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Well the night bus turned out not to b the worst in the world and although some terrible bumps and shaking, I did manage to sleep a bit! To my surprise I woke up to the sun, first thought that I had survived the night, second thought, dam I missed my stop as its never bright at 5am!! Reached the point of well what ever happens it's fine by me, at 7 we stopped for breakfast, noodles, no thank u!!! At this point I knew I had to ask where we are and risk getting thrown off the bus or being charged more, with little English, the driver agreed to drop me at hue, my intended next stop, however with the help I of a map a local said that we were actually in dong hoi, so asked the driver again could I get off,his face of disbelief asked to see my ticket and on!y then did he agree to drop me off...the poor man was probably being nice and wondering why I would want to get off at such a place!! Anyway turns out dong hoi is a nice place with move ppl, found a hotel, asked for directions to bus station, they were lonely and allowed me to use their WiFi!! After 2 hours decided i should move on and found a lovely spot for coffee, the owner even called a taxi for me!! The bus station was deserted but bought my ticket, took off to find some cold water which led me hang way back up the road the taxi had bright me down, one famil gave me a glass of ice water seeing my desire for cold water, eventually saw a place selling child water and ice cream,, jack pot!! Lovely lady again, they all seem so kind in this town, at 2 got the local bus to Phong Nha, bus driver was heavy on the horn and acted like a postman collection and dropping packages, everything from wood to tyres to steering wheels!!
Needless to say I was delighted and relieved to reach y hostel Easy Tiger!!!! And the welcoming, Laid back and Friendly staff made it so pleasant to stay!! Phong Nha is an infectious place, it's rural, small, cute with a strong farming vibe, grain drying on the footpaths, views was wandering down the street, families fishing on the river and Friendly people all of which gave warm greetings add I went for a evening stroll!!
Met some lovely people in the hostel, good food and the staff invited us to a leaving/birthday party of their colleagues down the road!! Met a lovely lad from Sligo which had just completed the grueling 6 day trek through the world's largest cave, a cork man whos father owned the home stay and bought me a shot of brandy when he heard I was from cork, so it was fun chilled our evening!!
It was an early start the next day for national park tour!! It was a great day out, visiting the park, seeing the highway 20 built during the war to get supplies from north to south, where the Americans had bombed the Mountains in an effort to cut off the roads, the temple Built, which we places some incense candles to remember those that had died on the caves and those that contributed to building the roads!! Up next was the paradise cave, the cold air was a welcome relief, we were able to go 1km deep which was fully lit, spectacular views!! There was also option to do 7km hike through the cave such is also meant to be amazing!! Afterwards it was time for a delicious lunch before hitting the dark cave ( this was another great challenge as I'm claustrophobic and don't like the dark! ) turns out this was a great challenge, the group were a lot of fun? We kayaked into the cave, and with our love jacket, helmet and head torch stated to walk into the darkness and it wasn't long until we were knee deep in mud and the mud fights had started which were taken very serious, all was going well until this German dude (who liked the mud way too much) decided I was too clean and put a fistful of mud into my face: nasty!! were spending their guide was great and as I stated to freak as couldn't open my eyes with the weight of mud, miracously found some water and cleaned them out! After that it was swimming in the cave and into the stunning clean lake!! And in all our was a fantastic day out!!
Back at the hostel met too English guys, who were booking through Vietnam, they work on navy did and so were spending their time off travelling!! Ate some amazing bbqd pork and rice, and a few beers to finish off the evening
The next day I set off for Hue, the hostel offered Transport and a tour so in nice air conditioned mini van we set off at 7am, we visited the DMZ tunnels which were amazing, learnt some more history and visited a museum before arriving at our hostel at 1pm.. Perfect!! So with Emilio from Mexico , Zak and Michelle from Colorado, we took off on scooters ( I on the back as not quite ready to brace a new city on bike just yet) _had a really pleasant time discovering the citadel. And we met this lovely local Vietnamese man ( also a fantastic business man) who told us that we should travel to hoi an by bike and within minutes he had books of review and picture, his trip advisor page in our faces and I have to say it was very impressive!! We were sold for 40 $ and booked it for the next day!
Afterwards we headed out of the city following the river, and found nice place to watch the sunset!! Afterwards we tried the local specialty cau lao At a local street food stand.. For some reason they put liver in it so it Def was not a winner for me!!
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