Hue, not Hoi An

Travel from Nha Trang to Hoi An involved taking a 11 hour overnight sleeper bus. When we arrived in Hoi An we stayed for 10 minutes and then got back on the bus.... Its not that Hoi An is a bad place (we don't think), its just that we didn't really have anything planned to do there and we didn't see much of interest on the journey in. So when we found out that the same coach would be leaving in 10 minutes time heading northwards to Hue, we jumped back on. We were tired and smelly anyway from one coach journey so doing another was not going to matter lol...We arrived in Hue early and just in time for a very heavy downpour of rain. Having declined the offer of staying at hotel offered by the bus company, we checked into another nearby hotel. We found a few decent restaurants nearby, but food in Vietnam is still very 'hit and miss' in our experience. Most places serve very basic rice, meat and veg dishes or Pho which are not bad sometimes but they are often lacking in the taste department. Some restaurants do have a varied menu with some taste involved in the dishes, but you have to choose carefully...

The following day when decided to take a city tour, by boat and coach. We started at 8am and traveled along the perfume river (no it doesn't smell of chanel no 5!!!) to nearby Thien Mu pagoda. Which was fairly nice. After that, and by far the best bit of the tour was to a Vietnamese kung fu display of Vo Kinh. 8 people took it in turns to entertain us with some weapons displays and one on one attacks. It was very impressive, nothing at all like the 4 years of karate that I did..... We then boarded the boat again and after that it all went downhill a bit. We had some lunch on the now very slow moving boat and visited 3 tombs and a temple. We went in the first tomb (Minh Mang tomb) which was fully completed in 1843. Minh Mang's tomb consists of 40 constructions (palaces, temples, pavilions, etc.) designed on a symmetric axis running from Dai Hong gate to the foot of La Thanh (Surrounding Wall) behind the Emperor's tomb. There grounds contain a nice lake and beautiful forests and gardens. It was all very peaceful and tranquil, but when you've seen one temple, you've seen em all ;-) So we didn't go in the next two tombs and nor did a lot of other people in the group.The last thing we saw (which was good) was a display by local village people making incense sticks and conical hats by hand. Then it was back to the hotel at 4:30pm. Tour over......

We then decided that we should go on the "DMZ tour" the following day. Starting at 6am and lasting for 12 hours and seeing us travel over 200 kilometres, we certainly were glutton for punishment. And now for some history:The Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone was established as a dividing line between North and South Vietnam as a result of the First Indochina War.During the Second Indochina War (popularly known as the Vietnam War), it became important as the battleground demarcation separating North Vietnamese territory from South Vietnamese territory.The Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone ran from east-west near the center of present-day Vietnam (spanning more than a hundred kilometers) and was a couple of kilometers wide. It ran along the Ben Hai river for much of its length, and an island nearby was controlled by North Vietnamese forces during the Vietnam War. Although it was nominally described as being at "the 17th parallel," almost all of the zone lies to the south of the parallel, with only a small portion of the zone near the eastern shore actually including the parallel.It was a little different from the Cu Chi tunnel tour that we did in that the Vinh Moc tunnels, housed an entire village that lived there for two and a half years. 17 were also babies were born in the tunnels during that time. The tunnels that we entered were bigger, longer and deeper than Cu Chi tunnels and we went down to a depth of about 25 metres to see the deepest tunnels.

We also stopped along some other significant points of interest along the way, but there wasn't really much to see. They were merely places of extreme importance during the "American war". We also stopped at the sight of the former Khe Sanh American combat base which was sat atop a plateau and was the site of another famous battle. Now, there are a few helicopters left on the site , a tank, some shells, some bunkers and a museum. There is also work underway to reproduce the former airstrip. We arrived back in our hotel at 7pm..Tired!! With numb bums......

The killer waves of Nha Trang

Nha Trang is quite nice. Its a coastal town and is very popular holiday destination. We stayed here for 2 days before moving on. On the first day we went to the beach and then prepared to have a dip in the sea. The beach had quite a sharp drop into the wavy sea and as we were walking in we became slowed down because our feet sinking into the waterlogged sand where sand and sea met. At this point a giant 2 meter wave rolled in over our heads and crashed down upon us throwing us onto our backs on the sand. As the wave dispersed from whence it came, it uncovered Eri and I who were shocked, stunned and covered in gritty sand.......

