breakfast buffet which included Spaghetti Bolognese. Now weird. Obviously, we didn’t eat Spag Bol at 6:30am… that would have been weird. We transferred back to the boat and spent the last day relaxing on the deck, reading and enjoying the beautiful scenery. It had been an amazing trip. Towards the end the ‘other’ half of our group were grating on me a little bit. We were asked to fill out a questionnaire on our experience and one of the girls went off on one about silly things. Needless to say the tour guide didn’t deserve the treatment he’d gotten from some of them. He had recovered 4 items of lost property that they had left on Cat Ba and on the mainland at his own expense, he had dealt with them bringing alcohol onto the boat which wasn’t allowed and endless other things which are difficult to explain on here. He did an amazing job!

We headed back to Hanoi happy that we had chosen wisely with our tour and glad that we had done as much research as we did.