Hoi An

Arrived in Da nang and negotiated a taxi fare to Hoi An, it was probably the first time that Taxi Men over here wanted to use the meter, but we got a fair price. During our journey to Hoi An he picked up his "friend" while she was nice and everything I felt she was trying to sell us things, she asked did we have a tailor, hotel, are we going shopping, etc..needless to say she got nowhere, as we heard there's a lot of tailors in Hoi An that cut corners (pun intended).

We sorted our accommodation in a middle of the road hotel, Hoi An is the Tailor capital of Vietnam and the city is absolutely littered with tailors. I got myself tailor made: 2 shirts, a suit, 2 trousers and a jacket, Tina got a dress, jacket and some jeans made up. We must be keeping some poor bloke up all night as they told us to come back tomorrow. Other than that we took a walk down the busy streets and treated ourselves to a nice meal after a hard day shopping.

Flight to Hoi An

We flew to Da Nang this morning, instead of 11 hours on a bus it only took us an hour flight. We heard the bridge had been repaired but we had already booked our flights and to be honest we were glad of it. The aircraft looked like something from the 60's with 2 fine propellers to boot. The flight itself was hassle free.

Nha Trang Part Deux

Back in Nha Trang again we decided to treat ourselves to another meal at CIAO Vietnam and then got a brand new motorbike and headed towards the Spa and Mineral springs. They are located about 2.5km down this dirt track (which was interesting). We arrived and got a mud bath and mineral spa for $10 each, after which we went into the swimming pool, but not for long as it was 38 degrees! When we left it was dark and rush hour traffic which was more then interesting, weaving in and out of traffic..it's actually quite fun!

Nha Trang to Hoi An to Nha Trang

Well we were 2 hours into our journey last night and were told the bridge had collapsed on the only road into Hoi An, so the driver done a U-turn and headed back he must of been doing the whole journey in 3rd gear because he was flying it he got back in about an hour to Nha Trang.

We now had two options, 1) To book a 10 hour train journey in economy (wooden seats) 2) Wait until tomorrow and see if there's any better seats available.

The price of the train is expensive $15 for economy and $27 for a sleeper cabin(the bus is $9 each). We looked around and had a look at Vietnam airlines last night and snapped up 2 tickets for about $35 each and it's only an hour away, we do have to stay another night in Nha Trang, but it's the same considering you'll be half a day on the train.

[GROUND HOG DAY]

Nha Trang

We decided to get a motorbike today, this is probably the busiest spot I've driven in SE Asia, but it was a fun experience. The key to not crashing is to be as reckless as you can and hands on the back AND front brakes, there seems to be a mutual understanding that people will stop sort of a zip like motion.

Fun aside we decided to head to one of the Pagodas, unfortunately the usual dickheads were trying to squeeze every penny they could from the foreigner, trying to charge me for parking on the footpath, the security guard came out and told me I could park it on the other side of the entrance, he then asked for double what the guy outside wanted, he was told where to go, it's a shame as opportunists like this will do more damage then good to the tourist industry here.

We headed across the bridge to the Po Nghar Cham Towers, the place is being restored at present but still a beautiful piece of architecture. We watched the afternoon prayer and headed back to the coast line and drove towards all the scenery.

We dropped the bike back and enroute found a place that sells beer for 7000 dong (0.33 US cents), we went in here and decided to grab a bite to eat (Ciao Vietnam 74 Nguyen Thien Thuat St). We had a pizza, the most Asian of food...but it was damn tasty and fresh, I recommend this place highly the staff brought out a mixed fruit dish after to us, and I said we didn't order and she said 'Free for you' ,when we called the bill they also gave us two shots on the house! There was another of repeat customers in this place, and Its a shame we only fund this place when we were leaving.

I forgot to mention we get on the 6:30pm sleeper bus for a 11 hour Journey to Hoi An....lovely

Nha Trang

Not too sure on this place as of yet, it's not as personable as Mui Ne, but does offer some delights, we had a pretty chilled out day today went to the beach, and shopping for a bikini for Tina (It only took about 4 shops this time!)..The beach itself is nothing special but there was a nice resort on the beach called the Louisianna Brewery, it's a microbrewery that has it's own pool and is pretty good value considering it's location...I recommend the pilsner here.

...maybe this place will grow on me. (and yes that's a picture of a dog enjoying th finer things in life!)

Dalat - Nha Trang

The bus arrived and thankfully it was another sleeper bus Yayyyyyy. Bad news it took until 7pm to get here so another 6 hour journey that covered a puny 150kms off the map. The road itself was dodgy so much so, at times there was no road, that and the VERY thick fog made the journey one of the more interesting ones.

The bus took us to a drop off at a hotel (surprise, surprise!). Tina had a look at the room and it was thumbs up, especially considering the rainfall outside.

We went out and I had my first Indian cuisine in Vietnam recommended by Tripadvisor, the place itself was average but the food had plenty of flavour. Found a place that done $1.50 Jager Bombs and chilled there for a while..........[SCENE MISSING].....zzzzz