After our 4 hour trip back from Ha Long, the lovely family staying in our hotel offered us there hotel room to freshen up in before our 10pm overnight train, they were such a lovely family. But the hotel actually offered us a room for free to use that evening! We were shocked by the level of service you'd never get that in the UK!!

We met up with the family after having a shower and took them to the restaurant that we loved in Hanoi. We had a lively time listening to where they had been and what they had enjoyed, also they had already visited Cambodia, so we got some hints and tips! It was lovely to have a meal out with more than just us two and relax.

We said our goodbyes and caught a taxi to the train station for our 10 hour overnight journey to Dong Hoi. We were slightly anxious about the trip, but it couldn't be worse than Chinas overnight train, plus it was a updated one.

We joined a young Welsh couple in our cabin that were traveling further than us and had headed to Vietnam for a two week holiday. We had a good chat about places to travel and what they had been up to before heading to bed for a decent sleep. The train itself was more modern and clean than the Chinese one, plus it had aircon. But of course the toilets were disgusting with wee all over the floor, yuck!

At 7:30am we hopped off the train in Dong Hoi to be greeted by taxi drivers in our face asking if we would like a taxi, not the best start when your groggy and smelly from a long journey. The weather was alot cooler and the sun was shielded behind the cloud so we decided to walk and not deal with the overpriced taxis. Our first impression of Dong Hoi from the station was similar to Sri Lanka with no pavements and small shack shops. We hadn't expected the place to be nice so it didn't shock us. As we walked on, our hotel was 2 km away, we noticed another couple loaded with backpacks heading the same way. They were American and had downloaded an offline map app which they recommended to us when they saw our make shift drawn out one! Which was alot of help.

We arrived at our hotel pretty early so we didn't expect to get our room key but hoped they would look after our bags. When we spoke to them they actually said that there were no more rooms left so they would upgrade us to their other hotel. Luckily this was just round the corner so not far to walk, we got a refreshing drink on arrival and got to check into our room as soon as we got there. The room was huge and had a lovely view over looking the brightly painted colonial houses of Dong Hoi.

We said earlier that our first impressions of the place weren't too high, but the area we were staying in was lovely, plus it was so quiet and relaxing, no one bothered you and hardly any tourists. The hotel was next to a large river that joined the sea further up, the river was used to store the beautiful fishing boats. One thing they don't lack in Vietnam is colour, these boats were painted blue and red with the Vietnamese flag flying high. Also along the river was a newly built promenade park, with statues and flowers, it was a nice place to relax. Along the park was a ruined church from the Vietnam War; it was the only building left standing after the war. Dong Hoi was bombed heavily throughout the war.

We found ourselves a favourite cafe again, mainly due to the lack of cafes in our area, we had dinner and breakfast there. It looked over at the river and was a relaxing place for us to take a breather.

The main reason we headed to Dong Hoi was to explore the caves, the largest cave in the world was discovered near here Hang Son Doong in 2009, however that's a 5 day trek and a hefty price tag so we opted for the more economical options of Paradise Cave and Tien Son Cave. We headed on our tour the next day in a mini-van full of tourists from different hotels. The caves are based in scenic Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, which is a mountainous terrain with limestone karsts covered in a jungle forest with large muddy brown rivers flowing through. It was a stunning journey driving up into it, we didn't see any wildlife but the guide book explained there are tigers and monkeys that live in the national park. It took around 1 hour to drive up to the Paradise Cave entrance, which then consited of taking a electric car further up the path and finally walking up a rather steep hill. Our guide didn't go in with us but explained that this cave is one for the longest in dry caves in Asia, but we would only be exploring 1km of the 31km. Unlike our previous cave trip in Ha Long this cave was spectacular, with large caverns up to 150m high and huge stalactites and stalagmites that must have taken thousands of years to form. The whole place was specualtuar to look at and with it being low season it was pretty quiet to walk around, if you could ignore the Chinese guide with her microphone on!

We walked down and headed in the minivan to our next cave, Phong Nha cave, which was sadly closed due to the large amount of rainfall, as this cave has a river flowing through it. However we took a small, hardly seaworthy looking, boat to the Phong Nha Cave entrance and hopped off by the shore. We then headed up a seriously steep 600 steps to a cave above called Tien Son Cave. Although this was another dry cave it was more compact inside, it was packed full of stalactites and stalagmites. It was impressive in its own way. We slowly walked down all the steps back to our little boat. The boat has fold up metal chairs inside for us visitors but the two ladies steering and driving walked along thin wooden planks nailed to the side of the boat. It was a nice journey even in the rain looking at the other boats, people fishing and the gorgeous mountains surrounding us.

We were joined on our trip by two young blokes who kept us highly amused with their discussions. They were meant to take the "backpacker mud fight" tour but got roped in with us boring lot as their cave was closed again due to the high water levels. They cracked us up boasting with each other about where they had traveled and the stupid things they had done, but in the most relaxed and nonchalant way we have ever heard. The phases of "yeah man" and "totally" came up alot, all I could think of was the turtle from Finding Nemo. It's interesting the different types of travelers you meet from the party hard crowd to the couples and the older generation. Everyone does it in their own way :)

Dong Hoi and the caves we visited looked seriously set up for tourists with hotels and bars and shops all over. The beach has been turned into a bar scene and the caves have brand new walkways, restaurants and facilities built. We assumed as it was low season that the place must be packed in the hot summer weather, however after researching and speaking to our hotel manager the place is struggling. There is not a high enough number of tourists visiting Dong Hoi, shops shut down and people have to find new work. It was surprising to us as the place was lovely and relaxing. But even our Lonely Planet guide book didn't mention Dong Hoi, and most people will be planning their trips from such books. It is a shame and we will be recommending it to all travellers heading this way. We thoroughly enjoyed visiting another natural wonder of Vietnam and experiencing a quieter side of this country.