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After our stress free border crossing being the only two Westerners and people for that matter, we were granted entry into Vietnam. We were immediately greeted by two men with motorbikes saying "Ho Chi Minh City?". Luckily we had researched to find that this was indeed a 4 hour journey and to have done that on the back of two bikes and backpacks on would have been impossible! We kindly declined and asked to be taken to the nearest town where we hopped on to a shuttle bus to take us the rest of the journey which to start with was very ropey due to the lack of paved roads and a crazy driver... not a good mix.
We awoke after a quick nap on the bus to notice a sudden increase in traffic and motorbikes. This was to be the usual flow for Ho Chi Minh City (or Saigon as it used to be called) which called for some interesting experiences crossing the road. We grabbed a taxi to take us to our hotel and got settled in before exploring the surrounding area. The festival of Tet was only just beginning and noticed that everywhere was decorated with street Christmas style lights and lanterns. This was quite a sight from the 42nd floor of a local skyscraper where we had a drink one night.
Our activities in Ho Chi Minh city apart from trying to stay alive crossing the road included having a day tour visiting the Cu Chi Tunnels which were used by the Vietnamese during the war. Here we learned the many different ways in which they would kill Americans clambering through the 250km network of tunnels. We had a go at crawling through 40m which was rather claustrophobic and got pretty hot. The one we tried was actually slightly bigger than what they actually would have been like to accommodate for fat Westerners! Part of the tour involved passing a shooting range which you got closer and closer to which really gave an eerie feel to walking through the jungle giving a taste of what it must have been like. Here we got 5 bullets each to fire an M16 rifle. We will be uploading videos of this where you can see Laura's reaction to the power of the gun. Our tour guide who he asked us to affectionately call him "Handsome Slim" referred to us as "My Famiry" or "Family". After the tour we got dropped off at the War Remnants Museum where we learned the shocking outcome of this ridiculous war and the after effects of Agent Orange, a chemical substance used by the Americans which still causes birth deformities to this day.
The following night we were to experience our first Lunar New Year celebration at a local bar. This was not too dissimilar to our New Year celebrations except they combine it with their Birthdays and Christmas as well and yes there is plenty of drinking involved. So much so we saw one girl paraletic in the corner of the bar then get picked up by her friends and thrown on the back of a bike to be taken home. Charming. They also like to play Abba's "Happy New Year" song over and over again much to my dismay.... Laura loved it however.
The next morning it really started to hit home that there was actually no where open for business. So we decided to move on to our next destination using our Open bus ticket which was Mui Ne, a coastal town with a single stretch of bars, clubs and restaurants. Here was where we experienced the nightmare that is finding a place to stay during the Lunar New Year/Tet week. Despite booking ahead, we arrived, to find our reservation hadn't, but were lucky to have one night out of the 3 we planned reserved. Shortly after checking in we started to notice a constant flow of backpackers walking the stretch trying to find a place to stay, this continued all day so we considered ourselves very lucky to have one night. Although that didn't help us for the remaining two nights so we spent the whole afternoon searching the internet for a place. In a panic we booked the only room we saw which involved us buying 4 beds! Not ideal but at least it was somewhere to sleep other than the beach... but we were to soon discover that that booking was a farce as well. After our first day exlporing Mui Ne, we checked out of our first stay to travel to our 4 bed room to be told by the owner she was fully booked.... ARRRRGGHH!!! She took pity on us and offered to put us up in what we can only compare to as a garage. We regretfully accepted as our desperation had reached a new level. It certainly put an interesting memory to our travels. Needless to say, we spent as long out of the garage as possible and commenced an immediate bar crawl along the beach to drown our sorrows. The next day we finally had a proper room to stay in at the same place, an upgrade if you will which was actually quite nice and had a beach view from our window. We spent our day walking the beach again and most of the afternoon watching the sea of Kitesurfers. We finished our Mui Ne stint with a seafood dinner where I got to pick my live shark to eat. We were also witness to a Russian lad picking a snake and have it beheaded in front of him so that the blood could be drained from it and it's heart cut out for him to eat and drink. As he gulped the blood down you could still see the heartless snake wriggling away.... wonderful dinner entertainment lol!
Our next stop was to be the mountain town of Dalat which is where the nations wine is produced and famous for strawberries. However, when I asked for my first Strawberry shake they were all out! Here is where we were forced to fork out on accommodation and book a Best Western hotel which was the only room available in the whole of Dalat. We looked at this as our Valentines day treat lol! Although it did have a amazing breakfast buffet and great view of the lake. We used Dalat as some much needed down time after the stressful few days of worrying if we would have a bed to sleep in! We walked around the lake and visited what's called "The Crazyhouse" which was indeed a bit crazy. See the pics. Whoever designed this house had to be on some serious drugs.
We finished up in Dalat and took the windy road down to Nha Trang, another beach town but much different to Mui Ne. After almost getting ripped off by a Tuk Tuk driver, we arrived at our hotel to find our room had been given away. This was getting beyond a joke now and if they hadn't have transferred us to an equally good room round the corner there would have been bloodshed. Nha Trang was a full on city it seems with plenty of Skyscrapers some even named "My Dung" which I found quite amusing as it seemed to have s*** dripping from the sign. We were starting to notice that much of southern Vietnam was very much geared to a Russian audience so much so that we heard of some places refusing to serve you unless you were Russian. We spent our days here on the beach and treated ourselves to a Parafin wax pedicure which I wouldn't say was much of a treat! Laura was in her element here and part of the package was to have a Chiwawa like puppy plumped on her during the treatment where it proceeded to sleep peacefully.
From Nha Trang we moved on further North to Central Vietnam which started with one of our favourites, Hoi An. Read our next blog for details on this and the rest of Vietnam.
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