Needless to say Eri did not go in the water after that, and I only went in once more. The method for entering the sea was to wait for the killer waves to calm down and then time your run into the sea so that when a big wave did come, you were already in the sea. All you had to do then was do a little leap and let the wave carry you up in the air. This method was deduced following careful observation of other people, whom did it both successfully and unsuccessfully.

Saigontól Huéig

Mióta Vietnámban vagyunk csak buszozunk reggeltől estig. Saigon után Dalatba mentünk ami hihetetlen, de tényleg hidegebb legalább tiz fokkal, mint a többi déli város. Tökéletes volt egy kis kirándulásra. Egy 2,7 km hosszú libegővel elmentünk egy hegyi pagodához, majd egy vizeséshez és a túra végén mentünk egy nagy kört egy elefánt hátán. Szerencsétlen pára nem nagyon akart menni és folyamatosan megállt potyogtatni és leveleket enni. Elég kényelmetlen elefántot ülni, de egyszer érdemes kipróbálni.
Dalatban nincs túl sok túrista ezért éttermek se nagyon vannak és kénytelenek voltunk a piacon activityzni ha enni akartunk, mert még nem beszélünk vietnámiul. Sikerült valamilyen húst rendelnem rizzsel és bizom benne, hogy a hús sertés volt. :) Továbbra se szeretnénk kutyát, vagy macskát enni.

Dalat után Nha Trang nevű tengerparti városba mentünk. Az eddigi strandokkal ellentétben itt fizetni kell a napágyért és normális kaja se volt a parton. Azt hiszem el lettünk kényeztetve Indiában és Kambodzsában. Nagy bátran bementünk a vizbe és egy két méteres hullám földhöz is vágott minket egyszerre, beletelt egy pár percbe mire ki tudtunk evickélni a partra. Ez volt az egyetlen alkalom, hogy füredtem a tengerben. Másnap már tovább is mentünk az éjszakai busszal Hoianba, de ahogy végignéztük a várost a buszból láttuk, hogy nincs semmi látnivaló és inkább a buszon maradtunk és még aznap továbbutazunk Huébe. Hué egy csendesebb város a Parfüm folyó partján. Szerencsétlen itt viszonylag biztonságosan át lehet kelni az úton és tele van a belváros olcsó és jó éttermekkel.

Tegnap elmentünk a korábbi demilitarizált övezetbe ami Dél- és Észak-Vietnám határán lévő 10 km széles, a tengerparttól a laoszi határig húzódó szakasz volt. A Khe Sanh nevű helyen volt az amerikaiak egyik bázisa és itt vivták a háború egyik legvéresebb harcát. A faluban felállitott múzeum érdekes élmény, mert a háborút a vietnámi oldalról mutatja be és tele van amerikai katonák képével és olyan képaláirásokkal, mint "Az amerikai katona fejvesztve menekül", "A rettegő foglyul ejtett amerikai katona" és "A hős vietnámi katona".

Megnéztük az övezetben található Vinh Moc nevű alagutakat is ahol a háború alatt 60 család élt és rejtőzködött a bombázások elől 5 éven keresztül. Az amerikaiak azt hitték, hogy a falusiak a Viet Kongot élelmiszerrel támogatják ezért bombázni kezdték a falut akik válaszul elkezdték a föld alatti rejtekhelyüket ásni. Először 10 méterre ásták, de mikor az amerikaiak olyan bombát vetettek be ami 10 méter mélyre berobban, továbbástak egészen 30 méterig. A falusiak teljes komplexumot alakitottak ki konyhákkal, kúttal, minden családnak volt egy apró kamraszerű bemélyedése és az alagút történelme alatt 17 kisbaba is született az egyik kamrából kialakitott szülőszobában. Mondanom se kell, hogy nem volt semmiféle luxus a szülőszobán, nem volt 3d-s ultahang meg labdán, vagy medencébe szülés, de még négy fal se, csak az alagút falából kivésett kis lyuk. Mind a 17 gyerek boldogan él a mai napig.

Gondok a blogolon

Sziasztok!
Sajnos nagyon ritkan tudunk a blogra irni, mert ugy nez ki, hogy le van korlatozva Vietnambol es egy heten egyszer ha meg tudjuk nyitni az oldalt. Gondolom nem szeretnek, hogy a nyugatiak rossz dolgokat irjanak az orszagukrol. Bar ha kitesszuk a labunkat innen ugyis megirok mindent.
Valoszinu meg ket hetet toltunk itt, utana ujra rendszeresen fogunk irni es kepeket feltolteni.

Đà Lạt

We are now in the city of Đà Lạt in the central highlands of South Vietnam. The city stands at an elevation of 1,500 meters and is a lot cooler than we have been used too lately. Average daily temperatures have been around 24 degrees centigrade when we have been more accustomed to temperatures of 35 degrees centigrade lately. It actually feels cold in the evenings and rain seems to arrive for an hour or so each afternoon now as the rainy season is fast approaching. We even had to buy an umbrella yesterday :-( Its a very pretty area though and there are mountains surrounding the area and it is very lush and green.

Today we hired a taxi and driver and went to see a few sights around Dalat. Firstly we went to a cable car and traveled a long and high above pine forests to a hill-top pagoda. From there we were taken around a large lake to our next ride, an elephant. This elephant (rather reluctantly) took us on a 30 minute trip around a small route in the forest next too the lake. Although I'm glad we did it, I did feel a little sorry for the elephant as she kept on making toilet stops en-route and seemed happy to remain static despite constant urging from the "driver" to move onwards. Also there was no opportunity to get photo's of us on the elephant along the way so we only have a few of us on the elephant.

After the elephant ride we were taken to the Datanla waterfall. This was very pretty and had quite a bit of water rushing down it.

We also made a visit to the Hang Nga Guesthouse, also known as the 'crazy house'. This house is a bit like something from a Tim Burton film with a bit of 'Alice through the looking glass' thrown in for good measure. They have different kind of themed rooms that you can stay in overnight (at a high price) but during the daytime the place is open to visitors. It was truly crazy.

Mekong delta river trip

The Mekong river is absolutely huge and is a very busy river. Apart from boats of all sizes ferrying people and goods back and forth there are also a lot of boats fishing and dredging up sand.






We went on numerous boats during our 2 day trip and visited 3 different islands in the vicinity. Whilst on these islands we got too see coconut candy being being made.



We also visited some fruit orchards and got to sample some of the delicious fruits grown there (Mango, Pomello, Papaya, Jack fruit, Pineapple) and the not so delicious fruits (Durian). Now this fruit is rather large and spiky, smells bad, and tastes even worse than it smells. It kinda smells of a mixture of horrible cheesy feet and bad body odour mixed into one. At first taste you think 'God, that is horrible' and upon second taste you think its worse. Everyone in our group of 6 who tried it all though that it was disgusting. But you can see the thing on sale everywhere around here. Actually before you see it, you smell it. Its that bad..



We also got to try out some other delights. We tried Honey wine; 40% alcohol and Banana wine; 35% alcohol. We also tried some coconut whiskey, and I tried out a shot of a special rice wine called "Ruou ran". The 'special' ingredients of this wine were the complete bodies of cobra's and a bird that resembled a blackbird........These were lying in the large jar of liquid and it is regarded as good for you. A kind of medicinal tonic....I just had to try it, Erika didn't want too for some reason...I don't know why.....



After drinking this I kept the snake theme going by having a large python draped over me.

We then got to see some a small bee farm where the bees were busy making honey and royal jelly. I didn't hold the bee hive tray though. I didn't want to get stung!!!!

Later we went for a bike ride through the local villages which was good because it was largely traffic free. During a journey on a smaller boat later on I also got the chance to assist rowing along the Mekong delta adding to my rowing trip on the Ganges.



All of the above took place on the first day and at 7am the following morning we were taken by boat to Cần Thơ floating market. There we saw many boats loaded up with all kinds of fruit and vegetables selling to people on smaller boats.


We also visited the land market adjacent to it. There amongst other things you could buy de-skinned frogs, complete pigs ears and de-furred rats and mice. I kid you not....even at rat was on the menu in the restaurant we visited later that after noon. Apparently it tastes like chicken. But then I have heard every kind of meat that you have never wanted to try as tasting like chicken...

...